Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis said his country is willing to share 500,000 COVID-19 vaccine doses with Viet Nam. 

Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh. Photo: VGP

PM Babis made the above statement during his phone conversation with Vietnamese counterpart Pham Minh Chinh on Monday.

Babis also announced that the Czech Republic has decided to gift 250,000 vaccine doses to Viet Nam.

In reply, Pham expressed sincere thanks for the valuable gift, calling on the Czech Republic to help Viet Nam get access to other vaccine supply sources as much and as soon as possible.

Pham also thanked the European country for assisting Viet Nam throughout the Viet Nam-EU free trade agreement negotiation process and appreciated the Czech Republic as the first EU country to ratify the Viet Nam-EU investment protection agreement.

The two PMs agreed to step up cooperation in such priority areas like transport, education and training, defense-security among others while facilitating the launch of direct air route between the two countries.

They expressed their pleasure at the close and effective ties between the two countries at multilateral forums and vowed to continue tightening multilateral collaboration.

Regarding regional and international issues of shared concerns, both sides underlined the importance of ensuring security, safety and freedom of navigation in and overflight above the East Sea, and settling disputes through peaceful measures on the basis of international law, including the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea./.