Ambassador Dang Dinh Quy, head of the Vietnamese mission to the UN

In a recent interview with Vietnam News Agency’s correspondent in New York, Quy affirmed that Vietnam has made every effort to optimise the interests of the country at the global forum, protecting its security interests and development and improving its position and prestige.

He said that along with the other countries who are non-permanent members (the E10 group), Vietnam has always tried to act as a bridge to help the UNSC permanent members (P5 group), who have disagreed for a long time, to understand each other better and minimise deadlocks and ineffectiveness due to disagreement.

Vietnam has joined efforts with other countries in the E10 group to strengthen intra-group solidarity and the solidarity between the two groups, contributing to enhancing links, promoting information sharing and joint action, and improving mutual support in many issues, including how to respond to climate change and the COVID-19 pandemic.

Notably, Vietnam has been active in promoting the role and voice of ASEAN as well as of the E10 in 2020 - a special year when two ASEAN members - Vietnam and Indonesia - are non-permanent members of the UNSC. On Vietnam’s initiative, the two ASEAN members have made nearly 20 joint speeches throughout the year on important issues, including those where it is difficult to find a “common voice”.

The diplomat highlighted that for the first time, Vietnam, as the ASEAN Chair, joined other ASEAN member countries to submit a resolution on ASEAN-UN cooperation, with the largest number of co-sponsors ever, at up to 110 countries, to the UN General Assembly.

In 2021, Vietnam will continue to promote issues relating to the E10 and ASEAN and will also promote cooperation between regional organisations and the UN, Quy said.

It will continue its efforts to enhance ASEAN’s role and image in the UNSC, especially in areas such as peacekeeping and in joint efforts to prevent conflict and promote post-peace construction.
In April, Vietnam will assume the rotating presidency of the UNSC for the second and also last time in its term.

Ambassador Quy said this will be a big challenge because Vietnam always wants to do better than it expects./.VNA