Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang and Russian President Vladimir Putin showed their determination to strengthen economic cooperation, and expand annual two-way trade to US$10 billion by 2020.
According to local media, during their talks in Moscow last Friday, the two leaders agreed to coordinate closely in implementing the Vietnam-Eurasia Economic Union Free Trade Agreement, which came into force last year. Both sides will facilitate business and export operations, including negotiations for agreements on food safety, trade promotion, and payment in the Vietnamese and Russian currencies.
The two sides agreed to proactively conduct projects of priority, including petroleum joint ventures in Vietnam and Russia, a light industry project in Moscow, TH Group projects in Russian localities, early establish joint ventures in automobile assembly and production in Vietnam, look into projects in energy and infrastructure, and continue cooperation in nuclear power projects for peaceful purposes.
The two sides pledged to deepen defense and security ties, expand cooperation in other potential fields like science-technology, education-training, culture, tourism, labor and local cooperation.
They were unanimous in using peaceful means to solve disputes in the East Sea without using force or threat of force on the basis of international law, especially the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), the full and effective enforcement of the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC) and the early completion of a binding Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC).
After their talks, the two leaders witnessed the signing of important documents, including the operational regulation of the high-level Vietnam-Russia working group on prioritized investment projects, a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the Vietnamese Ministry of Science and Technology and Rosatom on construction of a nuclear science and technology research center in Vietnam, an agreement between the State Bank of Vietnam and the Central Bank of Russia on anti-laundering of money from crimes and anti-sponsorship of terrorism, and a cooperative agreement between the Vietnam News Agency and Sputnik news agency.
Besides, there were a MoU between the Vietnam State Treasury and the Treasury of Russia, a space cooperation program between the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology and Roscosmos Group in the 2017-2022 period and a plan between Vietnam Railways and Russian Railways.
Addressing a joint press conference, President Quang affirmed Vietnam’s consistent policy of fostering its comprehensive strategic partnership with Russia and developing Vietnam-Russia cooperation. Quang said the two sides agreed to work together to build a strong ASEAN and boost ASEAN-Russia relations.
“We agreed to cooperate closely in the APEC Year 2017 with Vietnam as the host country and prepare for an official visit to Vietnam by President Vladimir Putin for the APEC summit,” he said.
(Source: thesaigontimes.vn)
