CPC congratulates CPV on Party congress opening

BEIJING/HANOI－The Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Tuesday sent a congratulatory message to the Communist Party of Vietnam on the opening of its 13th National Congress, a quinquennial gathering to chart the country's next five years and beyond.

Since the 12th congress, the CPV Central Committee, headed by General-Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong, has attached importance to strengthening party building and made a series of achievements in leading the Vietnamese people to advance its cause of socialist construction and innovation, the message said.

In the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, the CPV Central Committee has played a strong leading role, effectively prevented and controlled the pandemic, maintained economic growth and improved people's lives, demonstrating the advantages of the socialist system.

It said the CPC and the Chinese government attach great importance to the relations between the two parties and between the two countries, and are willing to work together with Vietnam, under the guidance of the principles of "long-term stability, future orientation, good-neighborly friendship and all-around cooperation "as well as the spirit of "good neighbors, good friends, good comrades and good partners", to inherit and carry forward the traditional friendship created and carefully nurtured by the older generation of leaders of the two neighbors.

The CPC and the Chinese government also stand ready to work with Vietnamese counterparts to well implement the significant consensuses reached by the top leaders of both parties and the two countries, and promote the China-Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership to continuously achieve new developments, so as to better benefit both countries and their peoples, and make new contributions to regional peace, stability, development and prosperity, it said.

Plan for next five years

The congress, which kicked off on Tuesday, gathers 1,587 delegates and will run until Feb 2.

Trong, speaking in a 75-minute address, stressed the importance of the congress to the country and the people and hailed the achievements in the past five years.

The gathering will map out plans for the country's next five years and beyond, including becoming a modern industrialized country with upper-middle income by 2030, and a developed country with high income by 2045, said the general-secretary.

Pan Jin'e, an expert on Vietnamese studies with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, noted a positive economic growth of near 3 percent in Vietnam in 2020, adding that Vietnam has become China's sixth largest trading partner, surpassing Australia and Germany.

Xinhua