HCM City recommits to helping needy kids

Needy and disabled children will be the focus of many long-term and short-term programmes that HCM City will begin implementing by the end of this year, according to the Department of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs.

These include a five-year programme on child protection that has been approved by the municipal People's Committee, another on providing care to HIV/AIDS afflicted children by 2020, and a pilot programme to disseminate provisions of the juvenile delinquency law among youth aged under 18 in District 1 and Binh Thanh District.

In a report submitted at a workshop held to review child protection and care in the first nine months of the year, the department also said that the city would continue to review and issue health insurance cards for children under six years old.

As of June, the department had co-operated with the districts' social insurance offices to provide health cards to 435,877 children in the below-six age group.

In the first nine months of this year, the department provided counselling to 4,765 children and their families on issues relating to labour and sexual abuse, health insurance policies and heart surgeries.

It also worked with hospitals to perform surgeries on 67 needy children with congenital heart diseases.

The report said that the department had co-operated with local authorities in districts with a high record of child abuse to check the use of child labour in their localities.

It carried out inspections at children's shelters to investigate issues relating to maltreatment and taking undue advantage of children to make profit.

The department also strengthened awareness campaigns on the laws relating to children's education, care and protection, and disseminated information on HIV/AIDS prevention.

It co-operated with the HCM Communist Youth Union to organise entertainment programmes for 2,000 needy and disabled children at the Dam Sen Park in District 11 and presented them with scholarships, bicycles and wheelchairs.

It worked with the Save the Children Fund Viet Nam to present notebooks and textbooks to children living with HIV/AIDS in Go Vap District.

The city spent more than VND5.7 billion (US$274,038) to organise entertainment activities for needy and disabled children for the Tet (lunar New Year) holiday, International Children's Day, summer holiday and the Mid-Autumn Festival.

2 Chinese caught in Hanoi selling fake gold

The Hanoi police arrested two Chinese men last Thursday for trying to swindle some locals, including a law-firm employee, by selling fake gold.

The two men were from Jiangxi Province in China and one of them belonged to a group of professional swindlers. (Photo: VNN)

Viet Nam-Russia university to be created

The Viet Nam-Russia University of Technology will be set up in Ha Noi following an agreement between the Vietnamese Ambassador in Russia, Pham Xuan Son, and Deputy Minister of Russian Education and Science, Sergey Ivanets.

Russia will send its professors to Viet Nam to teach technology-related subjects such as management, IT, tunnel construction and wireless and telecommunication techniques.

Vietnamese teachers and students from the Le Quy Don Technical University will be sent to Russia to learn and enhance their knowledge.

Scrap shop owner hypnotized, stolen $160

Do Lu, owner of a scrap shop in Tinh Ha commune, Son Tinh district, the central province of Quang Ngai, last Sunday reported he was hypnotized and VND3.3 million (US$160) was stolen from him by three foreigners driving a Camry car.

That evening, patrol policemen in Quang Ngai found two men and a woman travelling in a Camry car. They signaled for them to stop but the driver sped up and fled.

According to Lu, a tall foreigner, about 1.8 meters in height and 90 kilos in weight, wearing shorts and a blue shirt, stepped into his shop and took some iron bars and put them on a scale.

The man signaled that he wanted to buy 2 kilos and Lu’s wife said it was VND20,000.
The foreigner took out a VND500,000 (US$25) bill to pay. Having no change available on him, Lu brought out a bag of VND12 million to find small bills.

Another man then stepped off the car and waited to receive the change while the first man asked Lu’s wife to take him to the backyard to see more metal scraps.

“He told me to give him two VND200,000 bills, one VND100,000 bill, one VND50,000 bill and keep the remaining VND30,000. After they had left for 5 minutes, I suddenly had a headache and shortness of breathing. When we checked our money bag, we found VND3.3 million missing,” said Lu.

Witnesses said they saw people in the car throwing the steel bars they bought from Lu’s shop on the street.

On Monday morning, several owners of groceries, scrap shops and water filter facilities in Quang Ngai province’s districts of Binh Son, Tu Nghia, Son Tinh and Quang Ngai city also reported similar cases.

They said a group of people driving a car used a VND500,000 bill or dollar bills to buy their goods, asked for the change, then hypnotized and robbed them of their money.

The loss of money in each case ranged from several million to about a dozen million VND.

Yesterday afternoon, after a four-day investigation the local police in central Quang Ngai Province's Binh Son District announced the mysterious robbery at Tin Huy gold shop by hypnotism was a fake one staged by the shop owner with the help of one of her relatives.

According to Colonel Tran Van Sang, the head of the local police department, the fake robbery was plotted by Nguyen Thi Thuy, the owner, so she could avoid debt repayments to her many creditors.

Nghe An gets vaccines for foot-mouth disease

The central province of Nghe An will be supplied with 100,000 free doses of foot-mouth disease vaccines at the request of Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung.

