Vietnam takes place on National Security Council

This article reminded me that Vietnam took its rotating place on the UN National Security Council this year. It’s going to be a busy diplomatic year for Vietnam, with this and the ASEAN summit in the summer.

Vietnam has been trying to raise its diplomatic profile for a while now, so these two events will help further along the cause.

Source: Frederic Koeberl (@internetztube)

The risk that Vietnam faces is that it will now have to take sides on a number of positions that it was able to skirt previously. If the US wants something but China doesn’t, it has to now make a decision to side with one or the other. It had to do this with Iran, as this article talks about.

Ultimately, though, this sort of diplomacy are just what countries have to do as they get more important.

Surprisingly, the UN hasn’t said much about COVID-19, which is probably the biggest national security issue happening right now. It has basically left it up to the WHO, which has mostly left it to the Chinese authorities, as far as I can see.

Not to get too off-track, but the weird thing about the market in Vietnam is that it hasn’t performed that poorly. The HCMC Exchange Index (VNINDEX) is down 5%, but all of that decline happened in the first two days the market was open. The Hanoi Exchange Index (VHINDEX) is actually up 3%. I am sure that is partially due to the different mix of companies on the exchanges, but it still seems crazy to me.

Vietecon.com will be off on Monday but will be back to its normal updates on Tuesday.