Vietnam's Communist Party chief To Lam is expected to visit North Korea next month, two Vietnamese officials said, marking the first visit in nearly 20 years for a Vietnamese leader to the largely isolated nation.
The two Communist countries maintain close diplomatic ties but have currently no trade relations, according to the Vietnamese embassy in Pyongyang.
The possible visit, with preparations still underway, has not been officially announced by either side. Vietnam's ministry of foreign affairs and North Korea's embassy in Hanoi did not respond to requests for comment.
The two officials declined to indicate a precise time frame for the visit and the issues that may be discussed, but one official said Lam would meet North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un.
The last time a Vietnamese leader visited North Korea was in 2007 when the head of the ruling Communist Party Nong Duc Manh embarked on a three-day trip to the country, marking the first visit by a Vietnamese party chief since the late President Ho Chi Minh in 1957.
In a rare foreign trip, Kim visited Hanoi in 2019 as part of a visit whose highlight was a summit with U.S. President Donald Trump, then serving his first term at the White House.
Multiple lower-ranking officials have met in either Hanoi or Pyongyang in recent years, according to a list of meetings on the website of the Vietnamese embassy in North Korea, which shows meetings resumed last year after a five-year pause.
This year the two countries celebrate 75 years of diplomatic relations.
Lam visited South Korea in August
The visit would follow Lam's trip in August to South Korea, a country with which Pyongyang has tense relations. Lam was the first foreign leader hosted by South Korean President Lee Jae Myung since he took office in June.
Hanoi is highly reliant on investments from Seoul. Samsung Electronics 005930.KS and other large Korean multinationals are leading contributors to Vietnam's economy, with existing investments exceeding $90 billion, largely in factories.
The latest year for which data on trade with North Korea is available is 2016, when Vietnam exported to Pyongyang goods worth nearly $3 million, according to the Vietnamese embassy.
North Korea has for decades faced international sanctions largely linked to its nuclear weapons programme.
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U.S. has become a central outside power in the south caucasus, shaping diplomacy, security and energy flows. Its relations with Azerbaijan and Armenia have evolved from similar beginnings into two distinct partnerships that now define Washington’s role in the region.
Iran would retaliate by striking U.S. military bases across the Middle East if it comes under attack by American forces, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Saturday (7 January), stressing that such action should not be seen as targeting the countries hosting those bases.
France and Canada opened new consulates in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, on Friday, stepping up their Arctic presence in a show of support for Denmark, a NATO ally, amid renewed demands by U.S. President Donald Trump to acquire the strategically located territory.
Russia launched a large-scale overnight attack on Ukraine’s energy system early on Saturday (7 January), hitting power generation and distribution facilities with more than 400 drones and around 40 missiles, Ukrainian officials have said.
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Storm Leonardo hit Spain and Portugal on Tuesday, forcing more than 11,000 people from their homes, as a man in Portugal died after his car was swept away by floodwaters and a second body was found in Malaga.
An attacker opened fire at the gates of a Shiite Muslim mosque in Islamabad on Friday before detonating a suicide bomb that killed at least 31 people in the deadliest assault of its kind in the capital in more than a decade.
Iran and the United States opened nuclear talks in Oman on Friday, with Tehran calling the meeting a good start and both sides agreeing to continue discussions after returning to their capitals for consultations.
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France and Canada opened new consulates in Nuuk, Greenland’s capital, on Friday, stepping up their Arctic presence in a show of support for Denmark, a NATO ally, amid renewed demands by U.S. President Donald Trump to acquire the strategically located territory.
Russia launched a large-scale overnight attack on Ukraine’s energy system early on Saturday (7 January), hitting power generation and distribution facilities with more than 400 drones and around 40 missiles, Ukrainian officials have said.
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