Review of Russia-Vietnam co-operation

A press conference reviewing the results of the ties was held on Monday morning in Hanoi. The Russian side stressed that Vietnam has been and remains one of its key strategic partners in the Asia- Pacific region.

In 2015, Vietnam and Russia continued to step up political dialogue. In April, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev visited Vietnam. In May, State President Truong Tan Sang visited Moscow. Several other meetings between high-ranking delegations also took place on the sidelines of the Asia Pacific Economic Forum (APEC) and East Asia Summit.

At the press conference, Russian Ambassador to Vietnam Konstantin Vnukov stressed that Russia considered Vietnam as one of the key partners in the region as well as ASEAN. The intensive military co-operation between the two nations underlines the strong political trust between Vietnam and Russia.

Konstantin Vnukov, Russian Ambassador to Vietnam said: Our two nations have strong political trust. This is especially important in the modern world with many emerging complications, threatening global security. We’ll be stronger if we have higher mutual understanding and support. I believe that was proved by various activities between our countries in 2015. 

One of the key areas of co-operation between the Vietnam and Russia is trade. Despite many challenges from the world’s economy, trade turnover between the two nations remained at 2.7 billion US dollars in the first 10 months of this year. Leaders of both countries, however, believed that this figure has yet to reflect the full potential, and set a target trade turnover of 10 billion in 2020. The signing of the FTA between Vietnam and Eurasian Economic Union last May is expected to provide additional impetus to realise this goal.

Konstantin Vnukov, Russian Ambassador to Vietnam added: The signing of the FTA between the Eurasian Economic Union and Vietnam is the most significant landmark in the Russian-Vietnamese relationship. It will lay a strong foundation for our future co-operation in trade, investment and more. 

A variety of educational and cultural exchange activities have been organised in the two countries, with the highlight being a Russian film week in Hanoi and Hanoi Days in Moscow. These activities have played a good role in connecting people of the two nations.