The President's visit to Laos and Cambodia on his first official trip is of great significance, reflecting a very important message from the Party and State of Vietnam as well as from the President himself.

According to the announcement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, at the invitation of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party, President of the Lao People's Democratic Republic Thongloun Sisoulith and King of Cambodia Preah Bat Samdech Preah Boromneath Norodom Sihamoni, President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam To Lam will pay a State visit to the Lao People's Democratic Republic and the Kingdom of Cambodia from July 11-13.

Ahead of the visit, Deputy Foreign Minister Do Hung Viet gave an interview to the press about the contents related to the visit and bilateral relations between Vietnam and Laos and Cambodia.

- President To Lam will pay a State visit to Laos and Cambodia from July 11 to 13. Could you please tell us the significance of this special visit of the President?

Deputy Minister Do Hung Viet: At the invitation of Comrade Thoonglun Sisulith, General Secretary, President of Laos and King of Cambodia Norodom Sihamoni, President To Lam will pay a State visit to Laos and Cambodia from July 11 to 13.

This is President To Lam's first overseas trip since taking office. The President's visit to Laos and Cambodia on this first trip is of great significance, demonstrating a very important message from the Party and State of Vietnam as well as from the President himself. That is, the Party and State of Vietnam always attach great importance to and give the highest priority to the great friendship, special solidarity and comprehensive cooperation between Vietnam and Laos and the good neighborly relationship, traditional friendship, comprehensive cooperation, and long-term sustainability between Vietnam and Cambodia.

It is also a message affirming the solidarity and close bond between the three countries. Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are geographically close, have historical and cultural ties, and the three leading parties in the three countries have a common origin, the Indochinese Communist Party. The people of the three countries have also had solidarity and sacrificed their blood for the cause of national liberation, national unification and national development as it is today.

With the determination to promote the implementation of high-level agreements, especially the results of the annual meetings between the Politburo of our Party and the Politburo of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party and the Standing Committee of the Cambodian People's Party (CPP), the visit will mark a new stage of development in the Vietnam-Laos and Vietnam-Cambodia relations on the basis of equality, mutual benefit, effective cooperation, respect for each other's interests, contributing to consolidating strategic trust, deepening relations with the two countries, strengthening solidarity between Vietnam-Laos-Cambodia and the ASEAN bloc.

- Could you please give a general assessment of Vietnam's relations with the two countries and the highlights for each country?

Deputy Minister Do Hung Viet: The Vietnam-Laos and Vietnam-Cambodia relations are developing very well and comprehensively on the basis of increasing trust and solidarity. Party channel cooperation plays a core role, has been guiding and leading the strong development of the relations.

Defense and security cooperation between Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia is increasingly becoming a solid pillar of cooperation, contributing significantly to maintaining stability, security, politics and society in each country, especially in border areas. Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia are all steadfast in the principle of not allowing hostile forces to use the territory of one country to conduct acts of sabotage against the other. The three countries are promoting important cooperation mechanisms such as: Annual Conference between the three Ministers of Public Security/Interior Affairs, Annual Meeting between the three Ministers of Defense and Joint Search and Rescue Exercises between the three countries' Armies.

Economic, investment and trade cooperation continues to develop more positively and effectively, economic cooperation in border areas develops dynamically, not only increasing the connection between the three countries but also contributing significantly to improving the lives of people in border areas between Vietnam-Laos, Vietnam-Cambodia as well as between the three countries.

Meetings of the Vietnam-Laos Intergovernmental Committee are held regularly to promptly discuss and find solutions to enhance the effectiveness of cooperation in key areas. Vietnam continues to be one of Laos' largest investors and trade partners, and currently has 255 valid investment projects in Laos with a total capital of 5.5 billion USD.

Vietnam is currently Cambodia's third largest trading partner and Cambodia's largest in ASEAN. Vietnam currently has 205 valid investment projects in Cambodia with a total registered capital of 2.94 billion USD, ranking first in ASEAN and among the top 5 countries with the largest direct investment in Cambodia. Laos and Cambodia are both top countries among the 79 countries and territories that Vietnam invests abroad.

Educational and training cooperation has received special attention from the leaders of the Party and State of the three countries. Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia all give high priority to widely disseminating, especially to the younger generation, the historical values ​​of solidarity, friendship and mutual sacrifice among the three countries.

In addition, Vietnam focuses on supporting Laos and Cambodia to improve the quality of human resources. The number of students exchanged between Vietnam and Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia is increasing with increasingly high quality, which is a human resource that actively contributes to the development of each country, and at the same time is an extremely important foundation to promote cultural exchange, enhance understanding and communication between the people of the two countries.

In addition, cooperation in the fields of transportation, culture-society, tourism, science-technology is also developing strongly. In particular, the work of handling legal documents for people of Vietnamese origin in Cambodia has made new progress, which is a premise for creating better and better conditions for the Vietnamese community to live and do business in Cambodia. Recently, Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni signed a decree granting citizenship to 3 cases.

During the visit, President To Lam is expected to hold talks, meetings and contacts with all senior leaders of Laos and Cambodia. This is a good opportunity for the two countries' senior leaders to review high-level agreements, important areas of cooperation and outline future cooperation directions.

The visit will certainly create new momentum to develop more deeply, comprehensively and strongly the great friendship, special solidarity and comprehensive cooperation between Vietnam and Laos and the good neighborliness, traditional friendship, comprehensive cooperation and long-term sustainability between Vietnam and Cambodia; as well as promote cooperation within multilateral frameworks such as ASEAN, Mekong sub-region cooperation mechanisms and the United Nations.

- Thank you very much, Deputy Minister!./.