Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnam always attaches importance to building substantive cooperation with relevant agencies of Croatia, a country with an increasingly important position in the European Union, Minister of Public Security Luong Tam Quang has said.
At a reception in Hanoi on May 19 for visiting Croatian Minister of Foreign and European Affairs Gordan Grlić Radman and his delegation, Quang said that this is the first visit to Vietnam by a Croatian foreign minister since the two countries established diplomatic relations in 1994. He noted that the visit takes place at a time when Vietnam-Croatia relations are entering a new phase with promising cooperation opportunities.
In recent years, the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security (MoPS) and Croatian partners have carried out various practical cooperation activities, including the signing of a cooperation agreement on fire prevention, firefighting, search and rescue as well as coordination in verifying criminal information at the request of the Croatian INTERPOL Office.
Against the backdrop of rapid, complex and unpredictable developments in the world and the region, along with intertwined traditional and non-traditional security challenges, Quang said the ministry wishes to further promote the friendship between the two countries in general, and cooperation between the MoPS and the Croatian Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs and relevant Croatian agencies in particular, in a more substantive and effective manner for the benefit of the two countries' people, while contributing to peace and stability in the region and the world.
On that spirit, Minister Quang suggested that both sides continue facilitating more engagement of Vietnamese and EU businesses in each other’s markets, while making it easier for citizens of both countries to live, study and work in each other’s host country.
He also proposed that the two sides strengthen cooperation in producing specialised products for law enforcement forces in areas where Croatia has strengths and which meet the needs of the MoPS, while increasing delegation exchanges at all levels and expanding collaboration in areas of mutual interest.
On the occasion, the Vietnamese minister called on Croatia to soon sign and ratify the United Nations Convention against Cybercrime (the Hanoi Convention), while considering sending a Croatian professional football club to play a friendly match with the football team of the MoPS.
For his part, Radman said he was honoured to make his first official visit to Vietnam as Croatia’s Foreign and European Affairs Minister, especially on the occasion of the 136th birth anniversary of President Ho Chi Minh.
Congratulating Vietnam on its remarkable development achievements in recent years, he affirmed that Croatia values its friendship with Vietnam and considers Vietnam one of Croatia’s most important partners in Southeast Asia. He also expressed Croatia’s desire to strengthen bilateral relations across all fields.
Speaking highly of the outcomes of bilateral cooperation in security and law enforcement in recent years, the Croatian Minister expressed his belief that, with sincerity and strong political determination from both sides, cooperation between the MoPS and Croatian partner agencies will become one of the pillars helping elevate Vietnam-Croatia relations to a new height./.
