Leaders of the Communist Party of China and the state recently congratulated their Vietnamese counterparts on the 50th anniversary of the founding of the diplomatic relations between the two countries.

General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and President of the People's Republic of China Jiang Zemin, Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress Li Peng, and Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji jointly sent a congratulatory message to General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam Le Kha Phieu, Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai and Chairman of National Assembly of Vietnam Nong Duc Manh to mark the occasion.

The Chinese leaders said that over the past 50 years, the Chinese and Vietnamese people have extended mutual sympathy and mutual support to each other in their revolutionary struggle and socialist construction, and have developed profound friendship.

Particularly over the past eight years since the normalization of China-Vietnam ties, the relations between the two communist parties and the two nations have been fully restored and undergone smooth development. Their friendly exchanges and cooperation in all spheres have been steadily deepened.

Last February, the two general secretaries of the two parties held a historic meeting in Beijing and set a framework for the development of bilateral ties in the new century, thus ushering the relations between the two parties and two nations into a new stage of development.

Premier Zhu Rongji paid a successful visit to Vietnam in early December last year and breathed new life into the comprehensive cooperation between the two countries. Not long ago, both countries formally signed the land border treaty, symbolizing that a peaceful, friendly and stable border between them will be brought into the 21st century. The message said that the course of the development of the diplomatic ties between the two countries has demonstrated that the constant consolidation and development of bilateral friendly ties fully accord with the fundamental and long-term interests of both nations and their people, and are also conducive to the peace, stability and development of the region and the whole world.

The Chinese Communist Party and the Chinese government have always attached great importance to the Chinese-Vietnamese traditional friendship and will continue to be committed to the consolidation and development of the good-neighborly and cooperative ties between the two nations, said the message. (Xinhua)