Prime Minister attends the 33rd ASEAN Summit in Singapore

At the invitation of Singaporean Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, from November 13-15, 2018, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his wife led a high-ranking Vietnamese delegation to attend the 33rd ASEAN Summit and related summits in Singapore.

Within the framework of the 33rd ASEAN Summit, many important conferences took place such as the 33rd ASEAN Summit, ASEAN+3 Summit (China, Japan, South Korea), East Asia Summit (EAS), 7 ASEAN+1 Summits (China, South Korea, Japan, United States, India, Australia, Russia).

Along with that, the 2nd Summit of countries participating in the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) will take place.

Previously, from November 11-12, preparatory meetings at the Ministerial level (Foreign Affairs, Economic Affairs and Coordinating Council), ASEAN Senior Officials (SOM), ASEAN Senior Economic Officials (SEOM) and Ambassadors (Committee of Resident Representatives to ASEAN) took place.

Notably, at the 33rd ASEAN Summit, ASEAN leaders will focus on discussing promoting cooperation and connectivity, building the ASEAN Community in the spirit of the 2018 theme "self-reliance and innovation" and orientation for ASEAN in the following years.

At the Summit with partners, ASEAN leaders and partner countries will discuss measures to promote cooperation between the parties, including increasing economic cooperation, investment, trade, infrastructure development, enhancing connectivity, cooperation in responding to fluctuations in the world economy, adapting to the 4.0 Industrial Revolution; and addressing global challenges such as the environment and climate change.

ASEAN's "attraction" with the presence of many country leaders is thanks to ASEAN's increasing central role, and especially the increasingly dynamic Asia-Pacific region, becoming an important geopolitical region for the world.

In which, economy and trade are an example. Up to now, ASEAN is about to end the third year of implementing the ASEAN Community Vision 2025 and the Master Plans for building the three pillars of the Community with many positive and promising results.

Some of the key achievements include: 239/290 (82%) political and security cooperation action lines, 80/118 (68%) economic cooperation priorities and 100% of socio-cultural cooperation commitments have been implemented. Economic growth is expected to reach 5.1% in 2018 and 5.2% in 2019.

Notably, ASEAN's foreign relations continue to be promoted substantially with many practical initiatives to support ASEAN in building the Community. Countries continue to affirm their importance and desire to strengthen cooperation with ASEAN; commit to supporting ASEAN in building the Community, and support ASEAN's central role. To date, 91 countries have sent Ambassadors to ASEAN and 53 ASEAN Committees in third countries have been established.

In 2018, ASEAN held the ASEAN-India 25th Anniversary Summit (January 25, 2018) and the ASEAN-Australia Special Summit (March 17-18, 2018); Russia proposed an ASEAN-Russia Summit on this occasion; South Korea promoted the organization of a Summit to celebrate the 15th Anniversary of ASEAN-South Korea Partnership in South Korea in 2019.

Regarding the 2018 priorities, the theme “Resilient and Innovative ASEAN” proposed by the Singaporean Chairman has been concretized through: ASEAN Leaders’ Vision Statement on a Resilient and Innovative ASEAN with contents of cooperation to enhance ASEAN’s resilience against external impacts, strengthen ASEAN’s central role in the region as well as effectively take advantage of opportunities brought about by the 4.0 Industrial Revolution; ASEAN Leaders’ Statement on Cyber ​​Security Cooperation; Deploying the development of an assessment report on ASEAN’s readiness for the 4.0 Industrial Revolution; Building an ASEAN Smart City framework, implementing the ASEAN Legal Academy training program to promote sustainable development and contribute to building a rules-based ASEAN Community…

Within the framework of the conference, the Leaders will also discuss regional and international issues of mutual concern, aiming to contribute to maintaining peace, stability, cooperation and development in the region.

Vietnam, once again as an active and proactive member of ASEAN, has been and will actively contribute, together with other members, to building an increasingly stable, strong and prosperous ASEAN in the future./.