Latest news with #NguyenThanhHai
The Hindu
5 days ago
- Automotive
- The Hindu
Vietnam Ambassador meets West Bengal Chief Minister
Vietnam's Ambassador to India, Nguyen Thanh Hai, on Tuesday (July 8, 2025) met West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee at the State Secretariat in presence of officials of different consulates of the southeast Asian country and State government officials. Sources at the State Secretariat said that the meeting focused on bilateral ties between Vietnam and West Bengal in various sectors. Ms. Banerjee told the Ambassador that a delegation from Vietnam is welcome to participate at Bengal Global Business Summit— the West Bengal government organised industry summit. Along with the Ambassador, Consul General of Vietnam in Mumbai Le Quang Bien, and Counsellor of the Embassy of Vietnam in Delhi Tran Thanh Tung were present at the meeting. West Bengal Chief Secretary Manoj Pant was also present at the meeting. During his visit to Kolkata Ambassador Nguyen Thanh Hai met representatives of chambers of commerce and agreed to a proposal by representatives of a chamber of commerce that a 'dedicated desk in Kolkata' can be undertaken in the upcoming days. 'We will send more delegations to India to explore further business opportunities. VinFast [automobile company from Vietnam] has already started a $500 million EV plant in Tamil Nadu, we plan to expand more businesses across India to improve our bilateral relations and improve trade between the two nations,' Mr. Nguyen Thanh Hai has said.
India Gazette
6 days ago
- Business
- India Gazette
Vietnam, India have trade target of USD 15 billion: Ambassador Nguyen Thanh Hai
Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], July 7 (ANI): Vietnam's Ambassador to India, Nguyen Thanh Hai, highlighted the strong cooperation between Vietnam and India, citing the growing economic ties with a trade target of USD 15 billion. Speaking to ANI, Hai stated, 'Currently, we have seen fine development in our trade and investment cooperation.' He further attributed the success to the strong political cooperation, traditional friendship, and stated, 'One of the advantages of cooperation between our countries is that we have strong political cooperation, traditional friendship, and the comprehensive and strategic partnership between our countries is developing well.' 'With that development, trade and investment have been growing well over the last few years. The potential is huge. We are working with the government agencies of India and in this visit, I had a conversation with Bharat Chamber of Commerce in West Bengal about ways to promote trade, investment, and cooperation even further,' he added. The envoy expressed optimism about the future of the Vietnam-India partnership, saying, 'We are committed and optimistic about the potential and the future of the Vietnam-India partnership.' 'Right now, we have a trade target of USD 15 billion,' he said. As Vietnam continues to strengthen its ties with India, the country is also expanding its presence on the global stage. Brazil's Foreign Ministry has announced that Vietnam has officially joined BRICS as a partner country. This addition was announced in June 2025, with Vietnam becoming the tenth partner country. Earlier, Leaders of the BRICS nations welcomed Indonesia as a member of the group, while 10 nations, including Belarus, Bolivia, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Malaysia, Thailand, Cuba, Vietnam, Uganda, and Uzbekistan, as partner countries. Vietnam becomes the tenth BRICS partner country, alongside Belarus, Bolivia, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Uganda and Uzbekistan. The partner-country category was established at the XVI BRICS Summit, in Kazan, in October 2024, as per the BRICS official statement. The joint declaration of the 17th BRICS Summit in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro on Sunday stated, 'We welcome the Indonesia as a BRICS member, as well as the Belarus, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Kazakhstan, the Cuba, the Nigeria, Malaysia, Thailand, the Vietnam, the Uganda, and the Uzbekistan as BRICS partner countries.' PM Modi is also in BRICS Summit, where he met with Brazil president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and thanked him for his warm hospitality and the successful organisation of the Summit. During the BRICS session 'Peace and Security and Reform of Global Governance' on Sunday, PM Modi stated that the expansion of BRICS and the inclusion of new partners demonstrates its ability to evolve with times and called for reforming institutions like the United Nations Security Council, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and Multilateral Developments. The 17th BRICS Summit being held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on 6-7 July 2025, a statement by the Prime Minister's Office said. (ANI)
India Gazette
6 days ago
- Business
- India Gazette
Vietnam-India trade reaches USD 15 billion, Ambassador Nguyen Thanh Hai eyes further cooperation
Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], July 7 (ANI): Vietnam's Ambassador to India, Nguyen Thanh Hai, highlighted the strong cooperation between Vietnam and India, citing the growing trade, with targeting trade value of USD 15 billion. and investment between the two countries. Speaking to ANI, Hai stated, 'Currently, we have seen fine development in our trade and investment cooperation.' He further attributed the success to the strong political cooperation, traditional friendship, and stated, 'One of the advantages of cooperation between our countries is that we have strong political cooperation, traditional friendship, and the comprehensive and strategic partnership between our countries is developing well.' 