Vietnam and UK upgrade relations to Comprehensive Strategic Partnership

General Secretary To Lam and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer issued a joint statement on upgrading the Vietnam-UK relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership - Photo: VNA

On the afternoon of October 29 (UK time, early morning of October 30 Vietnam time), immediately after the talks, General Secretary To Lam and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer jointly issued a joint statement on establishing the Vietnam-UK comprehensive strategic partnership.

With this development, the UK has become the 14th country in the world to have this level of relationship with Vietnam. This also marks the fact that Vietnam has established a comprehensive strategic partnership with 5/5 permanent members of the United Nations Security Council including Russia, China, the US, France and the UK.

The goal is to double bilateral trade turnover.

According to information from the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at the talks, General Secretary To Lam and Prime Minister Starmer highly appreciated the positive development of bilateral cooperation, especially in efforts to remove obstacles and seek appropriate solutions in the spirit of cooperation for the common interests of the two peoples.

The leaders of the two countries were pleased to see that Vietnam and the UK have many similarities on international and regional issues of mutual concern. The two sides have also been closely coordinating and supporting each other at international and regional forums.

General Secretary To Lam stressed that Vietnam always values the traditional friendship with the UK on the basis of mutual respect, mutual benefit and looking towards the future.

Vietnam is ready to cooperate closely with the UK to elevate relations on key pillars such as politics - diplomacy, defense - security, science - technology and digital transformation, finance - banking, education - training, environment and climate change response, culture and people-to-people exchange.

The General Secretary affirmed that Vietnam, as a member of ASEAN, is ready to work with the UK to act as a bridge and promote cooperation between the UK and ASEAN, and as a gateway for the UK to access the Southeast Asian market.

The two leaders affirmed that the two countries have great potential for cooperation in the new period, especially in green and sustainable economic and energy transformation, digital technology industry development, and high-quality human resource training.

General Secretary To Lam and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer at a closed meeting - Photo: VNA

British Prime Minister Starmer expressed his wish to develop comprehensive bilateral relations with Vietnam, especially within the frameworks of the UK-Vietnam Free Trade Agreement (UKVFTA) and the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP).

The British leader stressed that the British Government is ready to support Vietnam in the process of implementing its commitment to achieve net zero emissions by 2050, while encouraging British businesses to increase investment and cooperation in Vietnam and pledging to support Vietnam in implementing the Just Energy Transition Partnership (JETP).

The two leaders agreed to set a target of doubling trade turnover in the coming time. In particular, Mr. Starmer hopes that Vietnam will support cooperation in e-commerce and financial services within the framework of CPTPP.

The two leaders led delegations from the two countries at the talks - Photo: VNA

Regarding security and defense cooperation, the two sides agreed on the need to diversify cooperation, jointly address illegal immigration, and agreed to strengthen defense cooperation related to peacekeeping forces and training.

At the talks, the two sides also spent time discussing international and regional issues of mutual concern.

On this occasion, General Secretary To Lam conveyed the regards of senior leaders of the Party and State of Vietnam to Prime Minister Starmer and senior British leaders.

He also invited Prime Minister Keir Starmer to visit Vietnam in the near future. In response, the British Prime Minister expressed his gratitude and happily accepted the invitation.

48-point joint statement on upgrading relations

The two leaders exchanged a Joint Statement on upgrading relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership - Photo: VNA

At the end of the talks, the two leaders issued a joint statement on the official upgrading of the Vietnam-UK relationship to a comprehensive strategic partnership. The two leaders agreed to work closely to implement the new framework.

The 48-point Joint Statement sets out measures to promote and strengthen Vietnam-UK cooperation on six main pillars. These include strengthening cooperation from politics, diplomacy, defense and security to economics, trade, investment and finance as well as science - technology, innovation, digital transformation, health; environment, energy, green transformation, etc.

The joint statement also highly appreciated the important achievements of the bilateral relationship, affirmed the principles, and set out major orientations to promote and strengthen cooperation and develop the traditional friendship.

On this occasion, the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security and the UK Home Office signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in preventing and combating international fraud and a plan to enhance cooperation on migration issues.

In addition to the joint statement on upgrading bilateral relations and the migration cooperation agreement, the two sides also reached a series of agreements in the fields of economy, green finance, education and training, health, clean energy, renewable energy, local cooperation, etc.

According to the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, these are very important, creating a foundation to deepen the cooperative relationship between the two countries.

Tuoitre.vn

Source: https://tuoitre.vn/viet-nam-va-anh-nang-cap-quan-he-len-doi-tac-chien-luoc-toan-dien-20251030025120514.htm