Vice President Võ Thị Ánh Xuân (right) and Deputy President of South Africa Paul Mashatile had talks in Hà Nội on Thursday. — VNA/VNS Photo Lâm Khánh

HÀ NỘI — Vice President Võ Thị Ánh Xuân held talks with Deputy President of South Africa Paul Mashatile in Hà Nội on Thursday, who is on an official visit to Việt Nam from December 12-15.

Vice President Xuân welcomed the South African Deputy President’s visit on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of Việt Nam-South Africa diplomatic ties.

Việt Nam always values traditional friendship with South Africa, stemming from the cooperative relationship between the Communist Party of Việt Nam and the African National Congress (ANC) since the 1960s, she said, adding that all-around cooperation between the two countries has kept growing over the past years. At present, South Africa is the first and only “Partner for Cooperation and Development" of Việt Nam in Africa.

Mashatile, for his part, said his visit follows the recent trip to South Africa by Vice President Xuân in September. It is to further propel bilateral ties across economy, trade, education-training, biodiversity conservation and environment, contributing to generating new momentum for the multifaceted cooperative ties between the two countries.

As there remains untapped potential of bilateral cooperation, especially in economy and trade, he wished that Vietnam would open its market to goods of South Africa's strengths, especially agricultural products and agro-processing, electric vehicles and batteries for electric cars.

Both sides agreed to further step up collaboration through the Party, State and people-to-people diplomacy channels; increase the exchange of delegations at all levels, as well as between ministries, agencies, localities and businesses to consolidate political trust, create a driving force for bilateral ties, effectively realise bilateral cooperation mechanisms and accelerate the organisation of the sixth meeting of the Việt Nam-South Africa Inter-Governmental Partnership Forum and another meeting of the Joint Trade Committee next year.

The guest thanked Việt Nam for supporting South Africa’s bid to become a Sectoral Dialogue Partner of ASEAN in July. He hoped that Việt Nam would support enhancing its partnership with ASEAN, affirming readiness to assist Vietnam in strengthening cooperation with the Southern African Customs Union.

In reply, Xuân suggested both sides step up negotiations on establishing frameworks for bilateral trade and investment cooperation, such as the comprehensive economic cooperation agreement, investment promotion and protection agreement, and mining cooperation agreement.

The two sides affirmed their determination to lift two-way trade US$2 billion in the coming time and encouraged investments in each other's market in various potential areas such as electric vehicles and their batteries, pharmaceuticals, industrial equipment, mining, natural resources and environment, and wildlife conservation.

They agreed to spread agricultural cooperation models involving three or more parties within the South-South framework, explore and propose the involvement of other African nations to launch the models.

Host and guest promised to enhance coordination in national defence-security, soon hold the third defence policy dialogue, and step up people-to-people exchange.

On the back of the initial results of education cooperation, they aimed to further facilitate the exchange of students in tertiary establishments, share experience and teaching materials in areas of mutual strength, and build programmes to popularise culture, thus creating favourable conditions for the entry of citizens from both countries.

The two leaders also briefed each other about the situation of each country and discussed global and regional issues of shared concern.

At the talks, they witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in tertiary education between the two governments. — VNS