HCMC — António Guterres, secretary-general of the United Nations (UN), arrived in Hanoi City on October 24 for an official visit and to attend the signing ceremony of the UN Convention against Cybercrime.

His October 24-25 visit is made at the invitation of State President Luong Cuong. Guterres was welcomed at Noi Bai International Airport by Tran Sy Thanh, chairman of the People's Committee of Hanoi City; Nguyen Minh Vu, permanent deputy minister of Foreign Affairs; and Ambassador Do Hung Viet, permanent representative of Vietnam to the UN, reported the Vietnam News Agency. The trip coincides with the 80th anniversaries of the founding of the United Nations and Vietnam’s National Day, both in 2025. It marks the secretary-general’s second official visit to Vietnam after his trip in October 2022. Since joining the UN nearly five decades ago, Vietnam has expanded cooperation with the organization in areas including peacekeeping, security, and development. The country has twice served as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council, in 2008–2009 and 2020–2021. Vietnam has deployed about 1,100 personnel to UN peacekeeping missions in South Sudan, the Central African Republic, Abyei, and the UN headquarters over the past decade. Guterres has served as UN secretary-general since 2017 and is currently in his second term. Before that, he was Portugal’s prime minister and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees. The UN Convention against Cybercrime, themed “Combating Cybercrime – Sharing Responsibility – Shaping the Future”, will be signed at the National Convention Center in Hanoi City on October 25 and 26. The convention, comprising nine chapters and 71 articles, was developed over nearly five years of negotiations to establish a global legal framework for combating cybercrime. According to Permanent Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Minh Vu, about 110 countries and more than 10 international organizations will attend the signing ceremony, and the total number of foreign delegates attending the signing ceremony is estimated at around 1,500.