Vietnamese Justice Minister Ha Hung Cuong, alongwith representatives from his agency, the Vietnamese National Assembly’sJudicial Committee, Social Affairs Committee, and the GovernmentOffice, are currently on a working visit to Italy from July 8-11.
Duringthe talks, Italian Minister of Justice Andrea Orlando stressed that theVietnam-Italy relations had developed substantially in recent times.
He expressed his approval for the basic content ofthe draft Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on cooperation between thetwo countries’ justice ministries, adding that the MoU would be signedsoon.
The Minister took the occasion to thank the Government ofVietnam for its support for Italy’s bid for non-permanent membership ofthe UN Security Council.
On his part, Minister Cuong concurredwith his Italian counterpart on the sound development of bilateral ties,stressing that Italy was one of Vietnam’s most important partners inthe European Union.
Briefing his host on theVietnamese context, Cuong introduced the country’s renewal process overnearly three decades, and the reform of law and justice over the last 15years, praising the approval of the new Constitution in 2013 as anexample of the efforts made to date.
He informed his hostthat Vietnamese authorities would work to institutionalise theregulations stated in the 2013 Constitution.
The guest expressedhis hope that the two ministries sign the MoU on cooperation as soon aspossible. He suggested the negotiation of a civil judicial assistanceagreement between the two agencies in order to protect citizens andinvestors in the two countries.
Minister Andrea Orlando agreedwith the proposal and the two sides pledged to assign the relevantagencies to the negotiation of a draft.
After thetalks, a round-table seminar was held between the two sides, focusing onthe organisational and operational structure of judicial agencies inthe two countries, as well as their experience in judicial reform andtraining.
In the afternoon, the Vietnamese delegation worked with representatives of the Italian Senate’s Legal Committee.-VNA