Russian President Vladimir Putin arrives in Hanoi, starts state visit to Vietnam

Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and his entourage arrived in Hanoi early morning on Thursday, starting a two-day state visit to Vietnam, at the invitation of Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong.

The Russian leader is accompanied by Foreign Minister Sergei Viktorovich Lavrov, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Nikolaevich Chernyshenko, and Russian Ambassador to Vietnam Gennady Stepanovich Bezdetko.

Prominent among those present at the airport to welcome the Russian guests were Secretary of the Party Central Committee and head of its External Relations Commission Le Hoai Trung; Party Central Committee member and Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha, also head of the Vietnamese sub-committee of the Vietnam-Russia intergovernmental committee on economic-trade and science-technology cooperation; and Vietnamese Ambassador to Russia Dang Minh Khoi.

President Putin has visited Vietnam for four times. This visit, the fifth one, holds an extremely important significance, further deepening the Vietnam-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership in all fields, especially in the context that the two countries are striving to implement the joint statement on the comprehensive strategic partnership vision to 2030.

The Russian President is scheduled to have talks with Vietnamese top leaders - Party chief Nguyen Phu Trong, President To Lam, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh, and National Assembly Chairman Tran Thanh Man.

The leaders are expected to discuss cooperation steps until 2030, focusing on economy-trade, defense-security, energy, science-technology-education and people-to-people ties.

In a preview conversation cited by Vietnam's Ministry of Foreign Affairs ahead of Putin’s state visit, Vietnamese Ambassador to Russia Dang Minh Khoi listed life sciences, energy technology, space technology, natural resources, finance-technology (fintech), artificial intelligence (AI), and biomedical science as some of the areas with cooperation potential.

Trade between Vietnam and Russia reached $5.5 billion in 2021, fell to $3.55 billion in 2022 and rebounded 2.3% to $3.63 billion in 2023, according to Vietnam's Ministry of Industry and Trade and the General Statistics Office. In the first five months of 2024, the figure rose 51.4% year-on-year to $1.96 billion.

As of this May, Russia's direct investment in Vietnam hit $1 billion with 186 projects, while corresponding figures for Vietnam's investment in Russia were $3 billion and 25 projects, according to Vietnam's Ministry of Planning and Investment.