General Director of the Vietnam News Agency (VNA) Nguyen Duc Loi and his counterpart from the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS Sergei Mikhailov have sought ways to further expand cooperation between their agencies.

During their talks in Hanoi on October 21, the VNA leader said that over the past decades, ITAR-TASS has always provided VNA with timely, accurate and diverse texts and photos, especially those related to the former Soviet Union as well as Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (SNG) today.

Visits by senior officials and the regular exchange of reporters have helped strengthen mutual understanding between Vietnam and Russia in general and between the two news agencies in particular, General Director Loi said.

The cooperation agreement inked between VNA and ITAR-TASS has been expanded to a broader level, contributing to tightening the Vietnam-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership, he added.

Regarding information exchange cooperation, General Director Loi said that the two sides have made the supply of information in compliance with the agreement and have considered the supplementation of new points in order to meet each side’s information demand in the new situation.

ITAR-TASS has paid attention to providing information related to Vietnamese people living in Russia while VNA has actively used economic and sports news and news covering SNG countries provided by ITAR-TASS.

Sergei Mikhailov said that over the past 60 years, VNA has become a reliable information source for his agency, not only in Vietnam but also in the Southeast Asian and Asia-Pacific regions.

ITAR-TASS is willing to provide news needed by VNA and will discuss measures to expand information cooperation of mutual concern, he said.

He expressed his wish that the two agencies will work together in organising a Vietnam-Russia photo exhibition in this November, on the occasion of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s official visit to Vietnam .

At present, VNA’s online Vietnam Pictorial is the only newspaper published in Russian in Vietnam , effectively contributing to fostering the traditional friendship between the two nations.

Over the past time, VNA and ITAR-TASS have actively exchanged delegations of senior officials and reporters to study each other’s experience, thus further strengthening bilateral cooperation.

Activities to support the two’s correspondents have been promoted productively. ITAR-TASS has provided the VNA representative office in Russia with political, socio-economic, sports and cultural news, especially that on the Vietnamese community in Russia and SNG countries.

Meanwhile, VNA has actively assisted ITAR-TASS correspondents in Vietnam in covering news and promoting their agency’s relations with local agencies and organisations.

VNA