Jakarta (VNA) – Party General Secretary To Lam met with Speaker of the People's Representative Council of Indonesia Puan Maharani in Jakarta on March 11 as part of the Vietnamese leader’s ongoing state visit to the Southeast Asian country.

Warmly welcoming the Party chief, his spouse and the high-ranking Vietnamese delegation, Maharani highlighted the significance of the visit, which coincides with the 70th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two countries. She praised the resilience of the Vietnamese people in their struggle for independence and congratulated Vietnam on remarkable achievements over the past nearly 40 years of Doi Moi (Renewal), particularly in economic development, socio-political stability, and improving people's living standards.

The host Speaker hailed the elevation of the Vietnam – Indonesia ties to a comprehensive strategic partnership, affirming that her country highly values and continually promotes the friendship and multifaceted cooperation with Vietnam. She expressed confidence that General Secretary Lam’s visit will provide a fresh impetus to strengthen and expand bilateral ties in the years ahead.

Maharani emphasised that the Indonesian People's Representative Council consistently supports the Government in enhancing relations with Vietnam. She highlighted the importance of fostering people-to-people exchanges as a foundation for long-lasting friendship between the two nations, and advocated for strengthening relations between political parties in Indonesia and the Communist Party of Vietnam.

For his part, Lam showed his deep impressions of Indonesia and congratulated Indonesian people on their remarkable achievements across various fields. He said he is confident that Indonesian people will continue to attain new successes in the years to come.

Both leaders shared the view that Vietnam and Indonesia hold crucial roles in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and are each other’s trustworthy partners sharing many interests and similar viewpoints.

They urged joint efforts to further expand bilateral relations between the two countries' Parties, Governments, parliaments, mass organisations, and localities, helping strengthen the traditional friendship and comprehensive strategic partnership in the time to come.

They agreed to boost economic and trade cooperation toward raising bilateral trade turnover to 18 billion USD by 2028.

The leaders praised the robust and effective all-round cooperation between the Vietnamese National Assembly (NA) and the Indonesian People's Representative Council within both bilateral and multilateral frameworks. They agreed upon the need to step up and expand collaboration across all fields, including organising regular all-level exchanges, and promoting activities of parliamentary friendship groups to foster experience sharing between the legislative bodies.

Additionally, the two sides concurred in enhancing information exchange as well as coordination and mutual support at international and regional parliamentary forums.

Lam expressed his hope that the Indonesian People's Representative Council and the Vietnamese NA, as representative bodies of the two peoples, will continue to contribute significantly to the friendship, multifaceted cooperation, and comprehensive strategic partnership between their countries.

ꦓ On this occasion, he conveyed an invitation from Vietnamese NA Chairman Tran Thanh Man to the Speaker to visit Vietnam for further parliamentary cooperation discussions, with Maharani graciously accepting./.