General Secretary of Central Committee of Communist Party of Vietnam Nong Duc Manh to arrive in Moscow on official visit

General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam Nong Duc Manh is arriving in Moscow on Wednesday for an official visit at the invitation of President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin. As the press service of the Russian president reported, Vladimir Putin's talks with Nong Duc Manh will be held on October 10th. During the forthcoming talks, it is planned to discuss the key questions of Russian-Vietnamese relations and the topical problems of world politics in the context of interaction between the two countries in the international arena.

On the eve of the visit, spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry Alexander Yakovenko stated in an interview with RIA Novosti that Russia comes out for establishing trade and economic cooperation with Vietnam. According to him, "in the Russian-Vietnamese contacts at all levels special attention is paid to the trade and economic sphere." The diplomat noted that Vietnam is a traditional and promising economic partner of Russia, which ranks eighth in the list of the countries-investors in Vietnam's economy, the sum total of its investments standing at about 1.5 bln dollars (bar the Vietsovpetro joint venture).

Over the first six months of 2002, the value of mutual trade amounted to about 330 million dollars, showing a year-on-year increase by nearly 40 per cent. Cooperation in the oil and gas sector remains a major element of economic interaction between Vietnam and Russia. But the Russian side would not like to confine itself only to the sphere of oil-extraction and reckons on fruitful joint work in the oil-refining sphere.

The visit of General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam Nong Duc Manh to Russia will last till October 13.