The two countries have reached consensus on expanding cooperation within the framework of China’s Belt and Road Initiative and Vietnam’s “Two Corridors and One Economic Circle” plan, as well as on enhancing production capacity cooperation, said Xi.
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HANOI-China’s President Xi Jinping said during a visit to Vietnam Friday that the two countries need to work together to promote trust and cooperation, calling its fellow communist state a “close comrade”.
In a commentary on Thursday, China’s official Xinhua news agency said now was the time to add substance to a “comradely and brotherly” friendship.
The two countries have since tried to fix ties with high-level contacts including Vietnamese Communist Party General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong visiting China in April.
He made no mention of the South China Sea and referred only to “tests” both had faced in the winds of history.
Pham Ngoc An, an activist who was detained at the No. 6 commune police station in Ho Chi Minh City’s No. 3 district, questioned why authorities had responded so harshly when protests and other anti-China events in the days leading up to Xi’s visit were allowed to proceed unhindered.
His first stop in his Asian journey is Vietnam, the first visit to the country by a Chinese top leader in a decade, and Xi’s first to the nation since assuming office in 2013.
On Saturday, the Chinese President is also expected to witness the signing of several Memoranda of Understanding with Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, and will deliver a lecture at the National University of Singapore.
A few analysts believe that any tacit Vietnamese support for United States calls for greater freedom of navigation in the Sea could further risks its relations with Beijing, which Hanoi shares $60 billion (55 billion euros) of annual trade.
“China and Vietnam are joined by mountains and water and the friendship between our two peoples goes back to ancient times”, Xi said.
China lays claim to nearly all of the South China Sea, parts of which are also claimed by the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan as well as Vietnam.
“China rejects that a country should seek hegemony once it grows strong”, he said, adding that China would “deepen mutually beneficial cooperation” with neighboring countries.
“Chinese leaders long ago realized that to secure long-term stability in bilateral ties, a key factor and challenge is to win over the hearts and minds of the Vietnamese young people”, said Shen Shishun, a senior researcher at the China Institute of global Studies.
Xi’s offers coincided with the public release of the text and agreements of the U.S.-led Trans-Pacific Partnership, a multilateral trade pact that, if passed among all 12 signatory countries, will encompass 40 percent of the global economy.
“The leader of a big country like China comes to talk to us, so there must be very important messages about the mutual ties”, Hong said.
Nakatani was in Vietnam on Thursday for talks with his Vietnamese counterpart, coinciding with Xi’s visit.
China says nearly all the South China Sea is its territory, overlapping with claims of its neighbors.
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With Vietnam making moves to counterbalance China’s rise, a few see this as an opportunity for Xi Jinping to try to smooth tensions.
