60 years of Vietnam – Algeria diplomatic ties marked in Algiers

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Vietnamese Ambassador to Algeria Nguyen Thanh Vinh reviewed the process of building and developing the traditional friendship and solidarity between the two countries, saying that the Governments and peoples of both nations always give each other active support in the past struggles for national liberation and national independence as well as in national construction and development.

Ambassador Nguyen Thanh Vinh said that Vietnam was one of the first countries to recognize the Provisional Government of the Republic of Algeria on September 26, 1958 and opened an embassy in Algiers right after Algeria gained independence in in 1962.

After 60 years of establishment, the two countries' relations have been increasingly expanded and consolidated through bilateral cooperation across multiple fields such as politics, economy, and culture.

Political and diplomatic relations between Vietnam and Algeria are promoted through maintaining the exchange of delegations at all levels of the Party, State, National Assembly, and mechanisms such as the Intergovernmental Cooperation Committee.

In recent years, bilateral cooperation mechanisms such as the Intergovernmental Cooperation Committee and the Political Consultation between the two Foreign Ministries have served as orientations for the fields of cooperation.

Regarding trade, according to data from Algeria's National Agency for the Promotion of Foreign Trade (ALGEX), trade turnover between the two countries in 2021 reached US$262.5 million, and US$140 million in the first half of this year.

Petroleum, phosphate, dates, olive oil, etc are some of the key commodities of the Algerian economy that Vietnamese companies can import, with the potential to develop into more extensive trade partnership.

In the field of investment, the oil and gas exploration and production project of PetroVietnam Exploration Production Corporation (PVEP)  has become a typical project for economic cooperation between Vietnam and Algeria.

In addition, based on the traditional friendship between the two countries, cultural cooperation has always been a bright spot and has been widely deployed in Algeria. Cultural cooperation has really become a "bridge" between Vietnam and Algeria, in which cultural values are shared on the basis of respecting differences.

There are currently two streets named after President Ho Chi Minh - in the capital Algiers and the city of Oran. President Ho Chi Minh, General Vo Nguyen Giap, Vice President Nguyen Thi Binh are heroic symbols in the hearts of the Algerian people.

During his visit to Vietnam in 2018, Algerian Foreign Minister Abdelkader Messahel once shared the two countries have many similarities to connect and Vietnam holds a special place in the hearts of the Algerian people.

On the celebration occasion, the Vietnamese Embassy in Algeria organized a special celebration program with performances of Vietnamese and Algerian national instruments along with Vietnamese traditional martial arts performed by Algerian students, a Vietnamese traditional long dress (Ao dai) display and an introduction of traditional Vietnamese dishes.