At the meeting (Photo: VNA) Hanoi (VNA) – Vietnamese Minister of Foreign Affairs Bui Thanh Son and hisIndonesian counterpart Retno Marsudi co-chaired the fifth meeting of the Vietnam-Indonesia JointCommission on Bilateral Cooperation (JCBC) in Hanoi on April 24.
Son congratulated Indonesia on its successful general electionearlier this year, believed that Indonesia would continue to prosper, elevateits position on the international arena, and become a developed country by 2045, its 100th founding anniversary.
Marsudi,for her part, affirmed that Indonesia always values and wishes to further enhance its strategic partnershipwith Vietnam. She hailed Vietnam's successful organisation of the ASEAN FutureForum, which has significantly contributed to promoting the building of astrong and self-reliant ASEAN Community, upholding its central and pioneeringrole in coping with regional challenges.
The two ministers agreed to further facilitate all-levelexchanges and meetings, effectively uphold existing cooperation mechanisms,expedite the completion of the action plan for the 2024-2028 period,contributing to fostering political trust and deepening bilateral cooperationin various fields, toward elevating bilateral relationship to new heights.
Indonesia is currently Vietnam's third largest trading partner whileVietnam is the fourth biggest trading partner of Indonesia in ASEAN. Two-waytrade hit 14 billion USD in 2023, and reached 3.6 billion USD in the first quarter of 2024, up 20% annually.
Toward a two-way trade of 18 billion USD by 2028, with a morebalanced fashion, both sides pledged to encourage the early organisation of ameeting of the Joint Commission on economic, scientific and technicalcooperation, hold trade promotion activities and help firms access each other'smarkets.
Minister Marsudi stressed that Indonesian enterprises areincreasingly interested in expanding their investments in Vietnam. In reply,Son suggested that both sides create favourable conditions for their businessesto expand and diversify investments, particularly in new and promising fieldssuch as green economy, circular economy, renewable energy, semiconductorindustry, digital economy, electric vehicles and Halal cooperation.
Host and guest vowed to reinforce collaboration in nationaldefence-security, fight against cross-border crimes, including cyber and humantrafficking crimes. They also encouraged promoting air connectivity and increasedcooperation in agriculture, aquaculture, education, tourism andpeople-to-people exchange.
On the global and regional issues of shared concern,including the East Sea and Myanmar issues, they promised to continue offering mutualsupport at multilateral and regional organisationsand forums, such as the United Nations, ASEAN, and sub-regional cooperation.
The two sides concurred to maintain ASEAN’s solidarityand agreed principles on the East Sea issue to ensure regional peace, stabilityand prosperity on the basis international law, including the 1982 UnitedNations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
They also pledged to step up the full and effective implementation of the Declaration on the Conduct ofParties in the East Sea (DOC) and actively push for the early conclusion of asubstantive and effective Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC) that is in linewith international law and the 1982 UNCLOS.
The sixth meeting of its kind is scheduled to be held inIndonesia in 2026./.
