Vietnam President Truong is scheduled to visit the Philippines later this month, the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) announced over the weekend.

The DFA added that an Action Plan for 2011-2016 is expected to be approved and launched during President Tang’s visit to drive the 11 areas of cooperation reviewed by senior officials of both countries, led by Foreign Affairs Secretary Albert F. del Rosario and Vietnamese Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh, at the 6th Philippines-Vietnam Joint Commission for Bilateral Cooperation (JCBC) held last week in Hanoi.

At the 6th JCBC, the two sides agreed to speed up implementation of the Memorandum of Agreement (MoA) on defense cooperation and the MoA on academic cooperation signed in October, 2010, during the visit to Vietnam by President Aquino.

Senior officials on both sides also endorsed the enhancement of cooperation on maritime and ocean concerns such as the elevation of the joint permanent working group on maritime and ocean concerns into a vice ministerial level, continued support for the joint oceanographic and marine scientific research in the South China Sea (now the West Philippine Sea), and implementation of the MoA on oil spill preparedness and the MoA on search and rescue at sea.

Noting the need to protect the fragile marine ecosystems in the West Philippine Sea from threats of overexploitation, the two sides agreed to cooperate to address illegal, unregulated, and unreported (IUU) fishing in accordance with their national laws.

Since the last JCBC in 2008, the two countries have worked together on a number of areas such as political cooperation, defense and security, trade and investments, maritime and ocean concerns, agriculture, energy, tourism, education, and culture.

This year, the Philippines and Vietnam are celebrating the 35th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations.