The Vietnamese Consulate General in Nanning, capital of south China's Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, officially opened on Sunday.

Addressing the opening ceremony, Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Phu Binh said the establishment of the Vietnamese Consulate General in Guangxi is "a new milestone" in the history of China-Vietnam relations and also in the history of cooperative ties between Vietnam's border provinces and China's Guangxi.

Nguyen said that Vietnam and China are neighboring countries with long traditional friendship. In recent years, with the joint efforts of the both countries, the Vietnam-China relations is advancing smoothly in the principles of building neighboring friendship, expanding all-round cooperation, enhancing long-term and stable ties and facing up to the future.

To further bilateral ties between Vietnam and China, the two governments signed agreements in October, 2003 on Vietnam's opening consulates respectively in Kunming, capital city of southwest China's Yunnan Province, and Nanning, capital city of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, said the Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Vice Chairman Li Jinzao of the Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Regional Government said, the trade and cooperation between Guangxi and neighboring Vietnamese provinces have greatly expanded in recent years. With the progressing of the Sino-Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Free Trade Zone and Nanning's winning of the opportunity to host Sino-ASEAN Fair every year since 2004, Guangxi has become an attractive place for domestic and overseas investment.

The land border between Guangxi and Vietnam's three northern provinces totals 1,020 kilometers. Customs Statistics show that in2003, trade volume between Guangxi and Vietnam reached US$666 million, an increase of 36.9 percent over that of the previous year, accounting for 81 percent of Guangxi's total trade with the ASEAN.

(Xinhua News Agency May 3, 2004)