The sixth political consultation between Vietnam and Cambodia was held in Phnom Penh on July 18.

Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Quoc Dung (L) and
Cambodian Secretary of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and
International Cooperation Eat Sophea co-chair the event (Photo: VNA)

The event was co-chaired by Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Quoc Dung and Cambodian Secretary of State at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Eat Sophea.

The two sides expressed their satisfaction at the growing friendly neighbourliness and comprehensive cooperation between Vietnam and Cambodia with the regular exchange of high-level delegations and meetings.

The cooperation between ministries and localities as well as people-to-people exchanges have been further deepened while the bilateral economic and trade partnership has developed strongly with two-way trade reaching 4.7 billion USD in 2018.

Vietnam is among the top five foreign investors in Cambodia with 211 projects worth over 3 billion USD.

The two sides held that there is still large room for Vietnam and Cambodia to collaborate in the fields of economy, trade, investment, education-training, and tourism.

They agreed to enhance trade relations, especially cross-border trade, and promote connectivity at border gates and develop infrastructure at border areas in order to increase two-way trade to over 5 billion USD and soon complete an overall plan connecting the two economies through 2030.

Vietnam affirmed to continue prioritising cooperation in education and training high-quality human resources for Cambodia under the signed agreements.

The two sides agreed to speed up the implementation of land border demarcation and marker planting and sign two legal documents recognising the completion of 84 percent of the work in 2019.

They vowed to closely work together to stabilise the legal status for Vietnamese-Cambodians.

Vietnam and Cambodia highly evaluated the political consultation mechanism and pledged to promote exchanges between Vietnam’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cambodia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation for better mutual understanding.

They agreed to coordinate to successfully organise the 17th session of the joint committee for economic, cultural, scientific and technological cooperation in 2019.

The two sides agreed to increase the sharing of information and coordination at regional and international forums, especially in the cooperation mechanisms of the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS) and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and related forums, contributing to the common goal of peace, stability and sustainable and inclusive development in the region, as well as promoting solidarity, unity and central role of ASEAN.

They pledged to strengthen coordination in 2020 when Vietnam will take over the ASEAN Chairmanship and Cambodia will host the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM).

Later on the same day, Deputy Foreign Minister Nguyen Quoc Dung paid a courtesy visit to Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Prak Sokhonn.