President of Timor-Leste José Ramos-Horta arrived in Hanoi on Wednesday evening, commencing a four-day state visit to Vietnam at the invitation of his Vietnamese counterpart To Lam.

The top Timor-Leste leader and his entourage were welcomed at Hanoi-based Noi Bai International Airport by Chairman of the Presidential Office of Vietnam Le Khanh Hai, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Do Hung Viet, Vietnamese Ambassador to Indonesia and Timor-Leste Ta Van Thong, along with several senior officials from Vietnam.

This is the fourth high-ranking visit by a top Timor-Leste official to Vietnam since the two countries established their bilateral diplomatic ties in 2002.

José Ramos-Horta, who received the 1996 Nobel Peace Prize, paid his first official visit to Vietnam as Timor-Leste president in April 2010, according to the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Speaking to the press, Ambassador of Timor-Leste to Vietnam João Pereira said that Timor-Leste looks to promote and deepen cooperation with Vietnam in such priority sectors as science-technology, agriculture, and fisheries.

The ambassador elaborated that both sides have huge potential for cooperation in various sectors such as agriculture, oil and gas, fisheries, infrastructure development, consumer goods, education, culture, and many others.

Import-export activities between the two countries have been almost one-way over the past years, with rice accounting for more than 90 percent of Vietnam’s exports to Timor-Leste and the rest including consumer goods and processed food items.

As for multilateral cooperation, Vietnam continued to team up with other ASEAN member states and the ASEAN Secretariat to support Timor-Leste in making preparations for joining the bloc.

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