'With that development, trade and investment have been growing well over the last few years. The potential is huge. We are working with the government agencies of India and in this visit, I had a conversation with Bharat Chamber of Commerce in West Bengal about ways to promote trade, investment, and cooperation even further,' he added. The envoy expressed optimism about the future of the Vietnam-India partnership, saying, 'We are committed and optimistic about the potential and the future of the Vietnam-India partnership.' 'Right now, we have a trade target of USD 15 billion,' he said. As Vietnam continues to strengthen its ties with India, the country is also expanding its presence on the global stage. Brazil's Foreign Ministry has announced that Vietnam has officially joined BRICS as a partner country. This addition was announced in June 2025, with Vietnam becoming the tenth partner country. Earlier, Leaders of the BRICS nations welcomed Indonesia as a member of the group, while 10 nations, including Belarus, Bolivia, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Malaysia, Thailand, Cuba, Vietnam, Uganda, and Uzbekistan, as partner countries. Vietnam becomes the tenth BRICS partner country, alongside Belarus, Bolivia, Kazakhstan, Cuba, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Uganda and Uzbekistan. The partner-country category was established at the XVI BRICS Summit, in Kazan, in October 2024, as per the BRICS official statement. The joint declaration of the 17th BRICS Summit in Brazil's Rio de Janeiro on Sunday stated, 'We welcome the Indonesia as a BRICS member, as well as the Belarus, the Plurinational State of Bolivia, the Kazakhstan, the Cuba, the Nigeria, Malaysia, Thailand, the Vietnam, the Uganda, and the Uzbekistan as BRICS partner countries.' PM Modi is also in BRICS Summit, where he met with Brazil president, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and thanked him for his warm hospitality and the successful organisation of the Summit. During the BRICS session 'Peace and Security and Reform of Global Governance' on Sunday, PM Modi stated that the expansion of BRICS and the inclusion of new partners demonstrates its ability to evolve with times and called for reforming institutions like the United Nations Security Council, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and Multilateral Developments. The 17th BRICS Summit being held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on 6-7 July 2025, a statement by the Prime Minister's Office said. (ANI)
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Business Standard
6 days ago
- Business
- Business Standard
India-Vietnam trade likely to grow to $20 billion, says Ambassador Hai
Ambassador Nguyen Thanh Hai says India-Vietnam trade has strong growth potential, urges deeper cooperation and highlights VinFast's $2 bn investment in Tamil Nadu Ishita Ayan Dutt Kolkata Listen to This Article India–Vietnam trade should reach $20 billion, Nguyen Thanh Hai, Ambassador of Vietnam to India, said on Monday in Kolkata. 'Trade is an important pillar in our partnership, with bilateral trade reaching $15 billion. But if you look at the total volume of trade of each of the countries, it is a small proportion,' the Ambassador said at a session organised by the Bharat Chamber of Commerce. 'There is a lot of potential. We need to find a way to promote further trade with each other,' he added. The environment was 'very conducive' to promote trade further, he said. On Sunday,
The Star
09-05-2025
- Health
- The Star
Cleaning up a toxic legacy
The Vietnam War ended on April 30, 1975, when the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon fell to Communist forces. But millions of people still face daily battles with its chemical legacy. Nguyen Thanh Hai, 34, is one of millions with disabilities linked to Agent Orange. Born with severe developmental challenges, it's a struggle for him to complete tasks others take for granted: buttoning the blue shirt he wears to a special school in Da Nang, practising the alphabet, drawing shapes or forming simple sentences. Hai grew up in Da Nang, the site of a US air base where departing troops left behind huge amounts of Agent Orange that have lingered for decades, leeching into food and water supplies in areas like Hai's village and affecting generations of residents. Across Vietnam, US forces sprayed 72 million litres of defoliants during the war to strip the enemy's cover. Long road ahead: Attendants sitting next to a field contaminated with dioxin before a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up the toxin left over from the Vietnam War, at a former US military base in Da Nang, on Aug 9, 2012. — AP More than half was Agent Orange, a blend of herbicides. Agent Orange was laced with dioxin, a type of chemical linked to cancer, birth defects and lasting environmental damage. Today, three million people, including many children, still suffer serious health issues associated with exposure to it. Vietnam has spent decades cleaning up the toxic legacy of the war, in part funded by belated US assistance, but the work is far from complete. Now, millions in Vietnam are worried that the United States may abandon Agent Orange cleanup as US President Donald Trump slashes foreign aid. When the war ended, the United States turned its back on Vietnam, eager to turn the page on a painful chapter in its history. But Vietnam was left with dozens of dioxin hotspots spread across 58 of its 63 provinces. Vietnam says the health impacts last generations, threatening the children, grandchildren, and even great-grandchildren of people exposed to the chemicals with health complications ranging from cancer to birth defects that affects the spine and nervous system. But the science about the human health impact – both to those exposed to Agent Orange and the generations that follow – remains unsettled. Reaching far and wide: Maps of the areas contaminated with dioxin around Danang airport are displayed during a ceremony marking the start of a project to clean up the toxin on Aug 9, 2012. — AP This is partly because when the two countries finally started working together in 2006, they focused on finding dioxin in the environment and clearing it instead of studying the still-contentious topic of its impact on human health, said Charles Bailey, co-author of the book From Enemies to Partners: Vietnam, the U.S. and Agent Orange. 