Participants in the two-day event will discuss such issues as disaster management, climate change, health care, improvement of human capacities, and plans for the General Assembly of the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) to be held in Nairobi, Kenya, in November.

Addressing the meeting, Deputy Prime Minister Pham Gia Khiem said that Vietnam highly appreciates the valuable contributions of the IFRC and other international humanitarian organizations in recent years.

He said that dealing with natural calamities and epidemics is not the internal affair of each individual country but global work that requires greater coordination between countries and regions.

The Vietnamese Government and the local Red Cross Society have cooperated in mobilizing resources and made a great effort to ensure that assistance reaches the right beneficiaries in areas affected by disasters and epidemics.