Vietnam will allow Russia to set up a ship maintenance base at its port of Cam Ranh – a former Soviet naval base, but this is definitely not a military base, Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang said Friday during his official visit to Russia.

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According to RIA Novosti, Mr. Sang, speaking to Voice of Russia ahead of a meeting with President Vladimir Putin, stressed that the port in the Vietnamese central coastal province of Khanh Hoa would not be a military base.

Sang also said Hanoi was planning to develop the capacity to provide maintenance services to any foreign ship docking at Cam Ranh.

Last month on June 3, US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta paid a visit to Cam Ranh Bay on his official two-day visit to Vietnam. Panetta is the most senior American official to visit Cam Ranh since the war ended in 1975.

Cam Ranh Port was used by the US for military purposes during the Vietnam War. After the war, Vietnam and the Soviet Union signed an agreement in 1979 that allowed the latter to use Cam Ranh as a base for 25 years. Russia withdrew in 2002.

RIA Novosti also reported that Russia’s naval chief, Vice Admiral Viktor Chirkov, confirmed Friday that Russia was in talks on setting up ship maintenance stations in Cuba, Vietnam and in the Seychelles.

In related news, Vietnam and Russia have agreed to upgrade their bilateral relations to comprehensive strategic partnership to meet their people’s aspirations and contribute to peace, stability and prosperity in the Asian-Pacific region and the world.

The agreement was reached by President Truong Tan Sang and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin during their talks in the Russian city of Sochi on July 27.

Vietnam and Russia held that international security is comprehensive and inseparable, adding that it is not allowed to ensure security of a nation by harming that of others, including the expansion of military-politic alliance and the establishment of global and regional anti-missile defense systems. They attached importance to enhancing joint activities on the international arena in order to fight terrorism in any form.