Defence Minister General Ngo Xuan Lich had bilateral meetings on June 2 with Defence Ministers of Australia, France and Japan on the sidelines of the 17th Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.

Defence Minister General Ngo Xuan Lich (second from right) and other Vietnamese delegates 

At their meeting, Minister Lich and Australian Defence Minister Marise Payne spoke highly of recent development in bilateral ties, saying that both sides continue carrying out effectively the defence cooperation in accordance with the spirit of the memorandum of understanding signed in 2010.

Minister Lich thanked the Australian Defence Ministry for helping Vietnam in providing language training for Vietnamese personnel taking part in the United Nations’ peacekeeping missions, as well as transporting equipment of the level-2 field hospital joining UN peacekeeping operations in South Sudan in the coming time.

During their meeting, Minister Lich and Japanese Defence Minister Onodera Itsunori agreed to boost future bilateral cooperation in the fields such as exchange of delegations at levels, maintenance of existing mechanisms, training, overcoming war aftermaths, UN peacekeeping operations, response to natural disasters, search and rescue activities and defence industry.

Meeting with his French counterpart Florence Parly, Minister Lich said Vietnam always supports France’s efforts to promote the maintenance of peace, stability and cooperation for development in the region. Vietnam is willing to support France to increase cooperation with ASEAN. 

Both ministers agreed that in the time ahead, the two sides continue raising effectiveness of existing cooperation mechanisms and seeking new cooperation opportunities in the fields of shared concern.-VNA