Vietnam, Malaysia promote friendship, cooperation

Hanoi (VNA) - The Vietnam - Malaysia Friendship Association (VMFA) under the Vietnam Union of Friendship Organisations (VUFO) hosted a friendship exchange in Hanoi on September 19 as part of activities to mark the 61st anniversary of Malaysia’s National Day.

At the event, Vice President of the Vietnam Fatherland Front (VFF) Central Committee cum Chairman of the VMFA Ngo Sach Thuc sent his congratulations to Malaysian Ambassador to Vietnam Zamruni Khalid, and asked the diplomat to convey his best wishes to Malaysian leaders and people on the occasion.

While expressing his joy at great achievements across fields of Malaysia, stressing that Malaysia has enjoyed high economic growth of about 5 percent. The country’s economic growth in 2018 is likely to reach 5-5.5 percent.

The country also recorded positive development in terms of culture, education, science-technology and social security, while the local people’s living conditions have been improved, and the nation’s position and international prestige has been raised.

Over the last 45 years, the Vietnam-Malaysia friendship and multifaceted cooperation have been bolstered across fields from politics, trade, security-defence, culture, labour and tourism.

As the key forces in promoting the friendship between the two countries’ people, the VUFO, the VMFA and Malaysian partners have made positive contributions in recent years.

Many practical activities such as exchange and art performance have been organised by the two organisations, contributing to enhancing mutual understanding between the two people, thus promoting the bilateral relations.

Thuc hoped for closer coordination and more effective support of one another between the VMFA and the Malaysian Embassy in Vietnam in the coming time, contributing to pushing the friendship and cooperation between the two nations.

For his part, Malaysian Ambassador Zamruni Khalid was pleased to announce that Vietnam and his country have reached important milestones in economic ties, especially in investment, trade and tourism cooperation.

Malaysian is the seventh largest investor in Vietnam with a total investment of 12.2 billion USD. Malaysian firms mainly invest in real estate, production, banking and oil and gas sectors.

Two-way trade between Vietnam and Malaysia hit over 11 billion USF in 2017. Vietnam’s key exports to Malaysia are mobile phone, electronic products and rice.

Regarding tourism links, over 480,000 Malaysians visited Vietnam in 2017, ranking tenth among the largest tourism markets of Vietnam.

Ambassador Zamruni Khalid said with the increasing number of flights between the two countries, the number Malaysian tourists to Vietnam will increase.

He believed that the Vietnam-Malaysia Strategic Partnership would be closer in the time to come. -VNA