Trump says he appreciates commercial order that Vietnam has made
Wednesday, February 27, 2019, 12:42 GMT+7
HANOI, Feb 27 (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday he appreciated the commercial order that Vietnam had made as well as the fact that the U.S. trade deficit with the Southeast Asian nation was coming down.
At a lunch with the Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and other officials, Trump also said he was looking forward to his meeting Wednesday evening with Kim Jong Un and that the North Korean leader wanted to do something great.
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| Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc (right) and U.S. President Donald Trump shake hands in Hanoi, February 27, 2019. Photo: Nguyen Khanh / Tuoi Tre |
Ahead of the lunch meeting, Trump met Vietnam's State President Nguyen Phu Trong, hours before the U.S. president was due to meet Chairman Kim for their second summit.
Trump and Trong, who is also Vietnam's Party chief, met at the grand, colonial-era presidential palace. During their meeting, the two leaders witnessed Vietnamese carriers VietJet and Bamboo Airways sign deals with Boeing Co to buy 110 planes worth more than $15 billion.
Vietjet signed firm order to buy 100 new Boeing 737 Max planes worth $12.7 billion at list price, whereas Bamboo Airways inked a deal to purchase ten planes from the U.S. planemaker.
On Wednesday evening, Trump is scheduled to meet Kim at the city's Metropole hotel, eight months after their first summit in Singapore, to discuss efforts to get North Korea to dismantle its nuclear weapons programme.
