France Wishes to Build 'Genuine Partnership' with Vietnam

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, October 29, 2002

France Wishes to Build 'Genuine Partnership' with Vietnam

France wishes to build a "genuine partnership" with Vietnam, French President Jacques Chirac said onMonday when meeting with visiting Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong.

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France wishes to build a "genuine partnership" with Vietnam, French President Jacques Chirac said onMonday when meeting with visiting Vietnamese President Tran Duc Luong.

Tran Duc Luong, arrived here on Monday for a four-day state visit, also said Vietnam is ready to deepen its relations with France in all fields, announced French presidential spokeswoman Catherine Colonna.

Chirac commented as "historic" the visit of Luong, the first official visit to France by a Vietnamese head of state since former president and Communist Party founding father Ho Chi Minh traveled to Paris in 1946.

Late French president Francois Mitterrand visited Vietnam, former colony of France, in 1993 and Chirac visited the country in1997.

During their two-hour meeting at the French presidential palaceof Elysee, Chirac and Luong talked about the perspective of economic cooperation and the issue of the adoption of Vietnamese children by French couples, said the spokeswoman.

Chirac reassured Luong that France supports Vietnam's bid to join the World Trade Organization (WTO), said Colonna.

In his stay in France, Luong is to meet French Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin, Speakers of the National Assembly and the Senate, Jean-Louis Debre and Christian Poncelet. He will also meetFrench business leaders in Paris and Lyon.

Luong and Raffarin will talk about the purchase by Vietnam Airlines of five A-321 Airbus aircraft, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP).

With an investment of 2 billion euros (nearly 2 billion U.S. dollars), France is the top non-Asian investor in Vietnam. The trade between France and Vietnam last year reached more than 1.1 billion euros.

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