General Secretary To Lam's policy speech at Oxford University

Principal, leaders of the School,

Professors, lecturers, researchers, students and friends of Viet Nam at Oxford University,

Ladies and gentlemen,

I and the Vietnamese delegation are glad to be here at Oxford University with a long tradition of promoting academic freedom and global knowledge. Oxford is one of the world's top education centers, a symbol of the UK's knowledge, where generations of people who have committed to peace, justice and human progress.

It is our special honor to share Viet Nam's vision for the new era with you, especially young people who are going to shape the future of the world, and with future scientists and policy makers.

In today's gathering, I would like to share with your three issues: First, the world has entered a period of fierce strategic competition, full of risks but also opening up new opportunities. Second, Viet Nam chooses the path of peaceful and people-centered development, independence, self-reliance, and creativity, not just to build a strong and wealthy country but also to make responsible contribution to stability in our region and rules-based international order. Third, the Viet Nam-UK comprehensive strategic partnership – the highest in Viet Nam's foreign policy hierarchy – needs to become a model of new, substantive, fair, mutually-beneficiary cooperation for mutual development.

Ladies and gentlemen

We are living in a period when borders and power concepts are changing day by day, even hour by hour. Political landscape is now witnessing strategic competitions between major power centers in terms of not only politics-security but also economy, technology, supply chain, data standard, artificial intelligence and biotechnology. Competition in innovation, control of core technologies, renewable energy, digital infrastructure has become a new power race. Frankly speaking, those who can master strategic autonomy and strategic technologies will shape rules of the game and likely be the winners.

At the same time, the risks of local conflicts, territorial and sovereignty disputes, interest collisions in maritime, cyber and digital spaces have intensified in both frequency and complexity. Pressure to take sides and join ally to contain each other have re-emerged in more sophisticated forms. New boundaries have expanded beyond territorial boundaries to include data, technology and supply chains. It seems that the world is running concurrently in two directions: connecting deeper, dividing faster.

Traditional and non-traditional security challenges are intertwined: Energy security, food security, water resource security, climate change, global pandemics, hi-tech crime, cyber attacks on key systems. No country, regardless of large or small, can handles these risks on its own.

Today's geo-economic competition is not merely the matter of market, tax or trade deficit. It is the competition that encompasses strategic supply chains, rights to access key minerals, rights to shape new technological standards. Many countries are revising industrial development strategies, promoting self-reliance and diversification, independence, and supply chain security, thereby shaping global production map and restructuring investment flows.

Given the context, the question for all countries is not only which side to take, where to stand, but how to stand firmly, how to be autonomous. For Viet Nam this is a matter of life and death.

Viet Nam chooses the path of peace, independence, self-reliance and cooperation for mutual development. Viet Nam had to sacrificed blood and bones to gain independence and paid price for peace. We profoundly understand the ultimate value of peace. The principle "No thing is more precious than independence and freedom" as said by President Ho Chi Minh is the guideline for our nation. It serves as the moral foundation and principle of life for us in today's life and international relations.

In a world full of pressure for side-taking, Viet Nam remains steadfast with the foreign policy of independence, self-reliance, diversification and multi-lateralization of external relations; Viet Nam wishes to be a friend, trusted partner, and responsible member of the international community. Viet Nam strives to be warm inside and peaceful outside: maintaining political stability, socio-economic development in the country while maintaining an external environment of peace and cooperation, and mutual respect; settling disagreements through peaceful means in line with international law; placing people and their legitimate interests first and foremost.

We sticks to the principles: firmly protecting independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity; at the same time creating an external environment conducive to advancing national development, improving living standard, narrowing development gap, making contributions to peace and stability in the region and the world at large. We protect our Fatherland by peace, international law, culture, national traditions, and cooperation for mutual benefits. This is our Viet Nam's proactive and responsible strategic choice.

I would like to emphasize that Viet Nam does not advocate confrontation. Viet Nam does not choose a development path based on conflict and confrontation. We believe in equal dialogues and international law, we believe that sovereignty should not be asserted by guns or by imposition, but by mutual respect, by agreements to respect common rules and by shared interests.

Such approach has helped Viet Nam maintain socio-political stability while proactively advancing international economic integration, joining new-generation free trade agreements, expanding multi-layered cooperation with partners in all regions, including the UK.

Dear friends,

If we want to go far, fast, stable, sustainable and proactively, we know that we cannot rely solely on natural resources, cheap labor, or human resource advantages, etc., Viet Nam has defined a clear path: science and technology, innovation, digital transformation and knowledge economy will be the key growth drivers in the coming period.

We are strongly gearing up the national strategy for digital transformation and development of digital economy, green economy, circular economy, low-carbon economy. We consider innovation as not only a pure scientific laboratory but as the vitality for the economy, as national competitiveness, and as the ability to withstand geo-political and geo-economic shocks.

The above process prompts the need for institutional reforms. We will continue building and improving the socialist-oriented market economy model: an economy that operates in line with market rules, encourages healthy competition, upholds the role of private enterprises as an important driving force for growth. We also affirm the leading role of the law-governed socialist State under the leadership of the Communist Party of Viet Nam in order to ensure both growth and social progress and social equality.

In short, we consider private economy as the most important driver to accelerate economic development; consider State-owned economy as the leading force to ensure macro stability, economic security, energy security and food security; consider the law-governed State, governance integrity, corruption/wastefulness/interest groups prevention and combat as the conditions to consolidate social trust, effectively allocate social resources, and ensure people benefit from development achievements.

At the same time, we place people at the center of all development strategies. The main targets are not merely statistical growth indicators, but the quality of people's lives: income, housing, public healthcare, education, social security, personal development opportunities, living environment. We strive not to trade environment for growth. We strive not to trade culture for industrialization. We want urbanization while leaving no one behind.

