ENGLISH DEYEA NEWS

NEW DELHI (AFP) - India and Myanmar will sign an investment pact and hold talks on wider border trade as a sign of expanding ties between New Delhi and military rulers of the secretive state, officials said Sunday.

India would also offer credit totalling 84 million dollars to Myanmar during a trip to the country by junior commerce minister Jairam Ramesh, who left for Myanmar Sunday on a four-day working visit, commerce ministry officials said.

"He will also offer two million dollars for 16 power transformers that were damaged in the cyclone as well as 200,000 dollars for the repairs of a famous Buddhist pagoda also hit by the storm last month," a ministry official said.

India was one of the first countries to rush aid to Myanmar after Cyclone Nargis hit on May 2-3, leaving 134,000 people dead or missing by latest count.

A ministry official in New Delhi said the decade-long investment promotion and protection agreement will aim at "encouraging flow of funds between the two countries."

The accord comes amid criticism by the global community of Myanmar's cyclone relief efforts and longstanding international calls for India to pressure the junta-ruled nation to shift to democracy.

India was until the mid-1990s a supporter of Myanmar's pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi. But it has since cultivated ties with the junta as it sees Myanmar as a key source of energy to power fast economic growth.

Bilateral trade between India and Myanmar totalled 590 million dollars in 2005-2006, the latest figures available show, according to the Indian foreign ministry.

In April, the two sides signed an accord under which New Delhi would invest 130 million dollars in Myanmar's Sittwe port on the Bay of Bengal that will give India's northeast access to a new trade route to Southeast Asia.

Last year, New Delhi also pledged to invest 150 million dollars for gas exploration in Myanmar.