President Nguyen Xuan Phuc (R) and President and CEO of Yonhap News Agency Seong Ghi-hong (Photo: VNA) At the reception, which also saw the presence of VNA General Director Vu Viet Trang, President Phuc welcomed Seong to Vietnam at a time when the two countries are celebrating the 30th anniversary of diplomatic ties.
He recalled his recent visit to the RoK and expressed impression on his talks with RoK President Yoon Suk-yeol, meetings with RoK leaders and the two countries’ people, and cultural-art exchanges to raise mutual understanding.
In particular, Vietnam and RoK announced the upgrade of their ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership, opening up a new chapter for bilateral friendship and cooperation, he said.
Via Yonhap, the Vietnamese leader extended his sincere thanks to RoK President Yoon, competent agencies and people for their warm reception that made important contributions to the success of his visit.
He said the visit by Seong is a specific action to realise the bilateral comprehensive strategic partnership recently announced by the two countries’ leaders.
Over the past three decades, Vietnam and RoK have reaped achievements in politics, national defence-security, economy, culture, tourism and people-to-people exchange, including cooperation between their news agencies, he added.
President Phuc described the RoK as a major economic partner and top investor of Vietnam with a total FDI worth over 80 billion USD. Two-way trade is estimated at 90 billion USD this year.
According to him, the two countries target 100 billion USD in two-way trade next year and 150 billion USD by 2030.
At present, there are over 216,000 Vietnamese people in the RoK with 65,000 multicultural families. The RoK also records a community of more than 180,000 in Vietnam. In the near future, both sides will enhance political trust and collaboration in national defence-security, culture, education, tourism and people-to-people exchange in the spirit of the bilateral comprehensive strategic partnership.
Seong, for his part, said his visit aims to upgrade Yonhap's cooperation with VNA, thereby contributing to the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two nations.
He told President Phuc that Yonhap assigned a large number of editors and reporters to cover the Vietnamese leader’s visit to the RoK, adding that he was impressed by Phuc’s meetings with Korean friendship associations and people during the visit.
The guest firmly believed that following President Phuc’s trip, many Korean firms will travel to Vietnam to seek business opportunities.
Informing the host about the results of cooperation between Yonhap and VNA, Seong said they have been working effectively together in the spirit of mutual understanding, cooperation and friendship.
He added that Yonhap and VNA will enhance collaboration in fighting fake and toxic news as well as implement cooperation and communications programmes, and vowed that he will work closely with VNA General Director Trang to lift ties between the two news agencies on par with the bilateral comprehensive strategic partnership.
President Phuc said VNA is a strategic and significant news agency of the Vietnamese State that is responsible for providing official news of Vietnam for media networks at home and abroad.
At the reception (Photo: VNA) On the occasion, he also praised VNA for pioneering in the fight against fake, spam and toxic news.
The host suggested Yonhap actively assist VNA in professional expertise and share stances at multilateral, regional and global forums.
He believed that the two news agencies will fulfill their assigned tasks and propel development in the two countries, the region and the world./.
VNA
