Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong on October 1 left Hanoi
for a four-day state visit to the Republic of Korea at the
invitation of President Park Geun-hye.
The visit
aims to strengthen political understanding and trust between the two
countries’ high-ranking leaders as well as promote cooperation between
the two ruling parties and the friendship between the two peoples.
Since Vietnam and the RoK set up diplomatic ties in 1992 and
bilateral ties were upgraded to a strategic cooperative partnership five
years ago, their relations have developed in a strong, comprehensive
and intensive manner.
The RoK has been one of
the top economic partners of Vietnam. As of June this year, the
country ranked first among foreign investors in Vietnam with 3,687
projects and came second in terms of registered capital with 31.2
billion USD, doubling the 2008 figure.
The RoK
is Vietnam’s third largest trade partner with two-way trade
reaching 27.5 billion USD last year, quadrupling the 2007 level. The two
countries set to raise bilateral trade to 70 billion USD by 2020 and
are actively finalising negotiations towards the early signing of a
bilateral Free Trade Agreement (FTA).
The RoK
is also the second largest donor of official development assistance
(ODA) to Vietnam, after Japan, with a committed amount of 1.2
billion USD for the 2012-2015 period.
As many
as 120,000 Vietnamese are living and working in the RoK, including
50,000 Vietnamese-Korean couples. The RoK community in Vietnam also
numbers around 120,000.-VNA