Friday, June 10 2005 16:08 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Colombo: Giving a major boost to their Defence cooperation, Sri Lanka today (Jun 10, 2005) said it will accept air Defence radar systems from India as the two sides announced a slew of measures which would help the island nation in various spheres of development.

At a joint press interaction with External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh after the meeting of the India-Sri Lanka Joint Commission, his counterpart Lakshman Kadirgamar said, "Yes, certainly we will accept it."

He said this when asked whether Colombo was going to accept New Delhi's offer of radar systems.

"Yes, this is very much under discussion," he said adding, "We are looking at ways and means to see how this can be done". The Minister, however, declined to fix any timeframe for accepting it.

Singh said a Defence Cooperation Agreement between the two countries, "Is in the process of being finalised. There are certain procedures to be gone through and that process is underway".

This would be a framework for providing regular exchanges between their defence establishments, training of personnel and capacity building, he said.

Stressing that India was determined to take relations with Sri Lanka to "greater heights", he said negotiations were currently underway for concluding a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) by the end of this year.

This was aimed at realising the enormous potential that exists for further economic and commercial cooperation.