Vietnam attaches importance to developing strategic partnership with Thailand

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc emphasized this when receiving the President of the National Legislative Assembly of Thailand.

On the afternoon of August 14, at the Government Headquarters, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc received President of the National Legislative Assembly of the Kingdom of Thailand, Mr. Pornpetch Wichitcholchai, who is on an official visit to Vietnam.

At the reception, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc welcomed the Chairman and the delegation of the National Legislative Assembly of Thailand on an official visit to Vietnam, and highly appreciated the good developments in the friendship and cooperation between the two countries as well as between the two legislative bodies in recent times.

The Prime Minister affirmed that Vietnam always attaches importance to developing the strategic partnership with Thailand. As both ASEAN members, the two countries have promoted cooperation in recent times, contributing to the relations between the two countries as well as ASEAN.

Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc received the President of the National Legislative Assembly of the Kingdom of Thailand.

Pleased to see the bilateral relationship between Vietnam and Thailand increasingly deepening with the exchange of many high-level visits, the Prime Minister said he would lead a high-level delegation from the Vietnamese Government to pay an official visit to Thailand at the invitation of Thai Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha from August 17-19, 2017.

During the visit, the two sides will discuss directions to promote bilateral friendship and cooperation to strengthen the Vietnam-Thailand Strategic Partnership.

In recent years, the two countries have also promoted cooperation in the fields of politics, security, defense, economics, trade, tourism, culture, and society. Currently, many large projects of Thailand are being implemented in Vietnam. Thailand is currently Vietnam's largest trading partner in ASEAN with two-way trade turnover last year reaching 12.5 billion USD and is the 10th largest investor in Vietnam.

With Vietnam having a trade deficit of 5 billion USD from Thailand in 2016, the Prime Minister hopes that the two countries will take measures to balance the trade balance and increase the trade turnover between the two countries to 20 billion USD by 2020.

Tourism cooperation between the two countries has also developed strongly, with about 800,000 Vietnamese tourists visiting Thailand and 200,000 Thai tourists visiting Vietnam last year. The Prime Minister hopes that more and more Thai tourists will visit Vietnam.

The Prime Minister also asked the President to encourage Thai authorities to open their markets to Vietnamese goods, facilitate Vietnamese workers in Thailand, and encourage Thai businessmen to increase investment in Vietnam. Vietnam will pay attention to resolving difficulties and creating favorable conditions for Thai investors to invest and do business in Vietnam.

The Prime Minister also expressed his gratitude to the Royal Family, Government, legislature and people of Thailand for creating favorable conditions for the Vietnamese community to live and do business stably in Thailand; he hoped that the Thai Government and legislature would continue to create favorable conditions for Vietnamese workers to live and do business in Thailand.

For his part, President of the Thai Legislative Assembly Pornpetch Wichitcholchai thanked Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc for taking the time to meet him and said that this visit to Vietnam aims to further strengthen the traditional friendship between the two countries, including in the legislative field.

Welcoming Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and the Vietnamese high-ranking delegation on their upcoming official visit to Thailand, the President looked forward to meeting Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc again in Thailand; believing that the visit will be a great success, continuing to promote the strategic partnership between the two countries.

The Chairman also informed the Prime Minister that recently, the National Assembly of Vietnam and Thailand have had very good relations and at international forums attended by representatives of the two countries' National Assemblies, there have been meetings and discussions on issues of mutual concern, promoting cooperation between the two countries.

In the fields of trade and investment, Thailand and Vietnam are major partners. The two countries also promote relations in the fields of security and defense, including cooperation in maritime patrols.

Regarding tourism, the President of the National Legislative Assembly of Thailand was pleased to see that the number of tourists from both countries visiting each other is increasing. However, the number of Thai tourists visiting Vietnam is still low compared to Vietnamese tourists visiting Thailand, so both sides need to promote solutions to attract more Thai tourists to visit Vietnam.

The President expressed his belief that in the future, when many roads and railways between the two countries are connected through a third country, this will be an important factor in promoting cooperation between the two countries in many fields, including tourism./.

According to VOV