Hanoi (VNA)– President Nguyen Xuan Phuc is going to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) meetings on November 11 - 12 viavideoconference, expected to help promote Vietnam’s stature in multilateral activities,including those of APEC.

The year 2021 isimportant to APEC as it is the first year to implement the APEC Vision 2040. The21 member economies continue attaching importance to APEC and considering this a leading forum in the region and an important mechanism in the Asia-Pacificto help augment multilateral efforts to cope with the COVID-19 pandemic,recover economies, and prepare for durable growth.

Vietnam became anofficial member of APEC on November 15, 1998, raising the forum’s membership to21. This was a significant milestone during the implementation of Vietnam’s openforeign policy of diversifying and multilateralising external relations and integratinginto the global economy.

The APEC region iscritical to the country’s security and development as it gathers 15 of the 30strategic and comprehensive partners which are leading economic and tradepartners of Vietnam. Thirteen of the 17 free trade agreements Vietnam isenforcing, negotiating, or waiting for ratification cover 17 APEC members.

During the 23 years ofits APEC membership, Vietnam has made active and proactive contributions to theforum, thereby helping to promote regional peace, stability, cooperation, andeconomic connectivity and maintain APEC’s role as a leading mechanism for economicconnectivity in Asia-Pacific.

Amid the COVID-19pandemic, it is currently one of the members taking the lead in boosting APEC’scommitment to the cooperation in sharing vaccines and ensuring equal andeffective distribution of and access to vaccines at a reasonable cost. It hasalso been appealing to other members to voluntarily transfer vaccine productiontechnology so as to step up vaccine production and supply towards herdimmunity.

The APEC Leaders' Week this year takes place amid the continuation of complex developments, increaseduncertainties, and new challenges posed by the COVID-19 resurgence with moredangerous variants. Meanwhile, the global economy is recovering, but unstablyand unevenly. The Asia-Pacific remains the leading region in economic recovery,development, and connectivity.

President Nguyen XuanPhuc is scheduled to participate in the 28th APEC Economic Leaders’Meeting on November 12 and a dialogue between APEC leaders and the APECBusiness Advisory Council on November 11. He will deliver a pre-recorded speechat the APEC CEO Summit on November 11 - 12.

2021 is the first yearVietnam has implemented the socio-economic development plan for 2021 - 2025 andmoved to a stage of comprehensive and extensive integration into the world. TheState leader’s participation in the APEC Leaders' Week will help raise Vietnam’sstature in multilateral activities, including those of APEC, and help thecountry make active and effective contributions to the building of a plan forimplementing the APEC Vision 2040./.