'The science of causality is still incomplete,' said Bailey. Vietnam identifies Agent Orange victims by checking family history, where they lived, and a list of health problems linked to the poison. And Hai's disabilities were very likely linked to the spraying of the defoliant, added Bailey. The 34-year-old who dreams of becoming a soldier like his grandfather, was unable to leave home for years, waiting alone while his family went out to work. It was only five years ago that he began attending a special school. 'I am happy here because I have many friends,' he said. The contamination also denuded Vietnam's natural defences. Nearly half of its mangrove trees, which shield shores from strong storms, were destroyed. Much of its tropical forest was irrevocably damaged, while the herbicide also leached the soil of nutrients in some of Vietnam's most climate-vulnerable areas. In the decades after the war ended, the recovering country fenced off heavily contaminated sites like Da Nang airport and began providing support to impacted families. But the United States largely ignored growing evidence of health impacts – including on its own veterans – until the mid-2000s, when it and began funding cleanup in Vietnam. Still feeling the effects: Students playing with wooden blocks in physiotherapy class at a school for victims of Agent Orange in Da Nang. — AP In 1991, the United States recognised that certain diseases could be related to exposure to Agent Orange and made veterans who had them eligible for benefits. Since 1991, it has spent over US$155mil to aid people with disabilities in areas affected by Agent Orange or littered by unexploded bombs, according to the US State Department. The two countries have also cooperated to recover war dead, with the United States aiding Vietnam's search for its own missing. Cleaning up Agent Orange is expensive and often dangerous. Heavily polluted soil needs to be unearthed and heated in large ovens to very high temperatures, while less contaminated soil can be buried in secure landfills. Despite years of work, large sites still need to cleared. In Da Nang, where an air base was contaminated during storage and transportation of Agent Orange, the United States completed a US$110mil cleanup in 2018 but an area the size of 10 football fields still remains heavily contaminated. Cooperation on war legacy issues also laid a foundation for growing US-Vietnam ties, culminating in 2023 when Vietnam elevated the United States to its highest diplomatic status of comprehensive strategic partner. 'The United States considers Vietnam a key partner in advancing a free and open Indo-Pacific,' former US treasury secretary Janet Yellen said in 2023. But Donald Trump's cuts to USAID stalled key projects in Vietnam, and while many have resumed, doubts remain about US reliability. Vietnam now has to negotiate a new reality where the US president says the country can no longer afford to help other countries. 'The country can't handle the toxic chemicals that still persist without help,' said Nguyen Van An, the chairman of Association for Victims of Agent Orange in Danang. 'We always believe that the US government and the manufacturers of this toxic chemical must have the responsibility to support the victims,' he said. He said he hoped that any stoppages to ongoing projects due to shifting politics in Washington would be temporary. Insufficient data means that experts can't definitely say when the risk to human health will end. But the more urgent problem is if that cleanup efforts are interrupted, the now-exposed contaminated soil could get into waterways and harm more people. A 10-year project to clear the some 500,000 cubic meters of dioxin-contaminated soil – enough to fill 40,000 trucks – at Bien Hoa airbase was launched in 2020. It stopped for a week in March and then restarted. But Bailey, who worked on issues related to the Agent Orange in Vietnam for years, said future USAID funding for the cleanup and a US$30mil programme for people with disabilities was uncertain. With federal cuts to USAID, most staffers in Vietnam are expected to be gone by later this year, leaving nobody to administer funding for remediation programmes, even if it is not cut itself. 'This basically leaves a very large mountain of contaminated soil. Only 30% of which has been dealt with and that is less contaminated,' said Bailey. He added that less than half of the soil at Bien Hoa had been treated and much of the remaining soil was heavily contaminated and needed to be treated in an as-yet unbuilt incinerator. Tim Rieser, who was retired Sen Patrick Leahy's foreign policy aide when the Vermont Democrat secured the original funding for Vietnam War remediation projects and is now a senior adviser to Sen Peter Welch, said Congress still supports the programmes but it would be hard for them to continue without staff. 'For more than 30 years, the United States and Vietnam have worked together to rebuild relations by dealing with the worst legacies of the war, like Agent Orange,' he said. 'Now the Trump administration is mindlessly shutting everything down, with no concern for the impact of their actions on relations with an important partner in the Indo-Pacific.' Chuck Searcy, an American Vietnam War veteran who has worked on humanitarian programmes in the country since 1995, said he worries that trust built over years could erode very rapidly. He pointed out that those who benefit from US funded projects to address war legacies are 'innocent victims'. 'They've been victimised twice, once by the war and the consequences that they've suffered. And now by having the rug pulled out from under them,' he said. — AP
