President’s visits to Ethiopia, Egypt achieve notable success

President Tran Dai Quang and his wife returned to Hanoi on August 29 morning, concluding their successful state visits to Ethiopia and Egypt at the invitation of Ethiopian President Mulatu Teshome and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi.

The two visits have yielded positive outcome regarding the exchange of contents between all sides, signed documents, as well as President Quang’s sideline activities.

While in Ethiopia from August 23-25, the Vietnamese State leader held talks with his Ethiopian counterpart Teshome and also held separate meetings with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed and Speaker of the House of Federation Keria Ibrahim.

His later visit to Egypt over August 25-29 took place amid the two countries’ celebration of 55 years of diplomatic ties. During the visit, President Quang held talks with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi and met with Speaker of the House of Representatives Ali Abdel Aal and Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly.

President Tran Dai Quang and his Egyptian counterpart Abdel Fattah El-Sisi co-chair a press conference after their talks.

At the end of each visit, a joint statement was issued, outlining major orientations and providing a foundation for bilateral cooperation in the not too distant future.

Regarding the significance of President Quang’s meetings with Ethiopian and Egyptian leaders, the Vietnamese diplomat said giving a boost to economics, trade, and investment was a main focus of the Vietnamese President’s visits to Ethiopia and Egypt, which are seen as potential markets of around 100 million people each, and both are in the process of economic reform. Egypt is now one of the three leading economies in Africa, while the Ethiopian economy has grown at an annual average rate of 10% over the last decade.

At their meetings, President Quang and the two countries’ leaders had in-depth discussions on specific solutions to encourage and offer favorable conditions for their business communities to engage in networking and market expansion. Vietnam can assist Ethiopia and Egypt in gaining entry to the ASEAN market, while the latters can help Vietnam enter the vast markets of the Middle East and Africa.

In pursuit of its foreign policy, Vietnam has always placed importance on traditional ties with Africa, having set up diplomatic relations with 53 out of the 55 countries to date. Vietnam-Africa trade hit roughly US$ 6.7 billion last year.

More and more Vietnamese businesses are highly interested in investing in Africa while Vietnamese officers have engaged in UN peacekeeping operations in the Central African Republic and South Sudan.

President Tran Dai Quang holds talks with Ethiopian President Mulatu Teshome.

During the visits, a number of important cooperation documents were signed, including three documents with Ethiopia and eight with Egypt, which cover trade, agriculture, finance, oil and gas, training and cooperation among localities, thus further facilitating bilateral cooperation, Nam said. Within the framework of his visit to Ethiopia, the Vietnamese President visited the headquarters of the African Union (AU) and met with Acting President of the AU Commission Amira Elfadil Mohammed Elfadil.

At the meeting, President Quang suggested developing countries, like Vietnam and several African nations should work hand in hand and offer mutual support to raise their stronger voices and roles at multilateral cooperation mechanisms, such as the Non-Aligned Movement, and the South-South cooperation framework.

The two leaders consented to study a cooperation model, as well as boost exchanges of information and experience in the fields of common interest, such as the UN peacekeeping mission, agriculture, education, infrastructure, IT, and telecommunication.

Quang proposed Vietnam and the AU build an annual dialogue to carry out large scale cooperation projects with the region and other countries, thereby strengthening their coordination at international forums to protect the interests of developing nations.

The visits of President Tran Dai Quang to Ethiopia and Egypt have given fresh momentum to the promotion of bilateral relations, which require a great deal of combined effort from ministries, sectors, localities and businesses in the effective implementation of the agreements reached by senior leaders in order to turn the potentiality into reality, Nam noted.