Russia to Provide $10B Loan to Vietnam Next Years, President Putin Says

The Russian government is to allocate a $10 billion loan to Vietnam in the next few years, President Vladimir Putin recently told reporters following a meeting with Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang. “The loan amounts to $10 billion,” Mr. Putin said, “of which around $8 billion is to be allocated to the construction of a nuclear power plant in Vietnam.” In Mr. Sang’s visit, Vietnam and Russia signed a number of cooperative agreements, including a protocol ratifying an agreement on juridical and legal assistance for civil and criminal issues and a protocol supplementing an agreement on juridical and legal assistance for legal ties and civil and criminal issues signed in 1998. Others include a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on cooperation in agriculture between Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Russia’s Agriculture Ministry, an MoU on the exchange of bilateral trade statistics and a joint action plan on the fight against smuggling between the General Department of Vietnam Customs and the Federal Customs Service of Russia, and a cooperation program for the 2013-2015 period between the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism and the Russian Culture Ministry. During his five-day trip beginning July 26, President Sang met Premier Dmitry Medvedev and paid a courtesy visit to State Duma’s Acting Chairman Melnikov Ivan Ivanovich. (http://vietnamese.ruvr.ru Jul 27, http://www6.lexisnexis.com Jul 27)