Budapest (VNA)– Vietnam will always support, facilitate and assist universities of thecountry and Hungary to effectively implement their training cooperation in thetime to come, General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam CentralCommittee Nguyen Phu Trong stated on September 11.

The affirmation was made when the Party leaderattended and delivered a speech at the opening of the second Vietnam – Hungary rectors’conference in Budapest, as he was making an official visit to Hungary at theinvitation of Prime Minister Viktor Oban.

Describing the conference asan important and very practical cooperation mechanism among universities of thetwo countries, Party leader Trong also spoke highly of the collaborationbetween the two countries’ relevant ministries in organizing the event with anaim of further developing relations between the universities, helping implementcooperation documents signed between the two sides.

Speaking at the event,Hungarian Deputy Prime Minister Mihaly Varga expressed admiration at Vietnam’sachievements in various fields, especially education and training, stressingthat Vietnam is an important gateway for Hungary to advance to Southeast Asia.Hungary is enjoying high development prospects to become a motive of economic growthof Europe, and this will create good chances for Vietnamese firms, the officialadded.

At the conference,participants focused their discussion on the prospects of bilateral cooperationin training and scientific research, with the core contents being strengtheningjoint education programmes between the universities of the two countries,boosting the exchange of students and lecturers, and  forming joint research groups, among others.

Vietnam – Hungary cooperationin education and training is a prominent point in the bilateral relations. Overthe past nearly 70 years, Hungary has helped trained over 3,000 Vietnamesestudents, many of them have held and are holding important positions in theState management apparatus, science, culture, art and business in Vietnam. Recently,the number of annual scholarships granted by the Hungarian government toVietnamese cities has seen a sharp increase, to 200 now from only five in 2012and 100 in 2016. Currently there are nearly 500 Vietnamese students studying inHungary while a large number of Hungarian students are studying in Vietnam.

The first conference of therectors was held in Hanoi in November 2014 with the participation ofrepresentatives from 50 Vietnamese and 15 Hungarian universities, on theoccasion of the Vietnam visit by President Janos Ader. The conference this timewas held on the occasion of the official Hungary visit by Party leader NguyenPhu Trong, drawing the participation of representatives of over 30 Vietnameseand 20 Hungarian universities. The signing of up to 15 agreement documents atthis year’s conference is described as evidence of attention from universitiesto the utilization of cooperation potential and chances in the field ofeducation and training between the two countries.-VNA