On 27 – 28 November 2019, the conference “Challenges and Opportunities for International Cooperation in Natural Sciences” was held in the Conference Hall of the International Centre for Mathematics in Hanoi in the frames of the guest JINR CP session. The conference was devoted to the celebration of the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements and took place under the supervision of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology (VAST), UNESCO and JINR. The Institute of Physics and the VAST International Centre of Physics were the local organizers of the event.

Prof. Le Hong Khiem, Plenipotentiary Representative of the Government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam in the JINR Committee of Plenipotentiaries, Academician Victor Matveev, JINR Director, and Dr Michael Croft, UNESCO Representative in Vietnam, welcomed the delegates at the opening ceremony.

Academician Nguyen Van Hieu, a prominent representative of Vietnamese science whose professional and scientific career had long been closely related to JINR, was honoured at the opening ceremony. Since 1981, Academician Nguyen Van Hieu was a Plenipotentiary Representative of the Government of Vietnam in JINR for many years and made a considerable contribution to the development of the scientific potential of Vietnam and strengthening of its positions in JINR and the international scientific community at large. JINR Director Victor Matveev presented to Nguyen Van Hieu a diploma of an Honorary Fellow of the Laboratory of Theoretical Physics.

Among participants and speakers of the conference, there were Dr Tran Chi Thanh, President of the VINATOM (the Vietnam Atomic Energy Institute), Dr Dinh Van Trung, Director of the VAST Institute of Physics and the VAST International Centre of Physics, researchers from Vietnam, the Republic of Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Japan.

From the JINR party, Chief Scientific Secretary A. S. Sorin reported on the Institute’s flagship project “NICA”; FLNR Deputy Director A. G. Popeko made a report on the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements. A review of fundamental problems in modern physics was made by BLTP Director D. I. Kazakov. LRB, LIT, BLTP, FLNP, and UC Directors reported on the scientific programmes and opportunities for cooperation. Reports on the opportunities for scientific cooperation with the Republic of Belarus and the Republic of Kazakhstan were made. Works of JINR on the neutron activation analysis and nano-technologies were presented by leading experts of FLNP and FLNR.

The milestones of the conference were summed up at a round-table session. According to the speakers, cooperation based on large objects of the research infrastructure seems very promising. In particular, a new project of the research reactor in Vietnam, for which specialists and scientific instruments will be prepared with the JINR participation, opens up wide opportunities. Participants from the countries of Southeastern Asia expressed their strong interest in JINR opportunities for the establishment of multi-party scientific cooperation, as well as in the fields of the personnel training.