HÀ NỘI — Deputy Foreign Minister Lê Hoài Trung and his Chinese counterpart Liu Zhenmin discussed how to boost co-operation between the two countries across the fields, including border and territory issues, during their annual meetings in HCM City and Phú Quốc (Kiên Giang Province) from April 16-17. 

The two diplomats said both countries enjoyed positive development in the bilateral comprehensive strategic co-operative partnership over the past year. 
They agreed to increase high-level delegation exchanges, reinforce political trust, expand people-to-people exchanges, enhance mutually beneficial and practical collaboration, control effectively and address satisfactorily any disputes. 
The foreign deputy ministers suggested enacting necessary measures to boost two-way trade in a stable, balanced, and sustainable manner, while accelerating the progress and ensuring quality of projects on infrastructure, industrial parks and factories undertaken by Chinese firms. 
They also agreed to implement effectively China’s loans and non-refundable aid for Việt Nam , and step up win-win co-operation between Vietnamese and Chinese localities. 
Deputy FM Trung thanked China for increasing the release of water to the downstream of the Mekong River to address drought and saltwater intrusion in the Mekong Delta. 
He proposed the two sides continue long-term collaboration in the sustainable use and management of water resources in the Mekong River. 
The two diplomats agreed to promote the role of the Việt Nam-China Land Border Joint Committee in soon reviewing the five-year implementation of documents on land border management, as well as maintaining stability, co-operation and development in the two countries’ shared border lines. 
They candidly exchanged maritime issues and concurred to pushing ahead with the current negotiation mechanisms to carry out joint projects. 
Trung expressed Việt Nam’s deep concern over tension and consequences of recent complicated developments in the East Sea. 
He reiterated the need to strictly follow agreements and common perceptions reached by leaders of the two countries’ Parties and States, especially the agreement on basic principles guiding the settlement of issues at sea. 
He called for controlling effectively marine conflicts, avoiding actions to complicate and expand disputes, and settling disputes via peaceful means and in line with international law, particularly the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), fully implementing the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC) and soon building a Code of Conduct in the East Sea (COC). — VNS