What’s in the New Vietnam-Brunei Comprehensive Partnership?

In late March, Vietnam and Brunei finally moved to upgrade their ties to the level of a comprehensive partnership. Beyond the formal elevation of ties, which is itself a notable step, the move more broadly reflects a culmination of a series of ongoing efforts by both Southeast Asian states to advance their bilateral relationship in recent years.

Brunei and Vietnam established diplomatic relations in 1992, following the end of the Cold War. But while both sides had long pursued collaboration in certain areas, recent years have seen an increased focus on further boosting the strategic aspect of the Vietnam-Brunei relationship, with efforts to make advances in defense and people-to-people ties as well as greater collaboration on issue areas such as maritime security. Both states are also claimants in the South China Sea disputes.

On March 27, Vietnam and Brunei finally agreed to formally upgrade their relationship to the level of a comprehensive partnership. The move came during a scheduled state visit made by Brunei Sultan Hassanal Bolkiah to Vietnam from March 26 to 28. It was only his second visit to the Southeast Asian state in over two decades.

The visit itself was comprised of several interactions. Bolkiah and his delegation meet with several top Vietnamese officials, including Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc and President and Communist Party of Vietnam head Nguyen Phu Trong, where they reviewed the state of bilateral ties, explored areas for further collaboration, and also discussed regional and international issues of mutual interest. There were symbolic aspects to the visit as well, with Bolkiah paying tribute at President Ho Chi Minh’s Mausoleum and laying a wreath at the Memorial of the Unknown Martyrs and Heroes.

The highlight of the visit was the formal upgrading of ties to the level of a comprehensive partnership, which is a landmark development for the bilateral relationship. As both sides expressed in a joint statement, the elevation of ties signified the commitment of both sides to strengthen the relationship, and should help “create new momentum” to bolster multifaceted areas of collaboration. For Vietnam, in particular, the formality of a new comprehensive partnership represents an important step because there are high-level discussions that go into Hanoi’s decisions about which countries it forges strategic and comprehensive partnerships with. The long deliberations that preceded the U.S.-Vietnam comprehensive partnership finally launched in 2013 are illustrative in this respect.

The joint statement went on to specify areas of collaboration, which included political relations, defense and security, trade and investment, energy, education and social cooperation, and people-to-people exchange, as well as cooperation within multilateral frameworks. And while specifics will likely be ironed out by further meetings in each of these areas, there were targets and focus points specified in the joint statement, from the trade target of $500 million by 2025 on the economic side to the establishment of new friendship associations in both countries to make serious inroads in the advancement of people-to-people ties.

While the joint statement naturally focused on future opportunities, both sides also clearly have addressing lingering challenges in mind. For instance, the direct mention in the joint statement of expanding the visa exemption periods for Vietnamese passports represents an emphasis on an agenda item that both sides have looked to make progress on. Both sides made reference to illegal, unreported, and unregulated fishing (IUU), which has been an occasional irritant in bilateral ties; Trong and Bolkiah also witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding on the use of a hotline for information-exchange to address the matter between Vietnam’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development and Brunei’s Minister of Primary Resources and Tourism.

To be sure, the upgrading of ties to the level of a comprehensive partnership represents only one of several steps both sides continue to take to manage the opportunities and challenges in the relationship. In order to truly assess how upgrading will affect the relationship tangibly, we will probably need to wait for working level meetings between individual ministries to see what sorts of inroads can be made. Nonetheless, as we move into 2019 and beyond amid domestic and regional developments for both Vietnam and Brunei, including both their chairmanships of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 2020 and 2021 respectively, the evolution of this comprehensive partnership will continue to be important to watch.