Viet Nam considers Kazakhstan partner of top importance in Central Asia

President Vo spoke highly of Kazakhstan's achievements in maintaining political stability and advance socio-economic development. Tokayev expressed his pleasure to visit Viet Nam for the first time in his capacity as President of Kazakhstan, highly valuing Viet Nam's socio-economic development achievements and rising prestige on the international arena.

He said that Kazakhstan sees Viet Nam as a partner of top priority in the Asia-Pacific region.

The two leaders affirmed the importance of fostering the exchanges of delegations, especially high-level ones, effectively implementing the existing cooperation mechanisms in order to strengthen mutual understanding and create driving force for multifaceted cooperation between the two countries.

The pair agreed to continue close coordination and mutual support at multilateral forums, particularly the United Nations and the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia (CICA).

President Vo affirmed Viet Nam stands ready to act as a bridge to help Kazakhstan enhance cooperation with Southeast Asian region while President Tokayev stated Kazakhstan is willing to help Viet Nam boost cooperation with Central Asian countries.

Both sides lauded the progress in economic and trade cooperation in general and in the implementation of the free trade agreement between Viet Nam and the Eurasia Economic Union in particular.

President Vo asked Kazakhstan to voice support for the above trade deal to be upgraded to create more opportunities for trade exchanges between the two countries.

President Tokayev expressed his wish that both countries should work closely together to raise the two-way trade to US$1.5 billion and called for the establishment of Viet Nam-Kazakhstan Business Association to promote partnership between business circles of the two countries.

The two Presidents agreed to expand cooperation to potential areas like transport, education and training, culture, tourism, finance, banking, and high technologies.

They welcomed the opening of direct air route between Viet Nam and Kazakhstan in October 2022.

The leaders expressed their belief that the signing of an agreement on visa exemption for holders of ordinary passports and the Moemorandum of Understanding on tourism cooperation on the occasion of President Tokayev's visit would contribute to strengthening tourism cooperation and people-to-people exchanges between the two countries.

During their meetings, the two Presidents also compared notes on regional and international issues of shared concern. They shared the view that disputes in the region and the world must be settled by peaceful measures on the basis of international law.

After their meeting, the two Presidents witnessed the signing ceremony of several documents: Agreement on transfer of sentenced persons, Agreement on visa exemption for ordinary passport holders, Framework Plan of Action for economic-trade cooperation in 2023-2025 period, Memorandum of Understanding on tourism cooperation, and Memorandum of Understanding between Viet Nam Television and Agency Khabar./.