Sierra Leone President's visit to Viet Nam: A new start for promising future coopearation
This official visit by President Julius Maada Bio and his Spouse marks a positive and good development between the two countries in the context that African countries attach great importance to establishing and developing relations with ones in the Asia-Pacific region, including Viet Nam.
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| The Sierra Leone President visits Viet Nam for the first time. (Photo: Nguyen Hong) |
Viet Nam and Sierra Leone have well-developed political relations. At the multilateral level, Sierra Leone supports Viet Nam's candidacy for the UNESCO Executive Council (2015-2019), the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC 2016-2018), and the United Nations Security Council (UNSC 2020-2021).
| Sierra Leone is a West African country bordering Guinea and Liberia, with an area of nearly 72,000 square kilometers and a population of about eight million. Viet Nam and Sierra Leone established diplomatic relations on June 24, 1982. The year 2022 marks the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries. |
In economic terms, despite the negative impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, the bilateral trade turnover still maintained its growth momentum, from 17 million USD in 2018, to increase three times to 51.5 million USD in 2021.
In addition, Sierra Leone has an investment project in the field of marketing and human resource management in Viet Nam with a registered capital of more than 33,000 USD. Viet Nam still has no investment projects in Sierra Leone.
The two sides also signed many important agreements to promote bilateral trade cooperation such as: Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on cooperation in agriculture and salt production (December 2001); Economic - Trade, Cultural and Technological Agreement (2003); MoU between Viet Nam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and Sierra Leone's Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Food Security on bilateral cooperation in the agricultural sector (2010); MoU between Viet Nam's MARD and Sierra Leone's Ministry of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources on bilateral cooperation in fisheries; Minutes of working between the two Ministry of Foreign Affairs (2010); MoU between two Ministries of Industry and Trade on rice trade (2011).
President's tight schedule
The president is quite busy when he spends seven days visiting many places in Viet Nam. On March 15 and 16, President Julius Maada Bio had talks with President Nguyen Xuan Phuc, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, and Chairman of the National Assembly Vuong Dinh Hue respectively.
In addition, the President and his Spouse also came to visit and laid wreaths at Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, laid flowers at the Memorial of Heroes and Martyrs, visited FPT University and worked with the Vietnam Academy of Agricultural Science (VAAS). From March 17-20, the President of Sierra Leone attends the Business Forum and has other activities in Can Tho and Ho Chi Minh City.
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| The President and his Spouse also came to visit and laid wreaths at Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, laid flowers at the Memorial of Heroes and Martyrs, Ha Noi. (Photo: Nguyen Hong) |
On the afternoon of March 15, at the Presidential Palace, President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his Spouse presided over a welcoming ceremony for the President of Sierra Leone, his Spouse and the delegation. At the meeting, on behalf of the State and people of Viet Nam, President Nguyen Xuan Phuc warmly welcomed President Julius Maada Bio and the high-ranking delegation from Sierra Leone to pay an official visit to Viet Nam. This shows the respect and desire of Sierra Leone's leaders to further strengthen the friendly cooperative relationship between the two countries.
President Nguyen Xuan Phuc highly appreciated the significance of the visit, which took place in the early days of 2022 and in the context of the bilateral celebrating the 40th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations (1982-2022).
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| President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and his Spouse presided over a welcoming ceremony for the President of Sierra Leone, his Spouse and the delegation. (Photo: Nguyen Hong) |
Delivering congratulations on Sierra Leone's achievements in maintaining stability, socio-economic development, prevention and control of the Covid-19 epidemic, and ensuring social welfare under the leadership of President Julius Maada Bio, Viet Nam’s President expressed confidence that Sierra Leone would continue to grow strongly and soon achieve the goals set out in the "Mid-term National Development Plan 2019-2023".
The President of Sierra Leone expressed his honor when visiting the beautiful Viet Nam for the first time. He expressed his sincere thanks to the President for the warm welcome, emphasizing that this was a vivid manifestation of the good relationship between Viet Nam and Sierra Leone. He believed that the visit would continue to strengthen good cooperative relationship between the two countries.
President Julius Maada Bio shared his admiration for the Vietnamese people's history of struggle and defense for national independence; deeply impressed by the socio-economic development achievements in recent years as well as highly appreciated the results of Viet Nam's response to the Covid-19 pandemic and economic recovery.
Economic cooperation is in focus
In the atmosphere of friendship, trust, sincerity and openness, the leaders exchanged and highly agreed on directions to promote cooperation in the coming time.
Regarding political diplomacy, the two sides agreed to continue maintaining high-level visits and contacts, exchanging delegations at all levels; strengthen coordination and mutual support at multilateral forums, especially the United Nations, the Non-Aligned Movement, and support expanding cooperation at the African regional level through the African Union.
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| Minister of Foreign Affairs Bui Thanh Son talked with Sierra Leone's Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. (Photo: Nguyen Hong) |
The two leaders agreed to consider the economy as a key area of cooperation. The two sides agreed to make the most of the potential and strengths of the two economies. On that basis, the two countries committed to seriously implementing the agreements reached to further promote trade cooperation, including rice trade; encourage and create favorable conditions for enterprises to seek opportunities for business cooperation and investment.
Due to similar climatic and soil conditions, the two sides agreed to make agriculture the mainstay of bilateral cooperation; learn and share experiences to promote agricultural cooperation within the bilateral framework, as well as tripartite cooperation between the two countries and the participation of international development organizations, industrialized countries and investors from the private sector. In addition, the leaders also focused on exchanging measures to expand cooperation in fields such as high technology, telecommunications, digital transformation, innovation, education and training, etc.
After the talks, President Nguyen Xuan Phuc and President Julius Maada Bio witnessed the signing ceremony of three bilateral cooperation documents in the fields of diplomacy, agriculture and fisheries, laying the foundation for strengthening the cooperation between Viet Nam and Sierra Leone.
At a meeting with President Julius Maada Bio, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh highly appreciated the good developments in the relationship between the two countries and emphasized that the two sides still have a lot of potential to further improve the efficiency of cooperation, especially in the fields of trade, investment, agriculture, technology, education and training, security, defense, people-to-people exchange.
For his part, President Julius Maada Bio once again emphasized that his country especially admires Viet Nam's great achievements in the agricultural sector. On the basis of the good relationship between the two countries, Sierra Leone wishes to receive support from Viet Nam and share experiences in this field.
At the meeting with President Julius Maada Bio on March 16, National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue affirmed that parliamentary cooperation is an important channel in implementing Viet Nam's foreign policy. NA Chairman expressed his wish that the legislative bodies of the two countries establish and promote cooperative relations, exchange information and experience in the field of legislation, supervise and decide on major issues of the country. Through President Julius Maada Bio, National Assembly Chairwoman Vuong Dinh Hue sent greetings and cordially invited Sierra Leone Speaker Abss Chernor Bundu to pay an official visit to Viet Nam soon.
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The first visit of the President of Sierra Leone to Viet Nam, as the first exchange of high level delegations between the two countries, with fruitful outcomes can be seen as the good start for the bilateral relationship to develop and flourish in the coming time - especially in the fields of diplomacy, agriculture and investment - meeting the aspiration of and efforts by the two countries' government leaders and peoples.
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