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Alleged
rhino horn syndicate boss awaits trial behind bars
The alleged head of
an illegal syndicate believed to acquire rhino horns for the Vietnamese black
market has been remanded in custody in
Alleged rhino
poaching kingpin, Hugo Ras, along with nine other alleged syndicate members
face a total of 318 charges for killing rhinos and selling rhino horns.
The 10 were
arrested in a nationwide sting on Friday September 19.
The spokesman for
the anti-rhino horn taskforce responsible for the arrests, the Hawks, Captain
Paul Ramaloko, said the syndicate was responsible for the “serial killing” of
rhinos.
The arrests
followed a year-long investigation led by the Hawks.
The charges include
various common law offences such as theft, fraud, malicious injury to
property as well as statutory offences including racketeering, money
laundering, conspiracy, incitement to commit crime, killing and dehorning of
rhino, illegal possession and sales of rhino horns and illegal possession of firearms
among others.
A week before the
arrests were made, South African National Parks (SAN Parks) welcomed a
delegation of Vietnamese celebrities, journalists and business people to
Kruger National Park for three days.
One of the visiting
celebrities, Hong Nhung said, “At Kruger National Park, we had the
opportunity to witness the most horrific scene: a bloated dead rhino that had
been slaughtered by poachers, its horn hacked off and its body left to rot in
the bush.”
SAN Parks spokesman
Reynold Thakhuli said he hoped the visit would help to debunk some of the
myths about rhino horn in
“We want these
celebrities to have a first-hand experience of the cruelty that these African
giants are subjected to, and to use their influence to discourage the demand
in their home country,” said Thakhuli.
Ras and five other
alleged syndicate members will appear in court again on October 8 for their
bail applications to be heard.
HCMC
leaders determined to control floods in inner-city area
HCMC leaders have
discussed drastic solutions to deal with floods and set a target to eliminate
all flooding sites in the inner-city area of around 100 square kilometers by
the end of next year.
Speaking at the
closing session of the 19th session of the HCMC Party Committee Tuesday,
Secretary Le Thanh Hai said flood control is one of six major programs of the
city.
Hai said climate
change has led to unpredictable heavy rain and high tides here in the city.
Therefore, the city is preparing urgent anti-flooding solutions to ease the
situation, including construction of dykes, tide sluices and regulation
reservoirs.
Nguyen Ngoc Cong,
deputy director of the
If rainfall is 80
millimeters or less, the area may not be flooded anymore until the end of
next year. However, the city should mull additional solutions such as
building dykes, tide sluices and pumps if downpours coincide high tides.
Cong said it is
necessary to build a dyke section from
According to the
local flood prevention center, there are still some flood-prone areas in the
city’s outlying districts 9, 12, Go Vap and Binh Tan. Flood recurrence has
been reported in other 22 spots since early this year, and long-delayed
projects and heavy rain are the main causes.
Hai acknowledged
that the local government has yet to take drastic actions against
foot-dragging projects in the city.
Earlier, the city
considered reviewing and revoking licenses of 1,200 foot-dragging projects as
a measure to deal with prolonged flooding in the city but has done with only
around 550 projects. Hai stressed the city will take bold steps against these
projects towards the end of this year.
Figures released at
a session of the HCMC People’s Council in July showed the city had revoked or
invalidated approvals of nearly 540 slow projects causing adverse impacts on
locals. These projects occupied more than 5,300 hectares of land.
Many deputies at
the session expressed concerns over the long-delayed projects as investors
had yet to give proper compensation to residents.
Work to
start on German House this month
Construction will
commence on the German House in the upcoming weeks to accommodate various
German organizations in HCMC, including the German Consulate General and the
German Industry and Commerce, said the German consul general in HCMC.
