Vietnam hopes to boost all-round ties with Russia

The Vietnamese top legislator made the statement during a meeting with Speaker of Russia's State Duma Vyateslav Volodin on November 30 in Havana, Cuba, where she was there to attend the funeral of Cuba’s revolutionary leader Fidel Castro Ruz. 

The two sides highlighted the effective and practical cooperation between the two legislative bodies, saying that the two sides have regularly maintained dialogue mechanisms and close coordination at international parliament forums like the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA), and the Asia-Europe Parliamentary Partnership (ASEP) Meeting.

NA Chairwoman Ngan suggest the Russian side accelerate the signing of an agreement on food safety control, thus making it easy for Vietnam to expand export of farm and aquatic products to the Russian market. 

She also called for more support of Russia's State Duma for the Vietnamese community in the country.

For his part, Vyateslav Volodin assured that his country considers Vietnam as its leading partner in Southeast Asia and hopes to step up the traditional friendship and comprehensive cooperation between the two nations. 

The legislators agreed to back measures bolstering the bilateral relations, and the implementation of the Vietnam –Eurasian Economic Union Free Trade Agreement, which took effect in October, 2016 towards lifting two-way trade to US$10 billion by 2020. 

They also underlined the need to perfect the regulatory framework for bilateral cooperation, and enhance connectivity among the two countries’ localities in the future. 

Speaker of Russia's State Duma Vyateslav Volodin took the occasion to invite NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan to attend the IPU General Assembly in October 2017 in his country. 

On the same day, Ngan and the Vietnamese delegation laid a wreath in the Ho Chi Minh monument in Havana.