The joint working group on Viet Nam-Cambodia border gates convened its first-round meeting in Ha Noi on January 9.

At the meeting

The Vietnamese delegation was headed by Deputy Foreign Minister and Chairman of the National Border Committee Le Hoai Trung, while the Cambodian side was led by Minister of State at the Ministry of Interior Sok Phal.

The meeting took place in the spirit of friendship, sincerity and mutual trust. The two sides evaluated the current operation of the border gates along the Viet Nam-Cambodia land border, agreeing that the increasing development of these border gates have contributed to promoting economic, trade, service and investment activities among border provinces, thus improving the lives of the people in the border areas.

They underlined the need to further improve the border gates in order to meet the growing cross-border exchanges of goods and people between the two nations.

The both sides agreed to seek ways to develop a system of land border gates in line with the real development situation in each locality as well as in accordance with law and development plans of each country.

It is imperative to conduct bilateral surveys of opening and upgrading pairs of border gates as proposed by the two countries within the framework of the 9th and 10th conferences on cooperation and development of Vietnamese and Cambodian border provinces, they said.

To facilitate coordination in implementing the border work in the new situation, the two sides agreed to ask for their governments’ permission to jointly draft an agreement on border gates and regulations on the management of Viet Nam-Cambodia border gates. The move aims to reinforce and further develop the traditional friendly relations and accelerate cross-border trade exchanges between the two countries.

The Vietnamese side will soon give Cambodia the draft version of this agreement for studying.

At the end of the meeting, the two sides signed a joint minute recognizing the attained results, while agreeing to hold the next meeting of the working group in the second quarter of 2020.