Vietnam, EU elevate ties to 'comprehensive strategic relationship'

Vietnam and the EU elevated their ties to a "comprehensive strategic relationship" on Thursday, as the EU Council President Antonio Costa paid a visit to Vietnamese President Luong Cuong in Hanoi.

The Vietnamese president and Costa announced the elevation during a news conference, according to a statement from the EU Council.

"This upgrade fully captures the depth and breadth of our collaboration to date, and our expectations for its future evolution-on trade, on green and digital transition, on security, on people-to-people ties" — and reflects "how closely our future is now linked," Costa said.

The EU and Hanoi are "reliable and predictable partners, united by a strong commitment to the international rules-based order, to multilateralism, and to peace and stability," he said on US social media company X.

"At a moment when international rules-based order is under threat from multiple sides, we need to stand side by side as reliable and predictable partners," Costa also said, according to a statement from the council.

"It is about developing spheres of shared prosperity. But it is also about the credibility of international rules. That is why our partnership matters beyond our own regions," he added.

This marks the EU's first Comprehensive Strategic Partnership in Southeast Asia.