71st anniversary of Vietnam-China diplomatic relations celebrated in Beijing

Vietnamese Ambassador to China Pham Sao Mai and Chinese Assistant to Foreign Minister Wu Jianghao cut the cake celebrating the 71st anniversary of Vietnam-China diplomatic relations (Photo: VNA)

The Vietnamese Embassy in China on March 26 held a ceremony to mark the 71st anniversary of Vietnam-China diplomatic relations.

The event drew Chinese Assistant to Foreign Minister Wu Jianghao, representatives of the host country’s ministries, sectors, agencies and localities, as well as the Vietnamese community and businesses in China.

Addressing the event, Vietnamese Ambassador to China Pham Sao Mai reviewed the 71 years of the diplomatic ties as well as major cooperation outcomes between the two countries in recent years.

He noted that since the beginning of 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, senior leaders of the two Parties and States have maintained regular meetings with flexible forms, while bilateral partnership in all fields have been promoted, including collaboration in economy, trade and investment.

Vietnam has been the largest trade partner of China among ASEAN member countries with two-way trade hitting 19.2 billion USD in 2020, up 18.7 percent year on year, according to statistics from China’s Customs. Meanwhile, China was the third biggest investor of Vietnam last year.

Ambassador Mai underlined that 2021 is a year of significant importance to both side as this is the first year that Vietnam implements the Resolution of the 13th National Party Congress, the socio-economic development plan for the 2021-2025 period, and the socio-economic development strategy for the 2021-2030 period. Meanwhile, this year, China celebrates the 100th anniversary of the Communist Party of China and begins the implementation of the 14th socio-economic planning for the next five years with a vision to 2035, he added.

The diplomat recalled that on February 8, few days before the Lunar New Year, Vietnamese Party General Secretary and State President Nguyen Phu Trong and General Secretary of the Communist Party of China and Chinese President Xi Jinping held an phone talk to sketch out major orientations for the development of the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic partnership in the future.

Ambassador Mai proposed that both sides fully and effectively implement the common perspectives reached by senior leaders of both countries, strengthen political trust, expand and enhance the efficiency of cooperation in fields, promote people-to-people exchange, control and satifactorily address disagreements on the basis of respecting each other’s legitimate interest in line with international law, especially the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), thus further boosting the growth of the Vietnam-China comprehensive strategic partnership in a healthy, stable and in-depth manner, contributing to maintaining peace, stability, cooperation and development in the region and the world.

During the ceremony, participants had a chance to enjoy Vietnamese traditional dishes./.