{"id":83811,"date":"2026-09-04T18:18:46","date_gmt":"2026-09-04T12:48:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/?p=83811"},"modified":"2026-09-04T18:19:17","modified_gmt":"2026-09-04T12:49:17","slug":"belgium-pm-visit-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/04-09-2026\/belgium-pm-visit-india","title":{"rendered":"Visit of the Prime Minister of Belgium to India"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>Syllabus: GS2\/IR<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Context<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Recently the Belgian Prime Minister visited India, marking the first official visit by a Belgian Prime Minister in two decades.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>About<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Bilateral Trade: <\/strong>India and Belgium have set a goal of <strong>doubling bilateral trade <\/strong>over the next <strong>five years.\u00a0<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>Both the nations welcomed the launch of the <strong>India-Belgium Investment Fast-Track Mechanism<\/strong> and recognised it as an important step towards further strengthening bilateral investment ties.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Defence Partnerships:<\/strong> The two countries also signed a<strong> Letter of Intent<\/strong> to strengthen defence cooperation through regular exchanges, training, research and defence-industrial partnerships.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>India and Belgium announced they are strengthening bilateral military relations by <strong>signing eight contracts<\/strong> between arms companies from both sides.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Global Security: <\/strong>Belgium reiterated its support for India&#8217;s permanent membership in a reformed United Nations Security Council.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>A Memorandum of Understanding<\/strong> was also signed between the<strong> Central Bureau of Investigation and the Federal Police of Belgium<\/strong> to combat transnational organised crime and cybercrime.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Green Transition:<\/strong> India and Belgium <strong>renewed their cooperation in renewable energy<\/strong>, including green hydrogen, solar power, energy storage and offshore wind.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>The leaders also encouraged greater cooperation in semiconductors, artificial intelligence, startups and emerging technologies.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\"><strong>Brief on India-Belgium Relations<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Diplomatic Relations:<\/strong> Belgium was one of the first European nations to<strong> establish diplomatic ties with independent India <\/strong>in September <strong>1947.\u00a0<\/strong>\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>In July 2026, <\/strong>Brussels hosted the <strong>inaugural Belgium-India Strategic Dialogue.<\/strong><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>The 3rd round of India-Belgium Foreign Office Consultations took place in Brussels in 2025.\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Economic and Commercial Relations:<\/strong> The <strong>India-Belgium-Luxembourg Economic Union (BLEU) Joint Economic Commission (JCM)<\/strong>, established in <strong>1997<\/strong>, is the primary platform for discussing bilateral economic and commercial relations.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>India-Belgium bilateral trade<\/strong> amounted to <strong>USD 13.01 billion in 2025-26.<\/strong> Major Indian exports include diamonds, tobacco, shrimp, medicaments and steel, while key imports to India are diamonds, pharmaceutical products, machinery and mechanical appliances and aluminium scrap.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>FDI inflows to India<\/strong>, from April 2000 to December 2025, amounted to USD 4.2 billion, positioning Belgium as the <strong>18th largest contributor to India\u2019s FDI.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Science &amp; Technology:<\/strong> India and Belgium collaborate in specific areas of science and technology under several MoUs:\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>The 1998 MoU<\/strong> on Cooperation in Space Technology,\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The 2014 MoU<\/strong> between TERI India and VITO-Belgium, and\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>The 2012 MoU<\/strong> between BARC and SCK-SEN (Belgian Nuclear Research Centre).\u00a0<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Cultural Relations:<\/strong> India and Belgium have had a cultural agreement since 1973.\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>An MoU for cultural cooperation was signed between ICCR and BOZAR (Center for Fine Arts, Brussels) in <strong>2021.\u00a0<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><strong>Indian Diaspora:<\/strong> The number of Indians in Belgium includes NRIs (18,283) and PIOs (16,717) <strong>(total 35,000<\/strong>, including 1,131 students).\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><strong>Diaspora includes<\/strong> Sikh Diaspora-15,000, Diamond Business Professionals-8,000, IT Professionals-9,000 and others-3,000.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Source: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.mea.gov.in\/Portal\/ForeignRelation\/India-Belgium.pdf\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>MEA<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><strong><br \/>\nContext<\/p>\n<p><\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">\n<p>Recently the Belgian Prime Minister visited India, marking the first official visit by a Belgian Prime Minister in two decades.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<p><\/p>\n<p><strong><br \/>\nAbout<\/p>\n<p><\/strong><\/p>\n<li class=\"ms-5\"\t>\nBilateral Trade: India and Belgium have set a goal of doubling bilateral trade over the next five years.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li class=\"ms-5\">\nBoth the nations welcomed the launch of the India-Belgium Investment Fast-Track Mechanism and recognised it as an important step towards further strengthening bilateral investment ties.<\/p>\n<\/li>\n<p><a href=\" https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/current-affairs\/04-09-2026\/belgium-pm-visit-india \" class=\"btn btn-primary btn-sm float-end\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83811","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-affairs"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83811","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83811"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83811\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83813,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83811\/revisions\/83813"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83811"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83811"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nextias.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83811"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}