(VOVworld) – Polish leaders have hailed Vietnam’s rising international status, affirming that Vietnam is always considered Poland’s important partner in Southeast Asia. During his official visit to Poland from July 25-26, Deputy Prime Minister cum Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh met with a number of high-ranking Polish officials and visited Vietnamese community representatives.

Deputy PM and FM Pham Binh Minh giving a speech at a press briefing after his talks with Polish FM Radoslaw Sikorski (Photo:VNA)

At these meetings, Deputy Prime Minister Minh confirmed Vietnam’s consistent policy of further strengthening the sound traditional friendly relations with Poland. The two sides agreed to maintain regular exchange visits between ministries and sectors aiming to beef up cooperation in specific areas. Polish leaders told Minh that President Bronisław Komorowski will visit Vietnam next year. At the meeting with the Polish Deputy Prime Minister cum Minister of Economy and business representatives, Deputy PM Minh affirmed Vietnam's willingness to create the best possible conditions for Polish firms to boost trade and investment in areas of their particular strengths such as shipbuilding, infrastructure development, environment processing technology and equipment, dairy production, and processing and food processing. Poland reiterated its readiness to facilitate Vietnamese students’ study by increasing the number of scholarships for them from 10 to 15 scholarships each year. They underlined the need to step up defence cooperation by promoting delegation exchange, staff training and technological transfer. Vietnam, in its capacity as coordinator of the ASEAN-EU relations, is willing to help Poland further its relations with ASEAN. Poland confirmed its support for Vietnam’s relations with the European Union and the early conclusion of the Vietnam-EU Free Trade Agreement negotiations before this October. Poland will soon announce its early ratification of the Vietnam-EU Partnership and Cooperation Agreement that Vietnam has signed with the EU. On the East Sea issue,  Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski said that his country supports the stance of resolving all disputes by peaceful measures in accordance with international law.