The vaccines will be drawn from the national reserves.

The disease broke out in seven communes in the province's Tan Ky District. The total number of livestock infected so far has come to 439, of which 37 per cent have died.

Japan was willing to provide assistance to help Viet Nam build capacity for medical personnel, especially nurses, in compliance with Japanese standards.

This statement was made by Acting President of the Democratic Party of Japan Yoshito Sengoku during his meeting with deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan in Ha Noi on Monday.

Nhan lauded this training incentive and affirmed that Viet Nam would upgrade old health institutions or construct new ones in order to be ready for training activities. The time frame for screening and selection process to pick hospitals whose nurses were eligible for training would not exceed six months.

He said after the proposal was submitted to the Government of both nations, the construction of infrastructure should be finished within two years.

On this occasion, Sengoku said Japan also wished to set up a university specialised in training human resources for high-technology and support industries, based in Ha Noi or HCM City, as well as construct a new nuclear plant.

During the meeting, Sengoku expressed his sincere thanks for the valuable support from the Vietnamese people during the twin disaster of earthquake and tsunami in March.

Vietnamese youths begin SEA journey

A Vietnamese delegation of young people left Hanoi on October 25 to attend the 38th Ship for Southeast Asian Youth Programme (SSEAYP) 2011 in Japan.

During two months of training, the 29-member delegation had learned about the political and socio-cultural situation in Japan and the Southeast Asian countries where the ship would visit on a 53-day journey. 

The delegation is bringing with them exhibits to create a model of Vietnamese villages and plans to perform traditional music performances on the ship. 

From now until December 16, the SSEAYP ship will dock in the Philippines, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam where the participants will pay courtesy calls to state leaders and engage in cultural exchanges and social activities. 

The ship will anchor in Saigon port in Ho Chi Minh City on December 4.

Conference seeks ways to prevent injuries in Vietnam

A two-day national conference opened in Hanoi on October 25 to analyse and seek ways to prevent accidents and injuries in Vietnam.

The conference, the second of its kind, was organised by the Health Ministry in coordination with the World Health Organisation and the United Nations’ Children Fund, and attended by representatives from central and local health authorities and scientists.

Discussions focus on the reality of accidents and injuries in Vietnam including traffic accidents, child accidents and injuries and labour accidents, as well as experiences in implementing and appraising policies and programmes to prevent accidents and injuries and build a safe community.

In Vietnam, the health sector has coordinated with relevant ministries and agencies in prevention accidents and injures, gaining remarkable in the fields.

Deputy Minister of Health Nguyen Viet Tien reported that information dissemination regarding accidents and injuries prevention were implemented in most cities and provinces in the country and the network of first aid and basic care of injuries were strengthened.

As of December 2010, 116 communes in the country have carried out the safe community programme and 30 percent of provinces are now able to set up the network of first aid and injuries care.

In Vietnam, about 900,000 people suffer from accidents or injuries each year resulting in 34,000 deaths, making up 11-12 percent of the death toll nationwide.

Woman fled with $13 mln debt turns herself in

32-year-old Nguyen Thi Cuc, who fled from home 17 days ago with a total unpaid debt of VND273 billion (US$13 million), presented herself to the police of Hanoi’s Phu Xuyen District on Monday.

Earlier on October 18, the police prosecuted Cuc for abusing trust to appropriate other people’s assets and searched her house in the district’s Van Nhan Commune in the presence of Cuc’s husband, Nguyen Xuan Hung.

Hung told the police that Cuc disappeared on October 7, leaving him no notice, and that he was not involved in Cuc’s loans.

He later handed to the police three notebooks that recorded the amounts Cuc had borrowed from her creditors.

Cuc’s victims are real estate investors, gold traders and pawn-shop owners who have lent her large sums of money to enjoy a lucrative interest rate of 4.5 percent per month.

To gain their confidence, Cuc, a trader of gold and real estate, pretended to be leading a prosperous life by travelling in a deluxe car worth VND5-6 billion, which she had bought with the loan money.

On October 9, Pham Thi Bien, 60, of Thuong Tin District, reported to the police that Cuc had borrowed from her VND2 billion and 32 taels of gold ($66,800) and failed to pay her back the principal and the interest.

Several days later, the police received more reports from Cuc’s creditors about her swindling scheme. The total amount Cuc has appropriated from her victims is estimated at VND273 billion, police said.

After handing herself to the police, Cuc refused to say anything about her scam but often asked for information about her husband and two children whom she had left in the care of her relatives before she fled, police said.

The police are still continuing their interrogation of Cuc.

Fresh probe ordered in $6.8mil theft case

A Dong Nai Province court has halted the trial of a Japanese former company executive and his lover for allegedly misappropriating $6.83 million from his company after the latter provided contradictory testimonies.

