Marseilles (France), Sept.29 The Horizontal Civil Aviation Agreement signed between India and the European Union on Sunday evening, finally ends nearly six years of legal uncertainty on bilateral deals on civil aviation services between EU member states and third countries discriminated against airlines from other EU states.

It may be recalled that in November 2002, a European Court had decided that such deals could not be encouraged.

With the passing of the latest deal, 26 separate deals that India had held with individual EU member states have been

India's Ambassador to the European Union, J Bhagwati, French government and EU officials inked the deal.

European Union officials said they hoped the new deal would encourage more airlines to offer services between the continents.

It is expected that Indian aircraft carriers like Air India, Jet Airways and Kingfisher Airlines will access European destinations more frequently with the help of this deal.

Both India and the European Union see the deal as an 'Open Skies' agreement. (ANI)