Kuala Lumpur, Feb 16 (IANS) India and Malaysia will sign a Comprehensive Economic Cooperation Agreement (CECA) Friday, the Indian High Commission to Malaysia said in a statement here Wednesday.

The agreement will be signed by Malaysian International Trade and Industry Minister Mustapa Mohamed and Indian Commerce and Industry minister Anand Sharma, according to Xinhua.

The Indian High Commission said that Sharma will visit Malaysia from Feb 17 to 19, during which he will also pay a courtesy call on Malaysian Prime Minister Najib Tun Razak.

The Malaysia-India CECA is a free trade agreement that covers trade in goods and services, investment, as well as economic cooperation.

The negotiations had begun in February 2008, but had been put on hold after two rounds of talks.

During a visit by Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Malaysia in October 2010, Najib expressed confidence that the CECA would increase bilateral trade between the two countries to $15 billion by 2015.