The visit,which will be made at the invitation of President Truong Tan Sang, alsodemonstrates Malaysia’s appreciation of the friendship andmulti-faceted cooperation with Vietnam and marks the 40 thanniversary of diplomatic ties between the two countries.
Vietnam and Malaysia established diplomatic ties on March 30, 1973 .
The two sides have maintained exchanges of high-ranking visits andcontacts. Most recently, President Truong Tan Sang paid a State-levelvisit to Malaysia in November, 2011 and Vice President Nguyen ThiDoan attended the Global Summit of Women in June this year.
Malaysia is Vietnam ’s ninth largest trade partner withtwo-way trade reaching nearly 7.9 billion USD in 2012 and 3.6 billionUSD in the first five months of 2013.
Malaysia hasinvested in 448 projects worth 10.2 billion USD in Vietnam , rankingeighth out of countries and territories investing in the latter.Meanwhile, Vietnam is operating nine projects capitalised at 813million USD in Malaysia .
The two countriessigned a Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in education duringPrime Minister Phan Van Khai’s official visit to Malaysia in April,2004.
Accordingly, Malaysia offers annualgraduate and post-graduate scholarships to Vietnamese students,including those sourced by government and economic groups.
The Malaysian government officially received Vietnamese workers from2002 and the two governments have signed a labour cooperation agreement.At present, there are about 80,000 Vietnamese workers in Malaysia .
Over the past time, the two countries have signed severalcooperation agreements including one on visa exemption for ordinarypassport holders in September, 2001, which resulted in a surge in thenumber of Malaysian visitors to Vietnam , from 106,000 in 2006 to211,000 in 2011. They adopted the Vietnam-Malaysia Joint Statement onComprehensive Cooperation Framework in the 21 st Century in 2004.Vietnam ’s Government General Inspectorate and Malaysia ’sAnti-Corruption Commission reached a deal on anti-corruption in 2010.
The two sides also signed several MOUs on cooperationin the fields of education, defence, banking and information andcommunications technology.
Vietnam and Malaysiahave benefited from long-lasting cooperation at regional andinternational forums, especially within the framework of ASEAN and theUN.-VNA