Deceased pilot awarded Fatherland Protection Order

Pham Duc Trung, the pilot killed in a military aircraft crash during a training session on August 26, has been posthumously honoured with the Fatherland Protection Order (first class).

Pham Duc Trung, the pilot killed in a military aircraft crash during a training session on August 26, has been posthumously honoured with the Fatherland Protection Order (first class). — Photo VGP

 

On behalf of President Tran Dai Quang, Minister-Chairman of the Government Office Mai Tien Dung paid respects to the soldier and presented the Order at the funeral held at the General Hospital of Phu Yen Province on August 27.

Trung, 22, was a trainee pilot of Regiment 910 of the Air Force Officers School under the Air Defence-Air Force Service.

He died while piloting an L39 aircraft which crashed into a rice paddy in Hòa Thanh Commune of Dong Hoa District minutes after taking off from Tuy Hòa Airport at 8:45am on August 26.

The Defence Ministry blamed the incident on engine failure.

Also at the funeral, Lieutenant General Le Huy Vinh, Commander of the Air Defence-Air Force Service, told the bereaved family of the Defence Minister’s decision to promote Trung from Master Sergeant to Second Lieutenant.

Chinese working illegally in Hau Giang

At least 70 Chinese labourers have been working illegally at Lee & Man Viet Nam, located in the southern province of Hau Giang’s Chau Thanh District industrial zone, the Management Board of the province’s Industrial Zones reported on Sunday.

The board said Lee & Man Viet Nam, under China’s Lee &Man Paper Manufacturing Limited, employed 168 foreign labourers but 70 weren’t registered to work in Viet Nam.

Chinese labourers were working illegally at Lee & Man Viet Nam, Nguyen Ngoc Dien, deputy chief of Management Board of Hậu Giang southern province’s Industrial Zones told Phap luat TP HCM ( HCM City Law) newspaper.   

The Chinese arrived in Viet Nam on tourist visas but in fact worked for Lee & Man Viet Nam.

According to Dien, the Management Board reported the situation to Hau Giang Province People’s Committee and proposed a solution.

“We are authorised to license foreign workers engaged in industrial zones managed by Hau Giang Province Industrial Zone’s Management Board,” Dien said.  

“However, there are shortcomings in that we provide licences without inspections. Therefore, we asked the provincial People’s Committee to give direction for tackling the problem, as well as re-building regulations between relevant offices”.

Earlier in August, Hậu Giang Province’s Ministry of Labor, Invalids and Social Affairs inspected and discovered 145 Chinese working at Lee & Man Việt Nam, of which 40 were working without a licence, according to Phap Luat TP HCM newspaper.   

The department informed the provincial People’s Committee, and co-ordinated with relevant offices and provincial police to investigate further.

A Hau Giang Province People’s Committee spokesman refused to answer reporters’ questions on measure to deal with the illegal Chinese labourers, but admitted that the Committee knew about the problem.

Holiday traffic safety top priority: PM

The Prime Minister has asked ministries, sectors and localities to step up measures to ensure traffic safety and social order while meeting the travel demands of passengers during the upcoming national holiday of National Independence Day (September 2) and the new school year (September 5).

Agencies were required to strengthen supervision of road sections along the key highways, particularly the routes to enter in and out of Hanoi and HCM City in order to prevent traffic jams and accidents.

The Prime Minister has also directed ministries and sectors to encourage the use of public transport instead of private vehicles and to step up dissemination about traffic safety on social media.

He also asked the Ministry of Transport to direct units to coordinate with the authorities of the relevant ministries, sectors and localities in examining accident-prone sites and to take actions to correct them. On-going transport infrastructure projects were required to ensure safety during their works in order to prevent accidents among road users in those areas. He also asked that inspections of the operation of means of transport on roads, inland waterways and aviation also be strengthened.

Activities to increase people’s awareness of traffic safety and reduce accidents during the holiday and new school year were also required to be improved.

Violations of traffic regulations, particularly those concerning speed, alcohol use, overloaded trucks and vehicles with expired registrations will be strictly fined.

Hotlines should be launched to receive feedback from citizens and to provide timely assistance or consultation on traffic management. In order to ensure traffic safety, Hanoi Police on August 25 deployed a force to inspect and handle violations of traffic regulations.

The transport inspection force was assigned to cooperate with the transport police in issuing measures to cope with “snail speed” buses and inter-provincial coaches that pick up and drop off passengers at unauthorised stops along roads.

Coaches found to be in violation would be strictly punished. Major Trinh Tien Thanh said the police force would be deployed to regularly patrol, detect and deal with violations.

To meet increasing demand from passengers during the upcoming holiday, many transport businesses have also set up plans to put more coaches into service.

Six lorises rescued

Education for Nature-Việt Nam (ENV) yesterday said it had rescued six lorises, whose scientific name is Lorisidae, three days after they were advertised for sale on line by wild animal traffickers.

Last Tuesday, an ENV volunteer informed the organisation that some people had advertised on a social network to sell the lorises on a well-known forum about pet trading.

ENV reported the information to the HCM City Environment Police.

