Attending the 1st International Summit of the Mekong River Commission (MRC) held in Hua Hin, Thailand, Vietnamese PM Nguyen Tan Dung on April 4 had separate meetings with the host PM, Lao PM and the World Bank Vice President.
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| Vietnamese PM Nguyen Tan Dung (center, left) and Thai PM Abhisit (center, right), Hua Hin, Thailand, April 4, 2010 - Photo: VGP |
Vietnam expects closer multifaceted cooperation with Thailand
Meeting his Thai counterpart, PM Dung stated that Vietnam wants to develop its friendship and multifaceted cooperation with Thailand.
The two leaders agreed that the MRC Summit and its strategies on basin development would lead to important guidelines for cooperation among countries in the time to come.
They welcomed the deeper participation of Myanmar and China in the MRC.
The PMs were unanimous in connecting the East-West corridor from Thailand to Vietnam in order to facilitate trade and commodity circulation.
PM Abhisit pledged to fully support Vietnam during the latter’s year of ASEAN presidency 2010 as well as to organize many activities in response to the 1000th anniversary of Thang Long-Hanoi.
Vietnam, Laos strive for trade turnover of US $1 billion this year
On the sideline of the Summit, PM Dung met Lao PM Buasone Bouphavanh.
Both PMs stressed that Vietnam and Laos should take specific measures to increase efficiency of their cooperation and raise the two-way trade value to US $1 billion in 2010.
They also wanted to expand bilateral cooperation to the fields of common potential and urged their inferiors to speed up the implementation of the agreements reached at the recent meeting of the Inter-governmental Committee.
WB pledges to back Vietnam’s public investment reform and climate change program
In the reception given to WB Vice President James Adam the same day. PM Dung highly praised the Bank for its assistance to Vietnam’s macro-economic policies, poverty reduction and public investment reform program.
Underlining the urgency of sea level rise in the Mekong Delta, the Vietnamese Government chief expected that the WB would further help Vietnam in combating climate change in order to help stabilize local residents’ life and protect the granary which produces 6 million tons of rice for the world per year.
Mr. James Adam hailed Vietnam for fruitfully using loans from the WB. He revealed that the Bank just approved a preferential loan of US $500 million to help Vietnam’s public investment reform program.
The WB will allocate resources for Vietnam to combat climate change and sea level rise, Mr. James Adam said.
