A view of the talks between Minister of Foreign Affairs of Việt Nam Bùi Thanh Sơn and Bakhtiyor Saidov, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Uzbekistan, in Hà Nội on Monday. VNA/VNS Photo Minh Đức

HÀ NỘI — Việt Nam and Uzbekistan need to maintain mechanisms for exchanging information, and enhance connections between their ministries and sectors to explore possibilities and seek new cooperation opportunities for the development interests of each country, and for peace and stability in the region and the world.

This message was delivered on Monday at the talks between Minister of Foreign Affairs Bùi Thanh Sơn and Uzbekistan Minister of Foreign Affairs Bakhtiyor Saidov, who is on an official visit to Việt Nam from March 17-19.

Sơn welcomed his counterpart on the first visit of an Uzbekistani Minister of Foreign Affairs to Việt Nam since the two countries established diplomatic relations in 1992. He affirmed that this is an opportunity for both sides to review and agree on directions and measures to strengthen the traditional friendship and promote bilateral cooperation in areas of mutual strength.

Sơn highly appreciated Uzbekistan's positive socio-economic development achievements, while noting the impressive growth of Việt Nam – Uzbekistan’s trade turnover from 2021 to date, averaging over 30 per cent per year. Particularly in 2023, bilateral trade turnover reached US$159.7 million, up 32 per cent compared to 2022.

Sơn affirmed that Việt Nam always values ​​its relations with traditional friendly countries, including Uzbekistan, and expressed his hope that both sides will create new impetus for enhancing cooperation, in line with the needs, desires and strengths of the two countries.

On this occasion, Sơn thanked Uzbekistan for supporting and creating favourable conditions for the Vietnamese community to continue living, studying and doing business in the country.

For his part, Minister Saidov emphasised that Việt Nam is one of Uzbekistan's traditional and leading partners in the region.

He expressed the desire to deepen bilateral cooperation, especially in economic, trade, investment, agriculture and education; and that Việt Nam will serve as a bridge to further strengthen Uzbekistan's cooperation with the region, including expanding cooperation between ASEAN and the Central Asian region.

The two sides briefed each other about the socio-economic situation and major foreign policy directions of each country. They also reviewed the cooperation situation, the implementation of agreements reached between the high-level leaders of the two countries in the past period, as well as sharing on international and regional issues of common concern. — VNS