President Michael Higgins highly appreciated Vietnam's foreign policy and guidelines; affirmed the importance of Vietnam's position and role in the Asia-Pacific region.
According to the special correspondent of the Vietnam News Agency, within the framework of the State visit to Ireland from October 1-3 at the invitation of Irish President Michael Higgins, on the morning of October 2 (local time), after the official welcoming ceremony solemnly held at the Presidential Palace, General Secretary and President To Lam and President Michael Higgins co-chaired talks between the high-ranking delegations of the two countries.
At the talks, President Michael Higgins warmly welcomed the first visit of General Secretary and President To Lam to Ireland; highly appreciated Vietnam's foreign policy and guidelines; affirmed the importance of Vietnam's position and role in the Asia-Pacific region; emphasized that the two countries have many similarities in the struggle for national independence and there is no field or topic in which the two sides cannot discuss and cooperate.
President Michael Higgins recalled his good impressions of his visit to Vietnam in 2016 and expressed his impression of Vietnam's achievements in socio-economic development, international integration, as well as efforts to implement the Sustainable Development Goals in recent years; and sympathized with Vietnam about the severe damage caused by the recent storm No. 3 (international name: Typhoon Yagi).
General Secretary and President To Lam thanked President Michael Higgins for the warm and respectful reception for the high-ranking Vietnamese delegation, affirming that Vietnam attaches importance to developing friendly relations and multi-faceted cooperation with Ireland; and highly appreciated the Irish Government's priority position for Vietnam in its development cooperation policy within the framework of the strategy "Global Ireland: Deploying activities in the Asia-Pacific region to 2025."
The General Secretary and President expressed his hope that Ireland will continue to provide development assistance to Vietnam in priority areas such as green growth, climate change response, environmental protection, information technology, digital transformation, and sustainable development.
In order to enhance political trust and mutual understanding, the two leaders agreed to promote delegation exchanges at all levels, especially high-level ones, and actively implement existing cooperation mechanisms.
On this occasion, General Secretary and President To Lam was pleased to announce that the Vietnamese Government has decided and is implementing procedures to establish a Vietnamese Embassy in Ireland. The two leaders expressed their belief that this decision will open a new stage of development in bilateral relations, for the common interests of the people of the two countries.
Regarding economic-trade-investment cooperation, the two leaders affirmed that this is an important pillar of cooperation and is developing positively with two-way trade turnover reaching 3.5 billion USD in 2024. The two sides need to effectively utilize the Vietnam-EU Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA), promote trade-investment connectivity, support the business communities of the two countries; strive to increase trade turnover between the two countries to 5 billion USD in 2026 on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations.
The Irish President stressed that Vietnam is Ireland’s leading trade partner and that there is still a lot of room for cooperation between the two countries; acknowledged Vietnam’s request to speed up the ratification process of the Vietnam-EU Investment Protection Agreement (EVIPA) to expand cooperation and investment opportunities between the Vietnamese and Irish business communities; and hoped that Vietnam would create favorable conditions for the export of high-quality agricultural products and food from Ireland.
The two sides welcomed the establishment of the Strategic Partnership on Higher Education between the Ministry of Education and Training of Vietnam and the Ministry of Education, Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science of Ireland, as well as the signing of the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Vietnam National University, Hanoi and leading Irish universities. The two leaders agreed that this is a priority area of cooperation between the two countries, thereby contributing to improving the quality of training, developing high-quality human resources, promoting scientific research and innovation in Vietnam.
To enhance mutual understanding and connect the two peoples, the two leaders agreed to promote people-to-people exchanges, cultural and artistic cooperation, tourism, and cooperation between localities.
The two sides agreed to create favorable conditions for overseas Vietnamese of both countries to live and work, contribute to each other's socio-economic development, and promote the role of a bridge for the friendly relations between the two countries.
Within the framework of the talks, the two sides had in-depth discussions on regional security issues of mutual concern such as the situation in Ukraine, the Middle East..., calling on all parties to protect civilians, conduct dialogue, resolve conflicts by peaceful means on the basis of international law and the basic principles of the United Nations Charter; agreed to strengthen cooperation at multilateral forums such as ASEAN-EU, the United Nations..., in many areas such as responding to global challenges, climate change, food security, ensuring supply chains...
The two sides support ASEAN's stance on the East Sea issue on ensuring peace, stability, security, cooperation and development in the region, resolving disputes by peaceful means on the basis of respect for international law, especially the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS)./.
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