Will India and Pakistan become part of the Eurasian Economic Union? The EAEU is an economic union of states located in the Russian neighbourhood with an integrated single market of over 180 million people and a GDP of over $5 trillion.
Russia, ahead of Sergey Lavrov’s visit to India, has stated that Moscow is leaving no stone unturned to ensure Indian entry into the Eurasian Economic Union or EAEU that will give preferential trading agreement with the Union.
The preferential trading agreement is one in which tariffs are decreased on certain products and can be termed as an FTA. The Eurasian Economic Union already has FTAs with China, Iran, Vietnam, Serbia, Tajikistan, Egypt, Uzbekistan, Moldova and Ukraine.
In 2016, speaking at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Russian President Vladimir Putin said, “In now we propose considering the prospects for a more extensive Eurasian partnership involving the EAEU and countries with which we already have a close partnership – China, India, Pakistan and Iran – and certainly our CIS partners.”
By joining the Eurasian Economic Union, the state gets fully involved into implementation of the Eurasian project aimed, on the one hand, at forming of four freedoms: free movement of goods, services, capital and labour force. On the other hand, – at the creation of one of the key economic centers of evolving architecture of the multipolar world.
The Agreement on the Eurasian Economic Union was signed by the presidents of the Republic of Belarus, the Republic of Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation on May 29, 2014. This Agreement came into force on January 1, 2015.
