Vice President Zeng Qinghong said in Nanning Tuesday that the work of demarcation between China and Vietnam is going smoothly and he believed that the work would be completed before 2008.

In a meeting with Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, Zeng said to further improve China-Vietnam is the common aspiration of the two people's and accords with the fundamental and basic interests of the two peoples.

He said China is ready to join hands with Vietnam to conduct bilateral dialogue and cooperation in the fields of foreign affairs, defense and security, properly handle the border issues left over in history and actively push forward the joint exploration of the disputed areas in South China Sea.

Zeng also urged the two countries to keep on exploring new areas to improve bilateral trade cooperation and try to increase the trade volume to US$10 billion prior to the year of 2010.

He said China attaches great importance to the construction of the Beibu Gulf economic rim and two economic corridors which respectively links Kunming of China to Lao Cai, Hanoi, Hai-phong of Vietnam, and Nanning of China to Lang Son, Hanoi and Hai-phong of Vietnam.

Nguyen said China and Vietnam are enjoying increasing mutual understanding and trust and bilateral cooperation between the two countries have produced fruitful results.

He said the Vietnamese party and government will follow the principles reached by the leaders of the two countries, which emphasizes long-term stability, future-oriented, good-neighborly friendship and comprehensive cooperation, to further high-level contacts and upgrade the bilateral relationship to a new level.

On economic and trade cooperation, Nguyen said China has become Vietnam's larges trade partner. He said he believed that the successful operation of the China-ASEAN Expo would give a strong push to the construction of the China-ASEAN free trade area as well as the growth of Vietnam-China trade volume.

He said Vietnam would take further adopt measures to facilitate bilateral economic and trade cooperation and Vietnam welcomes Chinese companies to invest in Vietnam.

Nguyen arrived in Nanning for the second China-ASEAN Expo, which is scheduled to open Wednesday.

(Xinhua News Agency October 19, 2005)