The signing of the agreement took place during the visit of Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khalid bin Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to New Delhi.
. India and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) on Monday signed their first Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on civil nuclear cooperation.
The agreement between Nuclear Power Corporation of India Limited (NPCIL) and the ENEC (Emirates Nuclear Energy Company)-led Barakah Nuclear Power Plant Operation and Maintenance Company was signed during the India visit of Sheikh Khalid bin Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the Crown Prince from Abu Dhabi.
. During Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to the UAE in August 2015, the two countries agreed to cooperate in “peaceful uses of atomic energy”, including in the areas of “security, health, agriculture, science and technology”.
Diplomatic sources noted that no agreement like the one signed between NPCIL and ENEC had been signed before. The NPCIL-ENEC agreement is part of the UAE’s policy to expand investment in the nuclear energy sector.
Trilateral Cooperation
Monday’s MoU is the culmination of several years of discussions between India and the UAE on nuclear cooperation. On September 19, 2022, the foreign ministers of France, India and the UAE met on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in New York to launch the tripartite cooperation mechanism. The meeting was followed by a telephone conversation between the three ministers on February 4, 2023.
Following the tripartite meeting, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) stated that the tripartite initiative would “serve as a forum to facilitate the design and implementation of cooperation projects in the energy sector, with a focus on solar and nuclear energy.”
Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan was received by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at Hyderabad House in New Delhi earlier in the day.
LNG Supplies
In addition to the MoU on nuclear cooperation, the two countries also signed a Memorandum of Understanding on long-term LNG supplies between the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) and the Indian Oil Corporation.
A third agreement between ADNOC and the Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserve Limited (ISPRL) was also one of the outcomes of the Abu Dhabi Crown Prince’s visit. Urja Bharat and ADNOC signed a contract for a production stake in Abu Dhabi onshore Block 1.
A fifth MoU was signed between the Gujarat government and Abu Dhabi Development Holding Company PJSC (ADQ) for the development of a food park in India.
India and the UAE are part of the I2U2 group, which also includes Israel and the United States, and have been planning food parks in Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh. The MoU for the Gujarat food park is considered an extension of this group.
The first-ever meeting between India and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) foreign ministers was held in Riyadh, the capital of Saudi Arabia, on September 8 and 9, and the visit of the Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi to India and the agreement highlighted the dynamic situation between the two countries.
Speaking at the opening address of the India-GCC Ministerial Meeting of Strategic Dialogue in Riyadh, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar expressed concern over the situation in the Gaza Strip and said, “The Gulf Cooperation Council is the basis of global energy supplies. India is one of the largest and fastest growing markets in the world. Much of the future demand will come from us.”