These are the very fundamental issues in Viet Nam's development mindset: fast growth must be associated sustainable development; sustainable development must be based on knowlege, science and technology, and innovation; innovation can only be meaningful if it brings about practical benefits to people on fair and equal bassis.

Against that backdrop, Viet Nam clearly set out two strategic goals - centenary goals. The first goal: We are determined to become a developing country with modern industry and high middle-income status by 2030 to mark the 100th founding anniversary of the Communist Party of Viet Nam. The second goal, Viet Nam strives to become a developed country with high income, modern economy, civilized society, high level of material and spiritual life, and high position on the international arena by 2045 to mark the 100th anniversary of the National Day. This is our political-historical commitment that we have declared to our people and to the international community.

Dear friends,

Viet Na and the UK established diplomatic relations in 1973. Since then, both sides have made great and meaingful stride despite geographical distance, and different development levels and political regimes.

In 2010, the two countries signed the Joint Declaration on the establishment of Strategic Partnership. This is a major turning point, ushering in a new period of extensive cooperation across various fields like politics-diplomacy, trade-investment, education and training, science and technology, defense-security, sustainable development and people-to-people exchanges.

To date, economic and trade cooperation between Viet Nam and the UK has become increasingly strategic. After Brezit, the two countries signed a free trade agreement with high-quality commitments, thereby ensuring the continuation of trade and investment flows. At the same time, the UK's accession to the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), where Viet Nam is a founding members, has created an open economic cooperation structure based on high standards on digital commerce, intellectual property, services and investment.

Education cooperation has emerged as a remarkable pillar. Tens of thounsands of Vietnamese students have studied in the UK in the fields of science, engineering, information technology, finance, medicine, biomedicine, public policy, serving as the bridge of knowledge between the two countries.

To day, we are standing on the threshold of new development stage: both countries are accelerating the upgrade of the bilateral ties to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership – the highest in Viet Nam's diplomatic hierarchy. This clearly reflects that Viet Nam regards the UK as not only a trading partner, an education partner, a science and technology partner, but also as a long-term strategic partner, working together to shape cooperation standards for the 21st century.

I would like to emphasize two things:

First: The Viet Nam-UK relationship is the relationship of friendship, cooperation and mutual development. This is the partnership that both sides share the fundamental interests in maintaining peace, stability, respect for international law, ensuring maritime freedom, protecting global supply chains, promoting fair and sustainable trade, cooping with climate change, and advancing green and inclusive development. In other words, this is the covergence of the UK's need to engage deepeer in the Asia-Pacific region and Viet Nam's need to expand strategic space, technology, education, and high-quality finance cooperation with the UK, Europe and the international community.

Second: we need a new model of cooperation that is practical, measurable, and beneficial to our two countries' people. The "new model of cooperation", as I have said, means cooperation in combining the UK's strengths in basic science, application science, high technology, biomedicine, public health, education and training, urban management, energy transition, financial with Viet Nam's needs for digital transformation, greeen transition, improvement of workforce quality, innovation of development governance, and perfection of socialist-oriented market economy.

This does not just limit to transfer of technologies. It means working together to create the future. I believe that it is Oxford-with a tradtion of connecting knowledge and public policies, and influential alumi community all over the world, could play a specific role in this process. I can imagine at least four directions:

(i) Joint cooperation in education and research in the key areas of public health, biotechnology, nuclear science, basic science, responsible artificial intelligence, climate change, clean energy policies.

(ii) Program on exchange of experts between Viet Nam's policy study academies and the UK's policy research, public governance, and sustainable development centers in order to propose policy recommendations that can be applied in reality, bringing back practical outcomes.

(iii) Cooperation in innovation and tech startups for Vietnamese enterprises, especiall small and medium-sized enterprises and startups – the stakesholders that would decide the speed of digital transformation and green transition of the Vietnamese economy in the coming decade.

(iv) Working together to test the models of sustainable urban development, green finance, open education, digital medicine, and public healthcare that both sides care for and need.

If we can do that, the relationship between Viet Nam and the UK will not purely be high-level political statements. It will become a living resource, a network of knowledge and technology spanning from Ha Noi to London, from Ho Chi Minh City to Oxford, academies to academies, universities to universities, enterprises to enterprises, and people to people.

Dear friends,

Viet Nam has entered a new development period with a strong aspiration: building a strong, prosperous, humane country; a modern, green and smart economy; an fair and civilized society, where everyone enjoys comprehensive security and has equal opportunities for comprehensive development. We strive for the goal of wealthy people, strong, democratic, fair and civilized nation. This is the consistent guideline in our's national development strategy.

We believe in the power of humannity. Throughout our history, Viet Nam always used humannity to overcome cruelty, benevolence to replace violance. We believe that the most sustainable power of a nation lies not only in military or financial strength. It also includes moral strength, the strength to unite people, and the strength to build trust with interntaional friends.

We love peace and aspire for freedom and development. We seek equal cooperation. We do not accept imposition. We respect international law. We do not wish the world to be devided into opposing blocs, but rather hope for a world that unites together for our plannet. We want the world to develop together.

With that spirit, I wish that young generation in the UK, academies, universities, innovation enterprises, civil society organizations, as well as future policy makers would always believe that Viet Nam is a sincere and trustworthy partner, standing ready to share responsibilities and interests in the emerging global order.

I believe that if we work together to build a comprehensive, substantive strategic partnerhship framework on the basis of mutual respect, mutual benefit, and long-term vision, the Viet Nam-UK relations will not only make a new step foward on the diplomatic map in the new era but also become a driving force, a model and a shared success story, not just for our two countries but also for peace, stability and development in the 21st century.

Thank you!

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