Foreign ministers meet in Hanoi

The two-day meeting, “Forging a Closer Asia-Europe Partnership to Address the Financial and Economic Crisis and Other Global Challenges" is the largest Asia-Europe Meeting held since the organization expanded to 45 members last year.
“The ninth Asia-Europe Foreign Ministers’ Meeting in Hanoi on the 25th to 26th of May constitutes one of the most significant events in international relations and Asia-Europe co-operation,” Vietnam’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs Minister Pham Gia Khiem said in his welcoming message on the official meeting website.
The Asia-Europe Meeting is made up of 27 European Union member states, the European Commission, 16 Asian countries and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretariat.
The 45 Asia-Europe Meeting partners represent half of the world’s gross domestic product, almost 60 percent of the world’s population and 60 percent of global trade. Vietnam’s greatest contribution to the Asia-Europe Meeting so far has been hosting the Fifth Asia-Europe Summit Meeting in Hanoi in October 2004
(www.vietnewsonline.vn)