The Obama administration has pledged to expand its relations with Vietnam as well as other emerging Asian Pacific nations, affirmed a US Assistant Secretary of State.

US Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell presented the Obama administration’s strategy in the Asia-Pacific at the March 31 hearings of the Subcommittee on Asia and the Pacific of the US House of Representatives’ Committee on Foreign Affairs.

Vietnam is one of the US ’s increasingly important partners, along with Indonesia , Malaysia , Mongolia , New Zealand , Singapore and India , said Campbell .

Vietnam is one of eight partners involving in the ongoing negotiations of Trans Pacific Partnership with the US, he affirmed, stressing that US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung agreed to further develop bilateral ties into a strategic partnership at a meeting in Hanoi last year.

He said that the Obama administration also pledged to increase involved in the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF), the ASEAN Defence Ministers’ Meeting – Plus (ADMM+), the East Asia Summit (EAS) and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF)./.