Last Saturday, the ENV staff, in co-ordination with the police, nabbed Lê Huỳnh Trí Ngọc, 28, and Mai Văn Nhí, 26, from the central city of Nha Trang.

The lorises are currently being looked after at the HCM City Environment Police. They will then be transported to a rescue centre.

Also last week, a gibbon was rescued in the Central Highlands province of Đắk Lắk thanks to information from a volunteer.

A resident from Krông Kma Town in Krông Bông District called the hotline number 18001522 with information that a gibbon was being raised by a family.

A volunteer in Đắk Lắk Province came to the spot to verify the information and collect evidence on the case.

The gibbon was rescued by the Krông Bông Forest Management Unit.

HCM City begins work on modern archive

Construction of a modern archive that will cost VNĐ490 billion (US$2.2 million) in the first phase began in HCM City’s Bình Tân District on Sunday.

Lê Hoài Trung, deputy director of the city Department of Home Affairs, said two main buildings would be built, one of 18 floors with 20,639 square metres for the archive and the other measuring 8,487 square metres for public purposes.

The centre would house all kinds of documents related to the administration and science and engineering and film negatives, he said.

To apprise international friends of the city’s policies, culture, and history, the archive will employ encryption technology to make the documents available on the internet, he said.

Many cultural activities, exhibitions, and others would also be held at the centre in future, he said.

Lê Thanh Liêm, deputy chairman of the city People’s Committee, attended the groundbreaking for the archive and urged the Department of Home Affairs to co-ordinate with relevant agencies to ensure the first phase is completed by 2018.

Vietnam, Japan cooperate in safe water supply management

A seminar to present and share the achievements of “Vietnam-Yokohama Safety Water Supply Management Project” was organized on 30 August in Hue City.

The Project has been implemented under JICA Partnership Program (JPP) since 2013 to accelerate the water business network among Japanese and Vietnamese public-private partners.

Organized by the Thua Thien Hue Construction and Water Supply State-owned Co., Ltd. (HueWACO) and Yokohama Waterworks Bureau, the City of Yokohama (YWWB), the seminar presents Japanese companies’ advanced waterworks technologies. 

District police chief fired over cafe scandal

The police chief of HCMC’s Binh Chanh District has been relieved of his duties after he wrongfully brought criminal proceedings against a private cafe owner, local media reported.

Nguyen Van Quy was dismissed nearly four months after his suspension as the criminal case against Nguyen Van Tan, the owner of Xin Chao (Hello) cafe in the district, was reviewed.

The disciplinary action by the director of the Political General Department of the People’s Public Security under the Ministry of Public Security was announced on August 23 by the HCMC police department.

Two other officers, Nguyen Hoang Tuan and Le Canh Tuan from the district’s economic investigation police unit, have also been sacked and rebuked, respectively.

In August last year, Tan was accused of running his cafe without a business license and a food safety and hygiene certificate. He then faced charges of “doing business illegally” following a decision signed by Quy.

Shortly after news that Tan was about to stand trial broke, Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc ordered HCMC to review the case and the secretary of the city’s Party Committee, Dinh La Thang, requested that the municipal police department and prosecution to review it.

On April 23, Le Minh Tri, head of the Supreme People’s Procuracy, worked with the prosecution in HCMC and Binh Chanh and concluded that Tan had not committed the criminal offense of doing business illegally.

He asked the officials responsible for the wrongful proceedings to apologize to Tan and compensate him. Tan declined any compensation, though. Two days later, Quy and Nguyen Hoang Tuan were suspended.

In a related development, Le Thanh Tong, former vice director of Binh Chanh’s prosecution agency, and prosecutor Huynh Van Son have also been dismissed over the Xin Chao café case. Tong served as deputy head of the prosecution agency in District 6 prior to his dismissal.

The two men were also linked to the unlawful proceedings against Nguyen Van Bi, a local man who was prosecuted for building a makeshift hut on his own land in Binh Chanh for duck farming.

Storm causes huge damage for northern provinces

Typhoon Dianmu, the third storm to hit Vietnam this year, left 11 people dead and missing, injured 15 others and wreaked havoc on the agricultural sector in northern mountainous provinces, according to a preliminary report of the National Steering Committee for Natural Disaster Control.

Downpours and floods triggered by the storm battered many localities in the north early this week. In Lao Cai Province, torrential rain on Tuesday morning caused severe landslides at Km 98 + 200 on National Highway 4D in Sapa Town in the district of the same name.

Nguyen Ngoc Hinh, vice chairman of Sapa District, said three houses collapsed with no casualties reported.

Nong Ngoc Hung, director of the Lao Cai Department of Transport, said big volumes of soil and stone on roads prevented vehicles from travelling from Sapa, Thac Bac and O Quy Ho Pass to Lai Chau Province. The road sections were fixed.

Nguyen Thanh Duong, vice chairman of Lao Cai Province, said at a recent meeting with the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development that over 200 households living near National Highway 4D’s sections in Bat Xat and Sapa districts are facing risks of landslides and must be evacuated.

However, financial aid of VND20 million (US$897) per family in line with the prevailing regulations is not enough to support people to come to safe places. Duong said these households need more funding from the State.

