Under a memorandum of understanding (MoU) reached between Ho Chi Minh City Department of Information and Communication and its Lao counterpart, HCMC will help the Lao capital city of Vientiane to improve the capacity of its telecommunication sector. According to the MoU, which was signed during the ongoing visit of HCM City officials to Vientiane, the assistance will be made through professional sharing. On August 13, Vice Chairman of the HCM City People’s Committee Le Manh Ha met with Secretary of the Vientiane Party Committee and Mayor Soukan Mahalath. During the meeting, Ha told the Laotian Mayor that the Vietnamese side had a working session with officials from StaTelecom Unitel, a joint venture between Viettel – a Vietnam’s military-run telecom group – and the Lao Asia Telecom. In reply, Soukan Mahalath said he highly values HCM City’s support for the Lao capital city over the past years, especially in the fields of personnel training and telecommunications development.

The Lao official said that Vientiane is making all efforts to fulfill the set targets, including those for the development of information technology, he said. He also expressed his hope that the two sides will step up their cooperation and create possible favorable conditions for the implementation of their joint projects, contributing to strengthening and promoting the traditional friendship and cooperation between Laos and Vietnam.