Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh's third working day at the 43rd ASEAN Summit

Continuing the working program at the 43rd ASEAN Summit, on September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended a series of ASEAN conferences with partners and bilateral meetings.

Continuing his work program at the 43rd ASEAN Summit, on September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended a series of ASEAN conferences with partners and bilateral meetings.

Ngày làm việc thứ ba của Thủ tướng Phạm Minh Chính tại Hội nghị cấp cao ASEAN-43

At exactly 8:30 a.m. on September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and other leaders attended the 26th ASEAN-China Summit. Speaking at the Summit, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh emphasized the mutual support between China's development and the ASEAN Community's solidarity, unity, and central role in the region. This is a solid foundation for the comprehensive strategic partnership to develop strongly.

The Prime Minister hopes that China and ASEAN will not only be each other's largest economic and trade partners but also one of each other's most important comprehensive strategic partners for peace, cooperation and development.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang Highlighting the importance of the ASEAN-China Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, Prime Minister Li Qiang said that this was achieved thanks to the efforts of both sides, together cultivating strategic trust, mutual support, win-win cooperation, and promoting sustainable and inclusive development. With mutual understanding and respect, the relationship will overcome all difficulties and challenges, and together pursue the goals of peace, cooperation and development aspirations in the future.

ASEAN and Chinese leaders were pleased to note that two-way trade reached a new record of US$722 billion; China has been ASEAN's largest trading partner for 14 consecutive years. The meeting agreed that 2024 would be the Year of ASEAN-China People-to-People Exchange.

On this occasion, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh met with Chinese Premier Li Qiang. The two Prime Ministers expressed satisfaction with the positive development of the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership; agreed to increase regular contacts between senior leaders and all levels, contributing to promoting increasingly effective, substantive and in-depth cooperation between the two countries.

Immediately afterwards, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and other leaders attended the 24th ASEAN-Korea Summit.

At the Conference, speaking on behalf of ASEAN as the coordinator of ASEAN-Korea relations, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh affirmed that the ASEAN-Korea Strategic Partnership and Comprehensive Cooperation continues to be promoted, and welcomed Korea's proposal of the ASEAN-Korea Solidarity Initiative (KASI) to elevate bilateral relations.

The Prime Minister thanked the countries for supporting the ASEAN-Korea Day initiative in November 2023 in Vietnam.

Looking forward to the 35th anniversary of ASEAN-Korea relations in 2024, the Prime Minister suggested that both sides should make joint efforts to open a new journey with a longer vision and higher goals.

President of the Republic of Korea Yoon Suk-Yeol thanked Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh for Vietnam's important contributions as a coordinator in promoting the strong development of ASEAN-Korea relations in recent times.

At the same time, it affirmed that the ASEAN-Korea Solidarity Initiative (KASI) demonstrates that Korea attaches importance to and is committed to strongly supporting ASEAN's central role as well as ASEAN's AOIP, and working with ASEAN to comprehensively develop the partnership in the coming time.

On the afternoon of September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh met with the King of Brunei Darussalam Sultan Haji Hassanal Bolkiah.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh expressed his pleasure at meeting the King again to review and discuss directions for implementing the agreements reached, especially the Action Program to implement the Comprehensive Partnership for the 2023-2027 period and the results and agreements reached during the Prime Minister's recent official visit to Brunei.

The Sultan of Brunei assessed that the official visit to Brunei by Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh (February 2023) created momentum to promote bilateral relations and effectively implement the Action Program for the 2023-2027 period.

The King agreed with Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh's proposals and affirmed that he would pay attention to directing the competent agencies to actively implement them.

Immediately afterwards, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and other leaders attended the 26th ASEAN-Japan Summit. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh affirmed that as an ASEAN member and a strategic partner of Japan, Vietnam is committed to making every effort to contribute to deepening the relationship, making it more effective and substantive.

The Prime Minister proposed making economic cooperation a key pillar and driving force for the ASEAN-Japan Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. Accordingly, he asked Japan to facilitate ASEAN countries’ exports to the Japanese market and support regional enterprises to participate more deeply in the supply chain of Japanese enterprises and the global supply chain.

Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio highlighted the importance of the trustful, heart-to-heart partnership with ASEAN, with important achievements over the past five decades, actively contributing to peace, stability and sustainable prosperity in the region.

The 26th ASEAN-Japan Summit adopted a Joint Statement establishing the ASEAN-Japan Comprehensive Strategic Partnership, marking a new milestone in the 50th anniversary of the establishment of relations. The parties pledged to closely coordinate to successfully organize the Commemorative Summit in December 2023 in Tokyo.

