Vietnam’s top leader begins his three-day visit to North Korea on Thursday for a trip that reflects Hanoi’s desire to balance regional relations amid ongoing tensions, analysts say.
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Communist Party chief To Lam’s visit – the first by a Vietnamese leader to the reclusive country in almost two decades – will coincide with a military parade in Pyongyang on Friday to mark the 80th founding anniversary of the ruling Workers’ Party, according to the Vietnamese government and North Korean state media on Monday.
North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un had extended a special invitation to Lam, Vietnam’s foreign ministry said, confirming a report on North Korea’s state media, KCNA.
This year marks the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations between the two communist countries.
The last time a Vietnamese leader visited North Korea was in 2007. The visit by the head of the ruling Communist Party, Nong Duc Manh, was the first by a Vietnamese party chief since the late President Ho Chi Minh in 1957.
Shifts in geopolitical focus and “cautious” diplomatic ties were responsible for this two-decade gap, Ha Hoang Hop, chairman of VietKnow, a Hanoi-based think tank focusing on political risks, told This Week in Asia.