The Dong Nai Province People’s Court had yesterday begun the trial of Nishimura Setsuo, 56, former financial director of the province-based Sanyo Di Solutions Vietnam Co Ltd, and Duong Thi Thanh Nhan, 29, a local who once owned a bar in Ho Chi Minh City’s District 1, for “abusing trust to appropriate assets.”

When the company discovered the money was missing, Setsuo and Nhan fled but the police caught up with them and arrested them.

The trial began despite the absence of some witnesses and the company representative, but the court ordered the case to be reinvestigated.

According to the indictment, between July 2008 and April 2009, Setsuo ordered an accountant to withdraw VND30.4 billion (US$1.45 million) from the company’s bank accounts.

Setsuo told the police he had given all the money to Nhan, with whom he had lived. He also gave her $530,000 he took from the company.

Nhan admitted to taking the VND30.4 billion and US$530,000 to open her bar despite knowing it had been taken illegally from the company by Setsuo. But she said she had returned VND11.9 billion to him.

The indictment thus made Nhan an accomplice in Setsuo’s alleged crime.

But in court Nhan claimed she had received only VND19.4 billion from her lover and had returned VND11.9 billion.

She confessed she had spent the money on her restaurant and on gambling during numerous trips abroad.

But Setsuo insisted: “I gave all the money directly to her or through her relatives. I did not use the money for any other purpose. I do not understand why she says so.”

Japanese-owned Sanyo Di Solutions Vietnam Co Ltd manufactures digital cameras and is located in the Bien Hoa II Industrial Park in Bien Hoa.

Father demands fresh probe into daughter’s death

The father of a 20-year-old girl, who was confirmed by police to drown after falling into a river during a party in Long An Province last August, with well-off local businessmen and officials in attendance, has requested a new investigation into the cause of her death.

In an appeal to the Ministry of Public Security and Supreme People’s Procuracy demanding a fresh probe, Dinh Tan Phuoc, father of Dinh Thi Kim Phuong, 20, said he does not believe that Phuong had fallen into the river by herself from the ferry on which the party was held.

Previously, the police had concluded that the drowning death of Phuong two months ago was an accident and no foul play was suspected.

However, Phuoc, of Can Giuoc District, said some witnesses told him that before the death occurred they had heard the sound of people joking and laughing while bathing in the river and then a girl shouting for help.

From this information, Phuoc claimed in his appeal that Phuong could not have fallen off the ferry into the river by accident but might have been pushed into it.

The police had earlier said there was no evidence of any fight between the guests or somebody pushing Phuong into the river – who did not join the others in the water as she could not swim.

Yesterday the provincial prosecutor’s office transferred Phuoc’s appeal to the procuracy of Tan Tru District, where the accident occurred, to consider and make a reply to Phuoc.

According to the case file, the deadly party was held aboard a ferry on the Vam Co River on August 20, by Nguyen Nhat Tuan, an executive at a local telecom company.

Fourteen people, many of them local law officials and businesspeople, and five women, including Phuong, attended the party.

After the incident, Nguyen Kim Doan, one of the officials, was removed from his post as head of the Can Giuoc prosecutor’s office and was given a warning for violating the moral code for party members by attending the party with the five women, some of whom worked for karaoke parlors.

Doan’s deputy, Nguyen Huong Giang, was also transferred to other job for the same misconduct.

In their seperate reports to the district party committee on August 31, both Giang and Doan said they had not known the women until meeting them at the party.

However, Thai Van O, standing deputy secretary of the committee, said some sources had alleged that Giang had known some of the women at the party, including Dinh Thi Kim Phuong, 20, the deceased.

The director of a company in Can Giuoc, who wanted to remain unidentified, told Tuoi Tre that he had seen Giang and two of the five women drinking at a local café at least once before August 20.

Another local told Tuoi Tre that a few days before the date he had seen Giang drinking in a bar with Phuong and another of the women who had been on the ferry.

Philippines hands over fishing vessels to Vietnam

The Philippines has handed over to Vietnam seven fishing vessels seized on May 30, 2011 on the sea about 2km from Palawan, according to the Vietnamese Embassy in the Philippines.

Vietnamese Ambassador Nguyen Vu Tu signed documents to receive the seven ships on October 24, the source said.

Earlier, seven fishing vessels of Vietnam with 122 fishermen on board went to the Philippines’ sea to fish under an economic contract between the Long Hai Long Company of Vietnam and the Philippines ’ Premiere International Interfishing Company.

The fishing vessels and crews were arrested in the Philippines’ territorial waters, when they had yet to complete necessary legal procedures.

As many as 88 fishermen returned to Vietnam after the court of Palawan province ended its hearing on August 26.

The 34 remaining fishermen, who are in Palawan, will return to the country with the seven fishing vessels in coming days.

VNN/VOV/VNS/Tuoi Tre