Lao newly-elected president visits Vietnam

The General Secretary of the Lao People's Revolutionary Party (LPRP) and President of Laos Bounnhang Vorachit started his first overseas visit to Vietnam on Monday after being elected.

At the invitation of General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam (CPV) Nguyen Phu Trong and Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang, Bounnhang Vorachit is touring Vietnam from Monday to Wednesday.

Speaking after the official welcoming ceremony held in Vietnam' s capital Hanoi, Bounnhang Vorachit said Vietnam is the country that he paid the first visit after being elected as LPRP chief in January and Lao President in April, reported Vietnam's state-run news agency VNA.

The visit showed that Lao party, state and people attach great importance to maintaining and nurturing the friendship with Vietnam, VNA quoted Bounnhang Vorachit as saying.

Vietnam is always a trusted and intimate friend of Lao people, said the visiting Lao party chief.

Trong, for his part, expressed his belief that the visit will help bring the relations between two parties and two countries to a new height.

The two leaders exchanged views and discussed measures to effectively implement high-level agreements between two parties and countries in 2016 and in the coming years, according to Vietnam's state-run radio VOV.

During his stay in Vietnam, Lao party chief and president Bounnhang Vorachit is scheduled to hold talks with Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang as well as meet with Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and Vietnam's National Assembly Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan.