Deputy Foreign Minister Nguyen Quoc Dung at the meeting

Attending the event were ASEAN senior officials from specialised agencies on the pillars of Political-Security, Economic and Socio-Cultural Communities, and ASEAN Vice Secretary Generals.

Speaking at the event, Dung shared Vietnam’s initiative on orientations to building ASEAN Community Vision following 2025, saying that it is a continuation of Thailand’s efforts during its tenure as the ASEAN Chair 2019, including working closely with the Economic Research Institute for ASEAN and East Asia (ERIA) to outline the ASEAN Vision 2040.

On the back of discussions within the framework of the ASEAN Senior Officials' Meeting (SOM) held in the central city of Da Nang in March, the meeting offered recommendations on orientations to building post-2025 ASEAN Community Vision to submit to the ASEAN Coordinating Council and the 37th ASEAN Summit later this year.

Delegates shared the view that the post-2025 ASEAN Community Vision should be inclusive and closely links with cooperation contents in the three pillars, with a focus on digital transformation and economic development, inclusive development, rapid and effective response to emerging challenges, people-oriented and people-centred approaches, and improvement of ASEAN’s central role and international stature, among others.

They suggested improving the efficiency of ASEAN apparatus, inter-sectoral and inter-pillar coordination, and enhancing the participation of all sectors in Community building.

Representatives from specialised agencies on the three pillars welcomed Vietnam’s initiative to hold the meeting and offered various opinions on the process.

In his speech, Dung proposed that ASEAN should pursue a progressive approach to gradually step up economic linkage, thus laying a foundation to determine the next linkage forms of the community.

Amid the rapid and complicated developments in the region and the world, he called on the bloc to continue proving its central role as a driving force to accelerate dialogues, build trust for the sake of regional peace, security and stability, and more actively and effectively cope with challenges.

ASEAN needs to ensure inclusive approach, even and sustainable development among regions, nations and different sectors of the society so that no one will be left behind, he said, adding that the grouping should pay full attention to closely linking sub-regional development with the common development of the ASEAN Community, building a people-oriented and people-centred Community.

According to him, the mid-term review of ASEAN Community Vision 2025 should be taken into account when it comes to discussing post-2025 ASEAN Community Vision.

As scheduled, Vietnam will hold more consultation conferences to collect feedback on the effort to submit to the 37th ASEAN Summit in November 2020./. VNA