According to the report, as of August 22 flash floods and landslides claimed nine lives in Yen Bai, Son La, Bac Giang, Lao Cai, Hoa Binh and Nghe An provinces. Meanwhile, two went missing and 15 were wounded in Lao Cai, Son La and some other localities.

Rain and floods damaged and inundated over 2,300 houses and forced 1,781 families to leave their homes.

Around 11,200 hectares of paddy and 2,600 hectares of crops were flooded in northern localities. In Vinh Phuc Province, 4,659 hectares of paddy and 1,291 hectares of crops were affected heavily.

According to the national weather forecast center, weather conditions are now unfavorable in the sea and on the mainland due to a tropical low pressure in the East Sea. Besides, rain and flooding are forecast to hit the central and southern parts of the country.

New book honours creativeness

The “Việt Nam Golden Book of Creativity 2016”, the first book to honour Vietnamese people’s creativeness in science and technology, made its debut yesterday in Hà Nội.

The book, which was published on the 71st anniversary of country’s Independence Day on September 2, introduces 71 examples of research work and creative solutions in science and technology covering areas such as agriculture, health and industry. All the research and solutions are said to be highly practical and bring about pragmatic results in daily life.

Addressing its launch, Politburo member and President of the Việt Nam Fatherland Front Nguyễn Thiện Nhân said the book aimed to honour researchers and research groups who have made outstanding works in social and applied science that considerably contribute to national socio-economic development.

“It is a precious document which helps to encourage every citizen, State agency, organisation, and enterprise to actively join in creative activities, scientific and technological research, and put forth initiatives in all areas in order to improve productivity and product quality for successful international integration,” he said.

On behalf of Vietnamese State and Party leaders, National Assembly Chairwoman Nguyễn Thị Kim Ngân congratulated the scientists and inventors whose research was selected for the book.

She also lauded the initiative to publish the book by the Việt Nam Fatherland Front, the Ministry of Science and Technology, and the Vietnam Union of Science and Technology Associations.

“The compiling and publishing of the book is creative and very timely in order to encourage and honour scientists and inventors.”

“At the same time, it provides Vietnamese people nationwide an insight into scientific and technological solutions which have made up the nation’s achievements in the reform process over the past years,” she said.

She hoped the book would contribute to building up a creative culture in Vietnamese people.

She asked related agencies to continue to attach importance to and encourage industries, organisations and agencies at all levels, as well as Vietnamese people inside the country and overseas, to actively join in the campaign of promoting scientific and technological research and application to contribute to national development.

At the ceremony, the organisers presented certificates and copies of the book to the researchers and groups whose works are introduced in the book.

Among them are Mai Văn Cúc from Bình Phước Province, who created a biological trap to kill fruit flies; Phan Thị Thuận from Mỹ Đức Silk Ltd. Co, who invented a method to make silkworms weave quilts themselves; and Tẩn Mý Dao, a Dao ethnic woman from the mountainous Sìn Hồ District in Lào Cai Province, who managed to multiply a species of tree that is traditionally used in herbal medicine.

From this year, the “Việt Nam Golden Book of Creativity”, will be published annually.

Co-operatives still need financial incentives

Deputy Prime Minister Vương Đình Huệ yesterday said preferential loans were needed for co-operatives to develop in a sustainable manner and in line with value chains.

“Involved ministries, agencies and localities arranged funding to boost the collective economic sector, particularly co-operatives,” Huệ said at the meeting with leaders of the Việt Nam Co-operative Alliance (VCA) yesterday.

He said that Việt Nam had policies that supported co-operatives, which were regulated in laws, Government decisions and directives, but the policies had failed to bring the expected impact in reality.

For example, 18 out of 64 cities and provinces across the country did not establish a credit guarantee fund. Or according to the Party Central Committee’s Economic Commission, none of more than 20,000 co-operatives nationwide accessed the maximum loan for co-operatives, VNĐ500 million (US$22,400).

Huệ said that only ten per cent of co-operatives paid proper attention to seek markets or output for their products, while the other 90 per cent concentrated too much on production, without tightening links to the market.

The Deputy PM asked the Ministry of Planning and Investment to review and identify causes for the improper production-consumption link.

“Lack of resources, impractical policies or poor implementation, which should be blamed for the modest performance of co-operatives?” Huệ asked.

Chairman of the VCA Võ Kim Cự said that 13 million households with more than 30 million labourers were joined in over 150,000 groups and 20,000 co-operatives.

By July 1, more than 9,000 co-operatives had re-registered, the qualification criteria for a co-operative as defined in a new Law on Co-operatives that the National Assembly approved in 2012.

Many previous co-operatives failed to shift to the “new-style” of co-operative because of financial problems or debts.

Cự said that the Government’s policies for co-operatives had failed to catch up with reality and were not systematic.

For example, co-operatives in 18 provinces are under the supervision of Planning and Investment Departments, in another 13 province they are under supervision of the Việt Nam Co-operative Alliance, while in other provinces, no agency is directly in charge of co-operatives’ operations.

Local authorities paid modest care to boost the development of co-operatives, he said.

VNS/VNA/VOV/SGT