The people – core of all development policies of Vietnam

Vietnam’s efforts in the struggles for national independence and reunification lasting for decades had no purpose other than to ensure that all Vietnamese people fully enjoy their rights, including the right to live in peace, independence, freedom, and autonomy, and the right to self-determination of their destiny and path of development.

With the approach of taking the people as the centre, Vietnam has been working hard to protect and improve people’s livelihood and ensure people’s rights through development, while making sure that development is for the people and by the people.

Along with building a law-governed socialist state, Vietnam has been strengthening its legal system on people’s rights, with more than 90 legal documents passed in only four years, creating an important legal framework to ensure the rights of people and citizens in the reality.

The people have also been put in the centre of all socio-economic development projects, programmes, and strategies of the country.

Vietnam is one of the countries that have successfully completed many of the UN's Millennium Development Goals ahead of schedule and are effectively implementing the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

In many years, the country has maintained high economic growth, reducing multidimensional poverty rate to 4.3% in 2022, and strongly improving education, health care and housing services.

Progress in ensuring gender equality has been demonstrated with women taking over 30% of the seats at the National Assembly and People’s Councils at all levels. At the same time, people’s religious and belief life has been promoted with thousands of religious and belief events taking place annually. Vietnam is one of the countries with the fastest growing rate of Internet users in the world with 78 million users.

Meanwhile, the country has made positive and effective contributions to promoting and protecting human rights globally by actively engaging in human rights forums of the UN, ASEAN and other mechanisms. The country has been elected to the UN Human Rights Council twice for the 2014-2016 and 2023-2025 tenures.

At these forums, Vietnam has raised many initiatives on human rights protection, especially the rights of women, children, persons with disabilities, and climate change-hit groups.

In 2016 and 2018, Vietnam initiated two resolutions on impact of climate change on children’s rights and women’s rights, which were approved by the UN Human Rights Council.

Veeramalla Anjaiah, an Indonesian journalist and a researcher at the Centre for Southeast Asian Studies (CSEAS), commented that as a responsible country, Vietnam has always supported the protection of human rights and dignity globally. It has strived to contribute to the common, positive, and progressive values of humanity regarding human rights through actively participating in human rights-related forums of the UN and other international organisations, the scholar noted.

Vietnam has implemented seven out of the nine fundamental international conventions regarding human rights to which the country is a signatory, as well as commitments given at the universal periodical review (UPR). The country has realised 86.7% of the of third cycle UPR recommendations, and 12.4% of the recommendations have been partially completed.

A low-middle income country, yet Vietnam is in the group of the countries with a high Human Development Index (HDI), leaping five places in the 2015-2021 period. This is a basis and motivation for Vietnam to take better care of all aspects of people's lives, realising the aspiration of becoming a modern industrialised country by 2045.

An outstanding contribution by Vietnam at the UN Human Rights Council in the 2023-2025 tenure is the proposal of the resolution marking the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the 30th anniversary of the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, which was approved by the council by consensus.

Efforts and achievements by Vietnam in promoting and ensuring human rights are undeniable. These are vivid and convincing evidence refuting the distorted and fabricated information by hostile forces on Vietnam's human rights situation.

In the coming time, in order to best ensure human rights, the Party and State will continue to complete the law-governed State, reinforcing the legal foundation and relevant policies on human rights protection, continuing administrative reform, and strengthening the implementation of SGDs, focusing on policies to sustainably reduce multidimensional poverty and narrow the development gap between geographical areas and population groups, with special attention to vulnerable groups.

The country will continue to support dialogue and cooperation in the field of human rights, and join other countries to enrich values of human rights and enliven the spirit of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the 21st century.

VNA-THANH BINH