Bulgarian President arrives in Hanoi, begins official visit to Vietnam

On the afternoon of November 24, President of the Republic of Bulgaria Rumen Radev and his wife Desislava Radeva arrived in Hanoi, beginning an official visit to Vietnam at the invitation of President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam Luong Cuong from November 24-28, 2024.

Photo caption — Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son welcomed President of the Republic of Bulgaria Rumen Radev and his wife at Noi Bai International Airport, Hanoi. Photo: Pham Kien/VNA

Welcoming the delegation at Noi Bai International Airport were: Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son; Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Pham Thanh Binh; Vietnamese Ambassador to Bulgaria Do Hoang Long; and a number of officials from the Office of the President and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Accompanying the President of the Republic of Bulgaria Rumen Radev and his wife on their visit to Vietnam were: Professor - Doctor Galin Tsokov - Minister of Education and Science; Associate Professor - Doctor Rosen Karadimov - Minister of Innovation and Growth; Mr. Evtim Miloshev - Minister of Tourism; Ms. Tzveta Timeva - Secretary General of the President; Mr. Roussi Ivanov - Assistant to the President for Foreign Policy; Mr. Hristo Aleksiev - Assistant to the President for Economic Affairs; Mr. Nikolay Koprinkov - Assistant to the President for Domestic Policy; Mr. Krum Kostadinov Zarkov - Assistant to the President for Legal Affairs; Mr. Kiril Atanasov - Assistant to the President for Media Relations; Mr. Vassil Alexandrov Terziev - Mayor of Sofia; Mr. Pencho Plamenov Milkov - Mayor of Ruse; Ms. Zornitsa Petrova Apostolova - Advisor to the President for Foreign Policy; Vice Admiral Mitko Aleksandrov Petev - Security and Defense Advisor to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces; Mr. Stefan Dimitrov Godzhevargov - Security and Defense Advisor to the President; Mr. Stefan Krasimirov Savov - Finance and Investment Advisor to the President; Ms. Natalia Stoyanova Micheva - Director of the Department for Asia, Australia and Oceania, Ministry of Foreign Affairs; Mr. Mircho Zhelyazkov Ivanov, Director of the Presidential Protocol Department; Mr. Pavlin Todorov - Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Bulgaria to Vietnam.

President Rumen Radev was born on June 18, 1963, in Dimitrov Grad, Bulgaria. From 2000 to 2005, he was Chief of Staff, 3rd Air Base in Graf Ignatievo. From 2005 to 2009, he was Commander, 3rd Air Base in Graf Ignatievo. From 2009 to 2014, he was Deputy Commander, Bulgarian Air Force. From 2014 to 2017, he was Commander, Bulgarian Air Force. In 2016, he was nominated by the Bulgarian Socialist Party as a candidate for President and won the election. He has been the 5th President of Bulgaria since January 2017. President Rumen Radev is a Doctor of Military Sciences. This is the first visit in 11 years by the Bulgarian President and also the first visit to Vietnam by Mr. Rumen Radev as President. According to Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Pham Thu Hang, the visit takes place in the context of positive development of Vietnam - Bulgaria relations in most areas. In terms of politics and diplomacy, Bulgaria is one of the first countries to establish diplomatic relations with Vietnam in 1950. In recent times, the two sides have regularly exchanged delegations at all levels, especially high-level ones, and closely coordinated and supported each other at multilateral forums. In terms of economic and trade cooperation, the two countries have also made progress, such as in the period 2021 - 2023, trade between the two countries was 200 million USD/year, nearly double that of the period 2019 - 2020. There is a traditional and extremely important area of cooperation between the two countries, which is education and training cooperation. In the past, Bulgaria has trained many highly skilled scientists and technical workers for Vietnam, with 3,600 scientists and about 30,000 highly skilled workers. Labor cooperation between the two countries is also a potential field. Local cooperation is also maintained and promoted with the establishment of many pairs of cooperative relationships between Vietnamese and Bulgarian localities.