Communist Party of Vietnam
by Hoang Thuy Giang

Dear Comrade Chairman,
Comrades and friends,

First of all, I would like to convey to all comrades and
friends the greetings of solidarity and friendship. We
would like to express our sincere thanks to the Communist
Party of Greece for its initiative to organize this
international meeting which provides us with the
opportunity to directly meet each other and exchange our
views, to enhance our mutual understanding and strengthen
the cooperation between our Parties. We are convinced that
this meeting is the most vivid expression of the content
raised in the subject of our meeting.

Comrades and friends,

Over the past few years, the world has continued to
experience complicated developments. The Asian financial
and monetary crisis, the invasion of Yugoslavia by the
United States and NATO, the initiation of the National
Missile Defense (NMD) system and the Theater Missile
Defense (TMD) shield by the US in Northeast Asia, regional
conflicts, coups d' etat have made the situation in many
regions get tensed up, threatening peace and security of
all nations.

In the revolution of science and technology, and in the
context of globalization strongly stimulated by developed
industrial countries, the picture of the world's
socio-economy is getting more and more boldly contrary. The
gap of development level, of rich and poor between
different nations and groups of nations, and between
different echelons of inhabitants in each country has
become bigger and bigger. Developed industrial countries
account for 15% of the world's population, 52% of the
world's GDP and 75% of the World trade volume. Developing
countries make up 77% of the world's population, 43% of the
global GDP and 19% of the world trade volume. Economic
transitional countries (28 nations) take up 5% of the
world's GDP and 4,2% of the world trade volume. 20% of the
richest people in the world are enjoying 86% of the global
GDP, while 20% of the poorest citizens on earth can enjoy
only 1.6%. In 1913, the gap between rich and poor
countries was 13 times but it went up to 74 times in 1997.
This reality is pushing up an international struggle for a
more just international economic relations system, and for
a more harmonious development between different groups of
nations. Developments occurred at outside the WTO
Ministerial Conference in Seattle, the United States of
America (at the end of 1999), the United Nations Conference
on trade and Development (UNCTAD - 10) in Bangkok, Thailand
(February 2000), the IMF and WB Conference in Washington
(April 2000), the annual Meeting of ADB in Chiangmei,
Thailand (May 2000) have clearly shown the evolution
tendency of this struggle. The first G-77 Summit to be held
recently in Havana, Cuba after more than 20 years of
foundation (the South-South Summit) was a milestone marking
a new positive step of development of this struggle.

Though the danger of mass-destruction war has been driven
back, local wars and armed conflicts are still
uninterrupted. The appearances of �high-tech war,�
�distance war� with great intensity and highly severe
destruction, and the danger of new spiral of arms race have
woken up the conscience of mankind, promoting the struggle
movement of wide-ranging social echelons in all countries
in the world against war, against arms race, and for peace.

Nations in the world are speeding up their struggles for
the defence of national independence, sovereignty, against
the policies of political hegemony, interference and
imposition of imperialism, for the protection of
fundamental principles in international relations
(especially those of national sovereignty,
self-determination of all nations, non-interference in the
internal affairs of other countries, non-use of force or
threat to use force ), for the equality of a new
international relations system, with equal participation of
all nations, regardless of big or small and rich or poor
countries.

Our parties are operating under different conditions and
circumstances. Any achievement recorded by each party in
the resolution of its national and international duties is
a fruitful contribution to the common struggle for peace,
national independence, democracy and social progress. We
think that the cooperation and coordination of action
between Communist and Workers' Parties will be an important
factor, making contributions to the victory of national and
class struggles which are happening in the International
arena. All parties are independent and self-reliant in
their action, and the cooperation and coordination of
action between parties are voluntary with the spirit of
equality and mutual respect. In the present international
context, and from the lessons of experiences of the
gatherings of the Communist and Workers' Parties in
previous struggles, we, on the one hand, totally agree with
comrade Aleka Paparigha, general Secretary of the Communist
Party of Greece, in saying that it is necessary for us to
have a strong workers' movement and a strong Communist
Party in each country if we want to bring our common
struggle to success. On the other hand, it is our opinion
that there is a need to study and exchange our point of
view on the content, form and method of the new gathering
between our Parties. In our view, under the present
conditions, we need to find a more effective coordination
of our efforts in each concrete field. Due to different
choices of our Parties, it is necessary to respect the
diversification and specification of each Party. We are
supporting every effort of promoting cooperation between
parties either in bilateral or multilateral relations, and
either in sub-regional, regional or international scale.

Comrades and friends,

Our party has just celebrated its 70th foundation
anniversary and this is also its seventy years of leading
the cause of struggle of our people for national
independence, freedom and unity, for the construction of
socialism and defense of the socialist Motherland. In the
speech delivered by our General Secretary Le Kha Phie on
that great significant day, the Communist Party of Vietnam,
once again, confirmed that �we have always been faithful to
our friendship, and Vietnam will never forget the dept of
gratitude extended to us by Communist and Workers' Parties,
international working class, nations oppressed and
exploited by the imperialism, peace-loving mankind, the
world peace movement, patriotic personalities,
intellectuals, peace and democratic activists who used to
support and help Vietnam stand up and gain final victory.
That great solidarity has been and will forever be our
strength.� We are always confident that the international
solidarity of the working class, the comradeship of the
Communists have been an extremely important factor, making
contributions to the victories and achievements of the
Communist Party of Vietnam and its people. That is why, our
party has always attached great importance to relations
with Communist and Workers' Parties, and to strengthening
of the international solidarity between our Parties.

Thank you for your attention./.