Vietnam, Laos foster collaboration in home affairs
Minister of Home Affairs Pham Thi Thanh Tra held a working session in Hanoi on May 23 with her Lao counterpart Thongchanh Manixay, during which both sides expressed delight at the close cooperation between the two ministries and the fruitful outcomes of joint activities.
The two ministries have enjoyed effective partnership in high-level delegation exchange, personnel training for the Lao side, experience sharing in administrative reform and religious affairs, and the building of a national archive centre of Laos, said Tra.
She said that the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam is focusing on reshuffling, speeding up administrative reform, decentralization and power delegation, and renovating the local administration operations. It is working on two draft laws and many resolutions as well as other legal documents.
The ministry has streamlined the administrative apparatus by reducing 8 districts and 563 communes, along with 10% administrative units and 13.5% non-business units. The number of civil servants has decreased 10.01%, while that of public employees has reduced 11.67%, she said.
For his part, Thongchanh Manixay said that the Lao Ministry of Home Affairs was established in 2011, thus the Lao side hopes to learn from professional experience of Vietnam, especially in State management over religious affairs, local administration management, and the building of communal-level administrative units.
The minister briefed his host on a number of achievements that his ministry has gained so far, including simplifying its organization.
The two sides agreed that despite the positive cooperation results, the partnership between the two sides has yet to meet expectations due to the impact of COVID-19.
To deepen bilateral cooperation in the 2023-2026 period, they will increase the exchange of high-level delegations and cooperation in personnel training as well as experience sharing, while working together on a project on the digitization of the Lao Ministry of Home Affairs to submit to the Laos-Vietnam, Vietnam-Laos Cooperation Committees and the two Governments.
Following the working session, the two ministries signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the 2023-2026 period.
Under the document, the Ministry of Home Affairs of Vietnam will send lecturers and experts to Laos to help with the building of legal policies and organize short-term training courses for Lao officials in different fields following requests from the Lao side./.
Each year, Vietnam will also receive delegations of Lao officials with about 20 officials each to join 1-3-month courses on fields under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Home Affairs.