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Welcome speechBy h.e. dr. tran chien thang, vice-minister

Ministry of culture, sports and tourism of vietnamAt the asem seminar on Preserving and promoting

the diversity of cultural expressions

sofitel metropole Hanoi hotel15 December 2008

Dear Mr. Sean DOYLE, Ambassador, European CommissionDelegation to Vietnam,Mr.Dominque Girard, Ambassador. Executive Director of Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF)Mrs. Anna de Oliveira Silva, representatives of the UNESCO

Secretariat,Distinguished delegates,Ladies and Gentlemen,

It is a great honor and pleasure for me to act on behalf of the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Vietnam and inmy own name to be present at the ASEM Seminar on preservingand promoting the Diversity of Cultural Expressions: SharingAsian and European Experiences. I would like, first of all, to

convey my warmest regards and best wishes to all of you, thedistinguished delegates, who have come to Vietnam forparticipating in this very meaningful event.

Ladies and Gentlemen,We believe that cultural diversity and the diversified

cultural expressions are among the most wonderful andprecious treasures of mankind built up in the process of humandevelopment. Cultural diversity creates the identities, which

differ a nation or an ethnic group from others and makes ourworld more colorful and more beautiful. Many of us agree thatculture is considered as the whole complex of distinctivespiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features thatcharacterize each nation throughout the length of history andthat have made a distinctive image of each country and servedas spiritual foundation and motivating forces for socialdevelopment. The globalization and integration should go alongwith the preserving, safeguarding and promoting the values of national cultural identity and at the same time to enhance theinternational cultural exchange in order to absorb the bestnuances of world culture to enrich one’s national culture. This

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point view has its place in the UNESCO convention on Protectionand Promotion of Cultural diversity and Expression and thisexplains why Vietnam is active in the process of formulating,signing and ratification of this important Convention.

We are happy to acknowledge that since the first ASEMCultural Ministers Meeting held in Beijing in 2004 up to thepresent, the ASEM Member countries have gone through a longpath and achieved a remarkably good result starting fromrecognition of cultural diversity to making policies and concreteaction plans on promoting cultural diversity. We recognize theextremely important contribution of ASEM Member countriesduring the arguing, discussing, formulating and approving theUNESCO Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the

Diversity of Cultural Expressions. We are delighted to informyou that the President of the Socialist Republic of Vietnamsigned the ratification of this important document on August 7th

2007.

Ladies and Gentlemen,At the national level, the Government of Vietnam

implements a number of policies to ensure the equal anddiversified development of cultures of all major and ethnic

minorities. Vietnam has 54 nationalities and ethnic groups withdistinctive identities and different levels of material, spiritualand intellectual development. The mission of Vietnam culturalpolicy is to preserve and promote the diversifying developmentof cultural expressions of all nationalities, social groups andindividuals in the unity of the whole Vietnamese culture. Atpresent, ASEAN member countries are in the process of formulating strategies and action plans aiming at realizing theASEAN Socio-cultural community by 2015. The ASEAN commoncommitment is also to build, develop and promote the“diversity in unity” of ASEAN cultures. In this regard, we highlyappreciate the initiative of organizing the ASEM seminar toexchange views and experiences among Asian and Europeancountries on preserving and promoting cultural diversity in eachcountry. Being an active actor in cultural cooperation, twoweeks ago, in November 26th -27th , 2008, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of Vietnam in cooperation with theEmbassy of Sweden organized a conference with the theme:Cultural Policy: Asian and European Perspectives whichgathered more than 60 delegates representing cultural policymakers, administrator, researchers and managers from ASEAN

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member countries, the ASEAN Secretariat, China, Republic of Korea and some European partners such as Sweden, Finlandand the United Kingdom etc. At this conference, Vietnam hasshared its experiences in the cultural policy review processfollowed the model of the Council of Europe as an input for a

wider deliberation and discussion on many other importantissues of cultural policy such as creative industry, culturaltourism policy, cultural heritage safeguarding, minority anddiversity policies…

It is our hope that this ASEM Seminar will once againprovide an opened forum for discussion on essential culturalissues and reaffirm the need and importance of the UNESCOConvention. It is of our expectation that it will give impulsion to

push forward the process of ratification of the Convention onprotection and promotion of the diversity of culturalexpressions.

May I wish the success to the Seminar and wish you allhave the most pleasant time in Ha Noi.

Thank you for your attention.

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