Viet Nam, Bulgaria establish strategic partnership
VGP - Viet Nam and Bulgaria have upgraded the bilateral ties into a strategic partnership, announced General Secretary To Lam and Bulgarian President Rumen Radev at a press conference following their summit meeting in Sofia on October 23.
General Secretary To Lam (L) and Bulgarian President Rumen Radev chair a press conference following their talks, Sofia, October 23, 2025 - Photo: VNA
During the meeting, the two sides agreed on major directions to expand and deepen traditional areas of collaboration, and identified new fields of cooperation in which both countries have potential and mutual needs, said President Radev.
In 2025, the two countries are celebrating the 75th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations - an important milestone contributing to further deepening the traditional friendship and multifaceted cooperation towards a more substantive and effective manner.
The host expressed his admiration for the significant achievements that Viet Nam has attained in its national development and international integration, affirming that with its impressive economic growth and rising political standing, Viet Nam is an important player in the Southeast Asian region.
He expected that the two countries will strengthen and enhance effective cooperation in traditional areas such as defense and security, education and training, science and technology, agriculture, culture and sports, tourism, and people-to-people exchanges.
The Vietnamese leader's visit opens up new opportunities and a broader vision for bilateral relations, further deepening the cooperative ties between the two nations, noted the President.
To, for his part, stated that building upon the positive developments and significant achievements in the Viet Nam–Bulgaria relations over the last 75 years and with firm confidence in a bright future for their relationship, the two sides have adopted a Joint Declaration on the establishment of the Viet Nam–Bulgaria Strategic Partnership for the benefits of their peoples and for peace, stability, and development in the region and the world.
This new cooperation framework will serve as a solid basis for consolidating and deepening the Viet Nam–Bulgaria relationship, he emphasized.
According to the Vietnamese leader, the two sides agreed to strengthen political trust via high-level delegation exchanges and contacts across all channels, promote existing cooperation mechanisms, and deepen sectoral cooperation.
They agreed to enhance collaboration in defense and security, in line with the current strategic partnership framework, boost training cooperation and academic exchanges between military academies and research institutions and expand collaboration in UN peacekeeping, cybersecurity, and military medicine, among other areas.
The two countries vowed to closely coordinate efforts to make economic, trade, and investment cooperation a central pillar of their strategic partnership.
Both sides committed to working together to maintain and strengthen free trade, vigorously promote trade and investment by opening markets to each other's goods and services, and effectively implement the EU–Viet Nam Free Trade Agreement (EVFTA) with the goal of doubling bilateral trade turnover in the coming years. They also agreed to serve as gateways for each other's goods to enter the ASEAN and EU markets.
The two sides concurred that science and technology cooperation should become a key pillar of the Viet Nam–Bulgaria strategic partnership, stressing the need to foster stronger ties in areas such as training IT human resources related to digital transformation, digital economy, digital infrastructure, and e-government; pharmaceuticals and biomedical sciences; artificial intelligence (AI) and modern computer science and green energy.
They pledged to join hands in addressing both traditional and non-traditional security challenges, and support each other at multilateral forums such as the United Nations (UN), ASEAN–EU, and ASEM, with a view to maintaining peace, stability, and development in their respective regions and globally.
Both sides reaffirmed their shared stance on ensuring security, safety, and freedom of navigation and overflight in the East Sea, highlighted the need to respect the rule of law and called for the peaceful settlement of disputes without the use or threat of force, in accordance with international law, particularly the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS).
The two leaders expressed confidence that the establishment of the strategic partnership will open up a new era of cooperation, serving the development goals of both nations and contributing to peace and shared prosperity in the region and the world./.
