Singapore's Prime Minister has accepted an invitation from Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, the Vietnam Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MoFA) announced on January 8. Singapore's Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong will visit Vietnam with his wife and other senior officials from January 12 - 15. The goal of Mr. Lee's visit is to foster cooperative economic relations with Vietnam.
Mr. Lee is scheduled to speak with Mr. Dung and attend the ground breaking ceremony of the industrial zone VSIP 4 in Hai Phong, which was an investment funded by Singapore's capital resources. Mr. Lee will also meet with the Communist Party' GeneralSecretary, Nong Duc Manh, and President Nguyen Minh Triet. He plans to hold a meeting to address Singapore's community in Vietnam as well.
Mr. Pham Hong Tam, Vice head of Southeast Asian sector of the South Pacific Department of MoFA, said that Mr. Lee's visit will help the two nations move forward with mutual economic trade. They will also ask for guidance from Singapore to help Vietnam advertise and cooperate with other countries in areas of commerce and to improve the effectiveness of Singapore invested resources in Vietnam. Additionally, Vietnam hopes that Singapore will provide insights on urban control and that more Singapore universities will be willing to cooperate with Vietnamese university and post-university programmes. Vietnam and Singapore will discuss and solidify the Vietnam - Singapore cooperation agreement, which has been in place for 5 years.
According to Mr. Tam, this visit will be a good chance for Vietnam to make a strong impression with Singapore, who co-founded the Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement (TPP), which Vietnam is applying to join. Mr. Lee also plans to have two more official visits to Vietnam in the near future.