China calls for closer maritime cooperation with Vietnam

Chinese President Xi Jinping said Friday that China and Vietnam should promote maritime cooperation.

The two countries should properly manage and control their differences through friendly negotiations and jointly safeguard stability at sea, Xi said during talks with his Vietnamese counterpart, Truong Tan Sang.

The Chinese president, who started a two-day state visit to Vietnam Thursday, said the two sides have reached a series of consensuses on deepening practical cooperation in various fields.

The visit has met the goal of consolidating traditional friendship, strengthening strategic coordination and boosting practical cooperation, Xi told Sang.

The two countries, both adhering to the leadership of communist parties, keeping firmly to the socialist road and sticking to comprehensive deepening reform, have put bilateral relations in an important and special position and strived for cementing China-Vietnam comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership, Xi said.

The Chinese president also suggested that the two sides keep to the right direction of bilateral relations, advance large-scale cooperation projects by conjoining each other's development strategies, and enhance people-to-people exchanges.

Sang, for his part, said Xi's visit will make an important contribution to the development of bilateral ties, adding that Vietnam and China should inherit and carry forward their traditional friendship forged by older generations of the two countries' leaders.

Sang said the two sides should properly address differences through consultations and will never let them affect the overall relations between the two countries and the two parties.

Meanwhile, China and Vietnam also said in a joint communique that the two countries agreed to enhance their practical maritime cooperation.

China and Vietnam will launch joint inspection in December on the waters outside the mouth of the Beibu Gulf, a half-closed bay surrounded by Chinese and Vietnamese territories and a traditional fishery place for the two countries.

The move can be seen as an important threshold for furthering bilateral maritime cooperation, according to the document.

The two sides also planned to steadily promote the negotiation of demarcation of the waters outside the mouth of the Beibu Gulf, and actively foster the joint development of these waters.

On maritime issues, the two sides should seek a basic and long-standing solution acceptable to both sides through friendly consultations and negotiations, and actively explore transitional ways, which would not affect each other's stance and viewpoints, including the study and negotiations on joint development, according to the communique.

To be specific, the two nations vowed to implement the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea (DOC) in a comprehensive and effective manner, and push forward the signing of a full code of conduct (COC) in the waters based on coordination at the earliest time.

The two sides agreed not to take any measures that would complicate the disputes, and handle the problems timely and properly, so as to safeguard the big picture of China-Vietnam relations as well as peace and stability of the South China Sea.

The two countries also pledged to promote the working groups for consultation on maritime joint development and for maritime cooperation in less sensitive areas. Endi