A ceremony was held in Ho Chi Minh City to celebrate the 4,346 th anniversary of the Republic of Korea ’s National Foundation Day (October 3).

Speaking at the event on October 2, Consul General Oh Jae-Hack highlighted the growing cooperation between his country and Vietnam in all areas, such as politics, economics, and culture, with Vietnam-RoK relations now formalised as a strategic partnership.

Since the establishment of bilateral diplomatic ties in 1992, two-way trade has increased 56-fold and reached 28 billion USD in 2013, he added. RoK businesses have so far injected more than 32.8 billion USD into Vietnam.

More than 100,000 RoK nationals live inVietnam, while tens of thousands of Vietnamese-Korean couples and families have come into being, illustrating the diverse relations between the two nations, he said.

Vice Chairwoman of the municipal People’s Committee Nguyen Thi Hong sent her congratulations to RoK expatriates on the occasion, saying the solid political ties created a stable foundation for the development of cooperation in other fields, such as economics.

She noted that the RoK was the fourth biggest investor in Ho Chi Minh City , with more than 1,000 projects worth nearly 5 billion USD. Bilateral trade exceeded 1.7 billion USD during the first eight months of the year.

She expressed her belief that the cooperative ties between the city and the RoK would play an active role in strengthening the comprehensive partnership between Vietnam and the RoK.-VNA