NEW DELHI, FEBRUARY 16: The first-ever summit at the level of PrimeMinisters between the European Union and India will take place on June 28,in Lisbon, Portugal, under the auspices of the Portuguese presidency of theEU.Over the next few months, in fact, India and Portugal are to intensify theirrelationship with a spate of events and visits that is expected toreenergise a historical relationship fallen into relative disuse.In the wake of the visit of the Portuguese minister of state for foreignaffairs Jose Lello this week, External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh andPrincipal Secretary Brajesh Mishra will visit Lisbon in March and Aprilrespectively.They are going to prepare the groundwork that will culminate in the firstever visit by an Indian Prime Minister to Portugal on June 27, which is toprecede the EU-India summit.The idea of such a summit-level meeting was floated towards the end of lastyear when Finland held the EU presidency, where it met with strong approval.Portuguese ambassador to India Manuel Marcelo Curto has pointed out that thesummit with India ``fills a gap'' with India, since the EU already hassimilar summits with China and Japan in Asia.Interestingly, India is still left out of the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM),even though Europeans privately concede that it is ``impossible to think ofAsia without India.''Portugal has a large Indian diaspora (about 57,000 out of a population of9.5 million), mostly those who left Goa after the Portuguese withdrew in1961, and who under Portuguese law were allowed easy emigration until 1981.The colonial inheritance seems to have, however, been interestinglytransformed into a strong cultural relationship.
