Over the past year, Mrs Ton Nu Thi Ninh - Vice Chairwoman of Foreign Affairs Committee of the Communist Vietnamese National Assembly – has been called “the Attractive Woman of Vietnamese Diplomacy”. During her time as Ambassador to Belgium, she has made a significant contribution to building an image of Vietnam as an active, self –confident and open – hearted nation. The ‘Vietnamese Day in Belgium’ she initiated is considered a successful event. On the threshold of the event this year, Vietnam Business Forum’s reporter Thu Huyen had an interview with her about Vietnam – Belgium relations and her experiences and memories during the time she lived in Belgium.
Vietnam and Belgium have established bilateral diplomatic relations for over 33 years. What is your opinion on traditional relations and achievements in bilateral diplomatic relations?
Belgium and Vietnam set up the diplomatic relations in the early after the Paris agreement on Vietnam was signed in 1973, After an interruption period in 1980s due to disagreement on certain international issues, the two countries restored normal diplomatic relations.
In recent years, many positive signs have been seen in the diplomatic ties between the two countries in terms of culture, education, and military. Both sides have exchanged working visits and many important agreements have been signed. Belgium opened a military office in Vietnam. So far, Belgium has reduced ODA beneficiaries from 60 to 25 countries. Vietnam is the only Asian country which is still supported by Belgium through ODA.
What is your opinion on trade cooperation between the two countries? Will there be any breakthrough in bilateral trade relations after Vietnam joins the WTO?
In 2005, two - way trade turnover was 723 million Euro, in which Vietnam saw a high trade surplus. Total Belgian exports to Vietnam were valued at 130 million Euro while the total export value of Vietnam to Belgium was 593 million Euro.
After Vietnam joins the WTO, bilateral relations will be boosted. However, it is hard to see a breakthrough in the cooperation because of the small Belgium population and overseas Vietnamese in Belgium. Moreover, most of them are workers and employees and their number of enterprises is small.
During the 2000-2003 period when you took the duty as Vietnamese Ambassador to Belgium, you organized lots of Vietnam Cultural Weeks in this country. Can you give us any opinions about them and their goals as well as practical lessons drawn from the organization of previous Vietnamese cultural weeks?
Before I arrived in Belgium, I had nurtured great ambitions of organizing Vietnam Cultural Weeks in Belgium, aiming to further relations among the three regions of Belgium with their three different languages. For this reason, I decided to hold the event in these three regions over three weeks. Notably, the event organized in Flanders, a powerful economic zone of Belgium whose main language is Flemish gained good results.
Bearing in mind the idea that the Vietnamese Embassy in Belgium was not a trade and investment promotion organ like Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI) or Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency under the Ministry of Trade, we have brought big opportunities to businesses to seek partners instead of single contracts when organizing the event. Doing this, the embassy wanted Belgian enterprises to understand more about Vietnam not only as a war-weary country but a young, active, and dynamic country, owing rich potential to boost cooperation with the European Community in general and with Belgium in particular.
At the fair in Ghent, I directed the ao dai performances of Sy Hoang, Minh Hanh, and Dieu Anh which were highly appreciated by Mayor of Ghent State and the local people. Since then, the mayor has actively created favorable conditions for Vietnamese delegations to cooperate with Ghent University.
What did the success of this event have an influence on multi – faceted cooperation between the two countries?
The event launched in Ghent follows the success of Vietnamese Week in Belgium that makes a contribution to boost multi - faceted cooperation between the two countries. In Leige, I was really happy and surprised at the good results thanks to the support of the community. Many Belgium citizens actively supported the event because they are aware of their country’s values and happy to join an event related to Vietnam.
What is your greatest impression of your time as a diplomat in Belgium?
Despite studying in France and traveling through many European countries, I had never gone to Belgium until I worked as an Ambassador to the country, I had a chance to get to know life there. The local people’s friendliness and enthusiasm undeniably put great impressions on many foreign visitors. My family and I also had some unforgettable memories. At that time, my husband was making enquiries at the French Cultural Center to enroll our son and a man coming out from the bus station nearby showed him the way. One time, I couldn’t find the way to a local province, thus, I had to ask a repairman. Surprisingly, he even stopped his work to take me there. We were really moved by these displays of kind behavior, especially in an industrial country like Belgium.
In terms of work, in 2000 I held a week entitled “Vietnamese Days in Belgium”. At that time, the economy of the Dutch-speaking community was more developed than that of French-speaking community yet was more politically disadvantaged. Therefore, I decided to move the event to the Dutch-speaking community in Ghent. I did not know anything about Dutch, but I always tried my best to gain recognition from this community. To realize this, I begged a Dutch Vietnamese to make a speech in Dutch and managed to learn two short parts.
Before the National Day, he helped me to practice the presentation for an hour via telephone. As a result, I got tremendous applause from the audience. They said: “Madam Ninh spoke Dutch like a German!” as the two languages are similar and I knew German, too. This encouragement made me happy, which proved that being a diplomat requires great effort to win the public’s recognition.
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