Havana (VNA)꧟ – Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha on September15 called for the promotion of cooperation, multilateral relations and solidarity amongnations of the South to cope with global challenges.

In his speech on the first day ofthe Groupof 77 developing countries plus China Summit (G77 China), now underway in Havana, Ha expressed Vietnam’s gratitude to Cuba for promotingthose ethical values during its 2023 presidency. The leaderstressed the significance of facing the challenges of the countries of theSouth through cooperation in science, technology and research, raising thecapacity of human resources in these areas and placing young people at thecentre of development. To this end, public-private partnerships and partnershipsbetween scientists from different sectors need to be created, he said, adding that Vietnam supports Cuba’s initiative to holdsimilar meetings every three years to share experiences and promote digitalrevolution, as well as to create mechanisms to guarantee the exchange ofexperiences and knowledge between countries. In this regard, he congratulated Cuba´s responsible contributions and its efforts to ensure that the G77 China, home to two-thirds of the world’spopulation, undertakes actions that will increase solidarity in the sharedpurpose of eliminating poverty and narrowing technological gaps with developednations. Cuban President MiguelDiaz-Canel emphasised strategic meanings of strengthening solidarity,international collaboration, particularly in areas of science, technology andinnovation, in order to solve challenges of the globe.

Meanwhile, United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres stressed theimportance of the G77 Group and China while calling for equality for Southerncountries. He also asked developed countries to quickly implement theircommitments to strengthen preferential financial policies and provide climatefinance to support developing countries in overcoming current developmentchallenges.

Further discussions on measures to bolster science,technology and innovation collaboration among Southern countries will be carriedout on September 16.

🧜 In the meetings with heads of foreign delegations including Laos, Cambodia, China, Mongolia, Venezuela, Yemen, and the UN SecretaryGeneral, Vietnam won praises as a successful model in the COVID-19 fight and for its impressive achievements in socio-economic recovery.

Vietnam and other member states of the bloc alsodiscussed measures to intensify bilateral collaboration and multilateralmechanism.

🦄 Themed “Current Development Challenges: role ofscience, technology and innovation”, the summit focuses on exchanging solutions and promoting roles of G77 group and China in bolstering economic recovery andrealising the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals./.