Although there is a tradition of cooperation that dates back many years, we are at a good time to reach a new stage and strengthen ties between higher education centers of both countries, Velazquez told Prensa Latina.

Vietnamese universities today show remarkable progress that we want to share with the Cuban academy, said the deputy minister and noted that this collaboration could be carried out through joint projects, mainly with the four universities he will visit during his stay in Vietnam, which will last until next Thursday.

As part of the program of activities, Velazquez held today a fraternal meeting with Vietnamese students graduated in Cuba, to whom he explained that from three universities existing in the 1960s, today there are 50 higher education centers in the country today.

Cuba has already trained more than 84 000 international students, ‘who have become one of the most important sources of solidarity’.

He also stressed that Cuban universities have always undertaken the main tasks of the Revolution and that today the emphasis is on research and the use of science and innovation, essentially in sectors such as energy, food production and the biopharmaceutical industry.

The MES vice-minister also announced that the University 2026 Congress, one of the most important events of its kind in Latin America and the Caribbean, will be held in Havana from February 9 to 13 next year, and that the First International Meeting of Graduates in Cuba will be held in the context of this event.

We hope,“ he said, ”to have Vietnamese representation at this forum, with which we will celebrate the 50th anniversary of MES and the university network, and to do so with a special motivation: the centennial of the birth of the historic leader of the Cuban Revolution, Fidel Castro, the architect of this movement of solidarity in the field of education.

In turn, the president of the Vietnamese Graduates Club in Cuba, Lien Phuong Song, praised the quality of the theoretical and practical training received there and reaffirmed that each of its members is always willing, wholeheartedly, to be by the side of the island in any circumstance.

The meeting was attended by the Cuban ambassador here, Rogelio Polanco, who described this group of graduates as ‘the vanguard team in solidarity with Cuba’ and praised the contribution made by them, over the years, to the strengthening of relations between the two countries.

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