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French President Chirac arrives in Delhi New Delhi: French president Jacques Chirac today arrived in New Delhi on his two-day visit to the country. Chirac is being accompanied by his wife and a high-powered delegation, which includes ministers and chief executives of several top French companies. Upon arrival at the Palam Airport, the French President was received by Science and Technology Minister Kapil Sibal and Anand Sharma, Minister of State, Ministry of External Affairs. Air Chief Marshal SP Tyagi was also present during the occasion along with several other officials. Chirac will spend the day interacting with French CEOs based in India, visit the French Embassy in the capital where he will address the French community before proceeding to attend a dinner hosted in his honour by Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh. On Monday, Chirac will be accorded a formal reception in the forecourt of Rashtrapati Bhavan (the President's official residence), wherehe will be received by President A.P.J.Abdul Kalam and Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh and members of the Union Cabinet. After inspecting a guard of honour, the French President will proceed to Raj Ghat to offer his homage to Father of Nation, Mahatma Gandhi. Informed sources said that thereafter he would hold talks with Vice-President Bhairon Singh Shekhawat and Congress party president Sonia Gandhi. These meetings will be followed by one-to-one talks between Chirac and Prime Minister Singh and delegation-level talks at Hyderabad House. Several agreements and memoranda of understanding reflecting the wide range of Indo-French collaboration are expected to be signed during the delegation-level talks. These include a declaration on development of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes; an Agreement on defence cooperation and an MoU on Tourism cooperation. ANTRIX (commercial arm of ISRO) will sign a contract with EADS Astrium to jointly build a satellite for Eutelsat. MoUs on cooperation between IIM Ahmedabad and ESSEC (Icole Supirieure des Sciences Iconomiques et Commerciales) and between BEE (Bureau of Energy Efficiency), Ministry of Power and AEDEME (Agence de l' Environnement et de la Mantrise de l' Energie) are also expected to be signed. India and France have a strategic partnership that was initiated in January 1998 during the visit of President Chirac to India. France is an important trade and investment partner of India. The two sides have agreed to make efforts to double the bilateral trade in five years from the present level of 3.5 billion. French FDI is about 760 million dollars from 1991 to date, of a total amount approved of 1.74 billion dollars. Indo-French cooperation ranges from high-technology areas like space, nuclear energy and defence to areas such as chemicals, infrastructure and food processing. The talks will be followed by a joint press conference and a working lunch. President Chirac will then deliver a keynote address at Vigyan Bhavan on the India-France Economic Partnership. Simultaneously, French CEOs will interact with their Indian counterparts. Chirac will then meet with the Leader of Opposition and senior BJP leader LK Advani before proceeding with his wife to meet President Kalam. He will then depart from India. The French President and his wife Bernadette are being accompanied by French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy, Defence Minister Michele Alliot, Economy, Finance and Industry Thierry Breton, Minister of State for Foreign Trade Christine Lagarde and Minister of State for Tourism Leon Bertrand, besides 30 senior French CEOs. Chirac' s visit is a follow-up to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to France in September 2005, which reflected the commitment of both countries to "vigorously pursue their strategic partnership" by intensifying bilateral cooperation. This will be President Chirac's third visit to India. He came here as Prime Minister in 1976 and again as President in January 1998. On both occasions, he was the chief guest at the Republic Day Parade. |
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