US Ambassador to Vietnam Marc E. Knapper (Photo: VNA)
He said Vietnam and the US have deepened their cooperation tremendously in all fields such as trade and investment, health care, climate, people-to-people and cultural exchanges, education, defence, security, law enforcement, and science technology.
The US hopes to work with Vietnam to strengthen peace and stability in the region, ensuring a free and open Indo-Pacific in general and a free and open East Sea in particular, he said.
“We share with Vietnam values such as respecting each other's political systems and respect for each other's sovereignty and territorial integrity,” he stated, adding that “we want a Vietnam that is strong, independent prosperous, and resilient.”
Regarding bilateral trade cooperation, the diplomat noted that trade between the two countries has reached nearly 140 billion USD per year.
“Although you see different figures, but basically it's grown over 300 times, a huge number in the last 10 years,” he said.
Two-way trade has increased more than 300 times from only 450 million USD in 1995, when the two countries normalised their relations, to nearly 140 billion USD in 2022, he clarified, underlining that Vietnam is the eighth largest trade partner and the biggest ASEAN exporter of the US.
Vietnam mostly exports machinery, electronic equipment, textiles, footwear, seafood, wood and wood products to the US.
At a working session between head of the Party Central Committee's Commission for External Relations Le Hoai Trung and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken (Photo: VNA) The two sides have also worked closely together in responding to COVID-19, post-pandemic recovery, science-technology, education and environment, he noted.
The US provided 40 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to Vietnam, while putting its regional CDC office in Hanoi, he said.
He said that there are over 30,000 Vietnamese students in the US, making Vietnam the fifth largest source of foreign students in the country. Many US education projects have been successful in Vietnam, including Fulbright University and Peace Corps programmes, he said.
The US has also coordinated with Vietnam in dealing with war aftermaths, enhancing law enforcement at sea, and joining peacekeeping operations, and criminal prevention and combat, underlined the ambassador, adding that the two sides have worked closely together at multilateral forums to solve regional and international issues of mutual concern, including sustainable development and climate change response.
Regarding his plan to promote bilateral ties in the future, Ambassador Knapper underscored that he will continue to focus on education cooperation with Vietnam, seeking ways to bring more Vietnamese students to the US and get more American young people to Vietnam.
“I want to see more American students, come here and study and hopefully make friends and build bridges in their own way here in Vietnam,” he stated.
He also mentioned cooperation in health care, especially when more US firms show interest in building their factories in Vietnam./.
VNA
