National Assembly Chairman Vuong Dinh Hue (L) meets with President of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) Duarta Pacheco (Photo: VNA)

At the meeting, the IPU President expressed his impression on the organisation of the 132nd IPU General Assembly in Hanoi, saying this was a great success of the IPU. He highly valued the contributions of the National Assembly of Vietnam when chairing and coordinating with the IPU in the adoption of the 2015 Hanoi Declaration “The Sustainable Development Goals: Turning Words into Actions”.

NA Chairman Hue affirmed that attending IPU activities is an important task in Vietnam's multilateral parliamentary diplomacy in order to promote and protect its interests as well as express the country's views on global concerns, contributing to raising the position of the Vietnamese legislature in particular and Vietnam in general in the international arena.

It offers opportunities for the Vietnamese NA to access operational experiences and good practices of parliaments around the world in order to improve the quality and efficiency of its activities, he noted.

Hue informed that the National Assembly of Vietnam has actively participated in promoting the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), passing laws, verifying and ratifying relevant international conventions and treaties, and approving national strategies and budgets for target programmes related to sustainable development.

In particular, it has promptly adopted a resolution to create a legal framework for the Government to proactively implement COVID-19 prevention and control measures, he added.

The top Vietnamese legislator made three proposals for the IPU to become an even more effective organisation. They are actively promoting initiatives to innovate operations, enhance the role of the IPU in current international affairs, and further develop the partnership between the IPU and the United Nations (UN), thus ensuring the common interests of member parliaments; contributing to developing world parliamentary diplomacy and strengthening multilateral cooperation; and hastening the implementation of a tripartite cooperation project between member parliaments, the IPU and the UN to support and create conditions for the National Assembly of Vietnam to integrate more deeply into the activities of international organisations, especially in such matters as sustainable development, poverty reduction, post-pandemic economic recovery and development.

The NA Chairman said that Vietnam is willing to host symposiums at the request of the IPU, considering this an opportunity to both support the IPU and improve its international cooperation capacity.

Expressing his consent with the proposals, IPU President Duarta Pacheco affirmed his willingness to come to Hanoi to discuss in detail the implementation of Vietnam's initiatives, including the organisation of regional symposiums and conferences on SDGs and economic recovery, and a global conference of young parliamentarians between IPU general assemblies.

The two sides agreed that the IPU has been operating actively and effectively as well as made many contributions to inter-parliamentary cooperation and multilateral diplomacy over the past 130 years. In the coming time, member parliaments should actively propose and promote initiatives to innovate the IPU's activities, especially further developing the IPU-UN partnership.

The COVID-19 pandemic has showed the fact that no single country, developed or developing, can solve global problems by its own and multilateral cooperation remains the best way, including through parliamentary channels, they said, affirming that all parliaments need to work together and put their trust in the IPU to build a better world.

Vietnam attends 18th Parliamentary Intelligence-Security Forum

A Vietnamese delegation, headed by National Assembly (NA) Vice Chairman Sen. Lieut. Gen. Tran Quang Phuong, attended the 18th Parliamentary Intelligence-Security Forum, which convened by the NA of Hungary on September 6 in both face-to-face and virtual forms.

Vietnam’s participation in the forum reflected the nation’s external policy orientation of proactiveness and self-reliance for peace, friendship, cooperation, development, multilateralisation, diversification, and comprehensive and extensive international integration, in which, the NA's foreign affairs serve as an important channel.

The attendance also demonstrated Vietnam’s support for the Hungarian NA’s hosting of the event given complicated developments of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Speaker of the Hungarian NA László Kövér said intelligence-security plays a very important role, helping legislators acquire useful information for planning, making accurate decisions, and dealing with challenges, thereby creating advantages for national development.

The forum is set to discuss a series of matters including the risks of cryptocurrency; strengthening Parliamentary cooperation; risks of using biological weapons; human trafficking and "black credit"; abusive activities in global economic expansion; and illegal trade, money laundering, and foreign investment with malicious intent./.

Source: VNA