Meeting with Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh expressed his delight at the positive and substantive developments in all areas of cooperation between the two countries; highly appreciated the Japanese Government's policies to restore and develop the economy after the Covid-19 pandemic, especially policies on ODA development cooperation, the semiconductor - digital industry and receiving foreign workers.
Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh proposed that Japan study the possibility of supporting Vietnam in developing the North-South high-speed railway project and urban railways in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City.

At noon on September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh took the opportunity to meet with President Yoon Suk Yeol of the Republic of Korea. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh expressed his delight at the rapid and substantial developments in the Vietnam-Korea relationship since the two countries upgraded their relationship to Comprehensive Strategic Partnership (December 2022); once again congratulated the success of President Yoon Suk Yeol's State visit to Vietnam last June, which left many deep impressions on the leaders and people of Vietnam.

The two leaders agreed to increase the exchange of delegations at all levels; make efforts to further promote trade, investment and education cooperation; and affirmed that they will continue to closely coordinate to develop the Vietnam-Korea Comprehensive Strategic Partnership deeper and more comprehensively, contributing positively to peace, stability and development in the region and the world.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh took the opportunity to meet with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced that Canada will send a business delegation led by the Minister of Trade to Vietnam in 2024 to explore business and investment opportunities; at the same time, he affirmed his readiness to support Vietnam in implementing its commitments related to labor and environment in the CPTPP.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh hopes Canada will create more favorable conditions for Vietnamese goods to be exported to Canada; promote cooperation in new areas, including digital transformation, green growth, climate change response, science and technology; grant more scholarships to Vietnamese students, and enhance tourism cooperation and people-to-people exchange.

In the early afternoon of September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended the 26th ASEAN+3 Summit (with China, Japan, and South Korea). The conference reaffirmed the importance of ASEAN+3 cooperation for peace, stability, cooperation, and development. In 2022, trade between ASEAN and its +3 partners increased by 10.2%, reaching 1,213 billion USD, while FDI from the +3 partners into ASEAN reached 54.8 billion USD, accounting for 24.5% of total FDI into ASEAN.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh expressed his hope that ASEAN+3 will play an active and effective role in proposing feasible solutions and together overcoming current difficulties and challenges.

Following that, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended the 11th ASEAN-US Summit. US Vice President Kamala Harris said she would establish an ASEAN-US Center in Washington DC, facilitating exchanges between people, businesses, and scholars of ASEAN and the US. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh stated that ASEAN and the US are entering a new era of cooperation with the Comprehensive Strategic Partnership framework established late last year, and need to coordinate to implement an effective, substantive, and mutually beneficial relationship.

The conference highly appreciated the positive progress in cooperation in recent times. In 2022, the United States was the largest investment partner in the region, with a total foreign direct investment of 36.5 billion USD, and was also the second largest trading partner of ASEAN with a total two-way trade turnover of 420.4 billion USD.

Vice President Kamala Harris affirmed that the United States has a strong and long-term commitment to ASEAN and the region, supports ASEAN's central role, emphasizes that the two sides share interests, priorities and long-term vision, and jointly respond to common challenges.

Late in the afternoon of September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended the ASEAN-Canada Special Summit. ASEAN welcomed Canada’s investment of 24 million CAD to implement the Canadian Trade Gateway initiative in Southeast Asia, and its initial contribution of 1 million CAD to the ASEAN-Canada Trust Fund to support the implementation of specific cooperation programs and projects.

The two sides agreed to coordinate to effectively exploit the potential for cooperation, focusing on the fields of digital transformation, food security, business support, education, human resource training, climate change response, connectivity, and narrowing the development gap...

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau affirmed that he highly values relations with ASEAN, strongly supports ASEAN's central position, commits to further engagement and presence in the region, upholds international principles, and actively contributes to peace, stability, cooperation and development.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh stressed that this is the right time to elevate the ASEAN-Canada relationship to a strategic partnership, opening a new era in cooperation, and affirmed that Vietnam will actively coordinate with countries to turn commitments into practical and concrete actions, worthy of the new stature of the relationship.

Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh took the opportunity to meet with US Vice President Kamala Harris. The two leaders were pleased with the strong development of the Vietnam-US Comprehensive Partnership , aiming to elevate the relationship in the coming time, especially in the fields of economics - trade - investment, science - technology, innovation, education and training, people-to-people exchange and overcoming the consequences of war.

On the evening of September 6, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh attended a reception hosted by Indonesian President Joko Widodo and his wife to welcome ASEAN leaders and partners attending the 43rd ASEAN Summit.

For the whole reception, please see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1_rEsARcKU

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