Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong speaks at the second Vietnam – Hungary rectors’ conference in Budapest on September 11 (Photo: VNA) Budapest (VNA) – Vietnam will always support, facilitate and assist universities of the country and Hungary to effectively implement their training cooperation in the time to come, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam Central Committee Nguyen Phu Trong stated on September 11.
The affirmation was made when the Party leader attended and delivered a speech at the opening of the second Vietnam – Hungary rectors’ conference in Budapest, as he was making an official visit to Hungary at the invitation of Prime Minister Viktor Oban.
Describing the conference as an important and very practical cooperation mechanism among universities of the two countries, Party leader Trong also spoke highly of the collaboration between the two countries’ relevant ministries in organizing the event with an aim of further developing relations between the universities, helping implement cooperation documents signed between the two sides.
Speaking at the event, Hungarian Deputy Prime Minister Mihaly Varga expressed admiration at Vietnam’s achievements in various fields, especially education and training, stressing that Vietnam is an important gateway for Hungary to advance to Southeast Asia. Hungary is enjoying high development prospects to become a motive of economic growth of Europe, and this will create good chances for Vietnamese firms, the official added.
At the conference, participants focused their discussion on the prospects of bilateral cooperation in training and scientific research, with the core contents being strengthening joint education programmes between the universities of the two countries, boosting the exchange of students and lecturers, and forming joint research groups, among others.
Vietnam – Hungary cooperation in education and training is a prominent point in the bilateral relations. Over the past nearly 70 years, Hungary has helped trained over 3,000 Vietnamese students, many of them have held and are holding important positions in the State management apparatus, science, culture, art and business in Vietnam. Recently, the number of annual scholarships granted by the Hungarian government to Vietnamese cities has seen a sharp increase, to 200 now from only five in 2012 and 100 in 2016. Currently there are nearly 500 Vietnamese students studying in Hungary while a large number of Hungarian students are studying in Vietnam.
The first conference of the rectors was held in Hanoi in November 2014 with the participation of representatives from 50 Vietnamese and 15 Hungarian universities, on the occasion of the Vietnam visit by President Janos Ader. The conference this time was held on the occasion of the official Hungary visit by Party leader Nguyen Phu Trong, drawing the participation of representatives of over 30 Vietnamese and 20 Hungarian universities. The signing of up to 15 agreement documents at this year’s conference is described as evidence of attention from universities to the utilization of cooperation potential and chances in the field of education and training between the two countries.-VNA
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