Singapore and Thailand will commemorate the 60th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations this year.
To mark the auspicious occasion, the Singaporean Embassy has introduced a logo that won a competition organised last year by the embassy, the foreign ministries of both countries and the Royal Thai Embassy in Singapore.
Speaking at the reception to launch the logo at Siam Paragon, Catherine Wong Siow Ping, Ambassador of Singapore to Thailand, said the two nations established diplomatic relations on Sept 20, 1965. "Today, the partnership is broad-based and multifaceted, spanning politics, economics, defence, education and more," she said.
Catherine Wong Siow Ping, Singapore's ambassador to Thailand, left, and Lalivan Karnchanachari, vice minister of the Foreign Affairs Ministry, right, presided over an event to launch the 60th-anniversary logo marking Singapore-Thai diplomatic relations in Bangkok yesterday. (Photo: Somchai Poomlard)
In 2021, Singapore and Thailand established the world's first real-time payment system linkage between Singapore's PayNow and Thailand's PromptPay. The Laos-Thailand-Malaysia-Singapore-Power Integration Project was also launched the following year for the multilateral cross-border trade for renewable energy, she said.
In 2023, the countries were each other's 9th-largest trading partners, and Singapore has consistently been among Thailand's top five sources of foreign direct investment. Singapore was the top foreign investor in Thailand last year, reflecting continued confidence in Thailand, she added.
She added that during the official visit of Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong last November, both governments discussed new areas of cooperation, such as food and energy security and carbon credit trade. She further added that Singapore looks forward to Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra's introductory visit to Singapore this year.
Meanwhile, Lalivan Karnchanachari, vice minister of the Foreign Affairs Ministry, said that relations between Thailand and Singapore date back long before formal diplomatic ties. In 1871, King Rama V made the first regional land visit to Singapore. The bronze elephant in front of the Old Parliament House in Singapore was a royal gift by the king that has stood there as a testament to the close ties.
At the regional level, the two are like-minded partners that were among the founding members of Asean, which has played a central role in keeping peace and promoting prosperity in the region.
"A shared vision of regionalism has driven the growth of Asean into an organisation that is well recognised worldwide and expanded Asean's economy into one of the largest economies in the world," she said.
