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by Our Foreign Desk
VIETNAM and the US deepened military co-operation with the signing of a new agreement in Hanoi on Monday.
The Joint Vision Statement on Defence Relations builds on the previous Memorandum of Understanding for Advancing Bilateral Defence Co-operation signed in 2011.
Defence Minister General Phung Quang Thanh and his US counterpart Ashton Carter said the two nations are extending their defence co-operation to include plans to conduct military operations together.
The US will support the operation of an UN peacekeeping centre in Hanoi and the participation of Vietnam in UN peacekeeping activities.
The agreement also ended a ban on US arms sales to Vietnam, following the US’s partial lifting of its ban on weapons sales to Vietnam, allowing the sale of lethal maritime security and surveillance capabilities in October.
Gen Thanh said that the full removal of the weapons sales restrictions would be “in line with the interests of both countries.”
In response to US criticisms of the of the deal, he said: “I think we should not attach that decision to the human-rights issue.”
Gen Thanh defended his government’s record, stressing that it respects the rights and freedoms of the people.
The US will provide $18 million (£11.79m) to Vietnam to buy coastguard vessels.
Mr Carter said that the legacy of the Vietnam war should be dealt with according to the terms of the statement.
But he returned a diary and a belt taken by US troops from dead People’s Army of Vietnam soldiers to Gen Thanh in the hope that they could be returned to their living relatives.
The US war in Vietnam caused millions of casualties there and in neighbouring Laos and Cambodia.
Another key issue discussed by the two ministers involved land reclamation projects being conducted by China, Vietnam and others in the South China Sea.
Asked if Vietnam would agree to US requests to abandon such projects, Gen Thanh said Hanoi had not expanded its building activities, pointing out that the work being done is to prevent soil erosion to ensure the safety of the local population.
