Vietnam PM to Tour Middle East This Month
Prime Minister of Vietnam Nguyen Tan Dung and his wife will pay visits to Qatar and Kuwait from 7 to 12 of March, the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs has announced in a statement.
Mr Dung’s visits will be made at invitations of his counterpart of Qatar Hamad Bin Jasim Bin Jaber Al Thani and Kuwait’s Prime Minister Nasser Al Mohammed Al Ahmed Al Jaber Al Sabah, the ministry said.
The ministry did not mention further details of the prime minister’s visit.
Communist Vietnam is seeking to expand export markets in the Middle East, Latin America, Africa, Asean and Asia besides its major markets including EU, the US and Japan which are falling deeply into recession, state media said.
Kuwait is still a modest export market of Vietnam’s goods. Vietnam’s exports tripled to US$15.93 million between January and June last year. Vietnam’s main exports to Kuwait are milk and seafood products, tea, furniture and electrical cables.
There are no latest trade figures between Vietnam and Qatar, but state media said that two-way trade reached US$33 billion in 2007, of which Vietnam exported US$13 million.
Mr Dung and his counterpart agreed to beef up bilateral cooperation in oil and gas, investment and trade last April, including setting up an investment fund of US$1 billion.
Qatar will recruit 2,000 Vietnamese workers in the coming years. (
www.chinhphu.vn)
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