Xi says China and Vietnam must fight any effort to mess up the Asia-Pacific.
President Xi Jinping stated on Wednesday in Hanoi that China and Vietnam should fight any “attempt to mess up Asia-Pacific” as Beijing strives to offset growing US influence in the communist country. Xi says China and Vietnam must fight any effort to mess up the Asia-Pacific.
Xi’s visit to neighboring Vietnam is his first in six years, and the two countries pledged to strengthen relations and signed more than 30 agreements, including a vow to build rail lines between Vietnam and China.
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The two-day visit comes after Hanoi strengthened diplomatic relations with Washington during a visit by US Vice President Joe Biden in September. According to Xinhua, China’s official state news agency, Xi said that China and Vietnam “should be vigilant against and oppose any attempt to destabilize the Asia-Pacific region.”
“We should strengthen coordination and cooperation in international affairs and jointly maintain a sound external environment,” Xi said. Biden’s visit was part of the United States’ global attempts to restrict China’s emerging economic might — and to acquire critical resources for high-tech production.
In a joint statement, China and Vietnam said they will “deepen and expand bilateral relations.”
They decided to form a “community with a shared future,” the visit was hailed as a “historic milestone in bilateral ties… contributing to peace, stability, and development in the region and around the world.” Vietnam has historically used “bamboo diplomacy” to maintain good relations with China and the United States.
According to Xinhua, Xi stated on Wednesday that China was willing to cooperate with Vietnam to “find a long-term solution to maritime issues” and contribute to developing a “substantive and effective Code of Conduct in the South China Sea.”
On Wednesday, Xi visited the revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh’s tomb and talked with Vietnam’s Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh and President Vo Van Thuong.
Chinh added that Vietnam was dedicated to “supporting China to strongly develop, promoting its role as a major country with important contributions to the international community, supporting initiatives by comrade Xi Jinping for peace, cooperation, and development in the world”.The nations with a millennia-long history of hostility promised to cooperate more closely in a 16-page joint declaration.
They said that one of their goals was to avoid what they dubbed a “color revolution” pushed by unfriendly elements, a phrase for popular upheavals that have shaken former Communist countries.
They “announced the establishment of a strategic China-Vietnam community of ‘ shared future’ to promote the upgrading of China-Vietnam relations,” Xi said earlier during a meeting with Vietnam’s parliament leader, Vuong Dinh Hue.
The decision was historic, and joining such a community was a “strategic” move, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said when he met Xi, who was visiting an Asian country this year. For example, there was no agreement on rare earths despite Xi’s statement in Vietnamese official media.
