July 24, 2008	Thursday	Rajab 20, 1429

SINGAPORE, July 23: Differences remain over an Asean-India free trade deal but there is hope it can be concluded this year, an official said after meetings between the two sides on Wednesday.

“Over the last year efforts have been made to narrow the differences, and differences have been narrowed,” Andrew Tan, a spokesman for Asean meetings taking place in Singapore this week, told reporters.

He was speaking after officials from India and the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) held wide-ranging talks as part of a series of meetings by regional ministers and officials here.

In April, India’s Commerce Minister Kamal Nath said his country hoped to conclude the free trade deal within three months. Only a “few things” still needed to be sorted out, he said.

But Tan said negotiators were still “thrashing out the details” and there was hope a deal could be reached this year.

“This is an important plank of Asean-India cooperation and we want to see it sewn up very quickly,” Tan said, without providing details of what issues still need to be resolved.

Negotiations had been held up because of differences over a list of products India wanted to exclude from tariff cuts. New Delhi had submitted a list of 1,414 products, while Asean’s target number was 400.—AFP