Ha Noi (VNA) – Singaporean President S.R Nathan and his wife will pay an official visit to Viet Nam from February 25-29 at the invitation of his Vietnamese counterpart Nguyen Minh Triet. This will be the second visit to Viet Nam made by President Nathan in his current position.
Viet Nam and Singapore established their diplomatic ties on August 1, 1973. Since 1991, particularly after Viet Nam joined the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in July 1995, bilateral relations has entered a new period of development. Comprehensive cooperation between the two countries has become increasingly efficient, especially in economics and trade. Viet Nam has become one of Singapore ’s key markets for trade and investment cooperation in Southeast Asia .
In 2004, the two ASEAN members signed a joint communiqué on comprehensive cooperation in the 21 st century. They agreed to realize the initiative to connect the two economies, with finance, investment, trade-service, transportation, telecommunication-information technology and education being major areas of cooperation.
Educational and cultural relations between the two nations have been broadened and strengthened. Singapore has also actively assisted Viet Nam in science, technology, human resources development, tourism, finance and banking, and shared with Viet Nam its experiences in market economy, regional and international integration.
Since 2000, Singapore has each year offered Viet Nam 150-200 scholarships on English language and training for certain areas. The number of self-financed Vietnamese students studying in Singapore has been also increasing.
Viet Nam and Singapore have cooperated efficiently in trade and investment. Over the past years, despite the fluctuation of ASEAN’s direct investment flows into Viet Nam , Singapore has always maintained its leading position with the number of projects and the volume of investment capital constantly rising.
By the end of 2007, Singapore had poured nearly 9.7 billion USD into more than 500 projects in Viet Nam . Its projects engage in all fields, from oil and gas exploration, industrial production to agro-forestry and aquatic processing. However, most of the projects go to infrastructure, services and real estate.