Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh (R) and President of the Philippines Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos (Photo: VNA) Phnom Penh (VNA) – Prime MinisterPham Minh Chinh met President of the Philippines Ferdinand Romualdez Marcos on November 10 on theoccasion of they both attending the 40th and 41st ASEAN Summits in PhnomPenh, Cambodia.
PM Chinh congratulated the Philippine Governmentand people on their achievements over the past years, especially in controllingCOVID-19 and maintaining high economic growth.
President Marcos expressed his belief that Vietnam willscore greater successes in renewal process and global integration. He alsowelcomed the upcoming Philippine visit by Vietnamese National Assembly (NA) Chairman Vuong DinhHue.
The two leaders expressed their satisfactionabout the growing bilateral strategic partnership despite COVID-19 and spokehighly of the effective maintenance of high-level exchanges and meetings. Two-waytrade hit an all-time high of 6.8 billion USD last year and nearly 5.4 billion USD in the first eight months of this year.
Sharing the view that there remains ample room to further deepen the bilateral strategic partnership, both sides agreed to promote all-levelvisits. PM Chinh suggested that the two sides coordinate to make the best preparation for the upcomingPhilippine visit by NA Chairman Hue.
He proposed the two countries enhance trade,including in rice, while considering the removal of unnecessary barriers to createbetter investment environment for each other's companies. He also took the occasion to ask thePhilippines to continue offering support to the Vietnamese community to liveand do business there.
Agreeing with PM Chinh’s proposals, PresidentMarcos urged both sides to foster economic-trade-investment, nationaldefence-security cooperation, especially maritime, education-training, labour,culture, tourism, locality-to-locality and people-to-people links. He calledfor attention to sharing experience in energy security, climate changeresponse, digital transformation, hi-tech and offering mutual support to fightnational disasters and epidemics.
On global and regional issues of sharedconcern, the two leaders agreed that Vietnam and the Philippines need tostrengthen consultation and support each other at regional and globalorganisations, especially at ASEAN and the United Nations.
They vowed to support each other and maintainthe unity and centrality of ASEAN.
Regarding the East Sea issue, they pledged touphold the principles of settling disputes by peaceful means in accordance withinternational law, including the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law ofthe Sea (UNCLOS 1982).
On the occasion, President Marcos invited PMChinh to pay an official visit to the Philippines soon at a time convenient for both sides./.