Hans-Dieter Stell
revealed this project at a meeting on October 1 with local media to announce
activities due to take place later this year and in 2015 to celebrate 40
years of diplomatic relations between
The diplomat said
the 25-storey building located at
As scheduled, the
German House will be completed in the third quarter of 2017, and will also
accommodate Goethe Institute, enterprises and organizations. Other facilities
include restaurants, an outdoor leisure center, swimming pool, four parking
lots.
Half of this
building’s floor space will be reserved for enterprises, especially German
businesses in
The land lot at the
intersection of Le Duan and Le Van Huu streets was formally handed over to
the German Embassy for use in 99 years starting from October 10, 2011 with
the symbolic rent of one Vietnamese dong.
At the press
conference, the German consul general also mentioned the expansion of
In the rest of this
year, the German consulate general in HCMC will organize educational and
cultural activities, including the German National Day on October 3,
Oktoberfest on October 10-18, Beethoven and Brahms Symphony on October 19 and
so on.
In 2015, Goethe
Institute will hold cultural exchange programs to celebrate 40 years of
diplomatic relations between the two countries, remarkably a concert
performed by German and Vietnamese artists in March and lacquer exhibition on
steel and wood in April. Besides, there will be a German Film Festival in
September, electronic music performance on German classic films and Rock-Pop
Stabil Elite tour for students in November.
Fires claim
55 lives in nine months
More than 1,550
fires occurred nationwide during nine months from November, 2013 to August,
2014, killing 55 people and injuring 119 others.
Property losses
from the fires were estimated at 921.8 trillion VND (42,900 billion USD),
according to the Fire Prevention, Fighting and Rescue Police Department.
Firefighters
inspected nearly 129,460 establishments and provided information and
knowledge on fire prevention and fighting for people. Over 18,230
firefighters directly participated in extinguishing 1,162 fires with 2,814
fire engines involved, the department said.
In same period last
year, the country recorded 1,920 fires, claiming 32 lives and leaving 99
injured.
Son La
seizes largest heroin haul
Police in the
northern mountainous province of Son La arrested a four-member drug gang armed
with a gun and a grenade on October 1, confiscating 161 heroin cakes in
Vietnam’s largest illegal drug haul so far.
Police officers
also impounded more than 2,300 USD in cash, two cars and eight cell phones.
Since late
September, the provincial police has arrested 10 drug dealers, seizing a
total of 210 heroin cakes, 20,000 methamphetamine tablets and 10 guns.
One dead
and 2 unaccounted for after fishing boat explodes
A commercial
fishing boat exploded and sank off of Con Dao island on October 2 leaving one
dead and two missing, according to the Ly Son district island’s People’s
Committee of the central coastal
Vo Van Tam-the
captain of the 5-member fishing boat, who lived in An Vinh commune, Ly Son
district was reportedly killed instantly while two other fishermen remain
missing and one is in hospital in serious condition.
When the incident
occurred, a nearby fishing boat rescued two other fishermen.
Ly Son district’s
People’s Committee Vice Chairwoman in
Traffic
accident in Dak Lak kills two, injuries 11
A crash between a
coach and a motorbike on a national highway in Dak Lak caused two deaths and
11 injuries on October 1.
The accident
occurred at around 4:30pm on a section of National Highway 14 running through
Ea H’leo District, a 16-seat passenger car crashed into a motorbike going the
opposite direction while trying to pass another car.
The driver of the
car was Tran The Nam of Buon Ma Thuot City and the driver of the motorbike
was Vo Trung Truc from
Truc and his wife
died on impact, and the car overturned, injuring 11 people, five seriously.
The victims are being treatmed at
The rate of
households living under the poverty line in
Speaking at a
seminar on poverty reduction in the southern region, Do Manh Hung, Deputy
Chairman of the National Assembly's Committee on Social Affairs, said the
rate of poor districts would fall below 30 percent and the rate of poverty
relapse would continue to drop.
Hung said the
poverty rate had fallen to 9.45 percent in 2010 from 22 percent in 2005.
In 2005, there were
six regions with a poverty rate above 20 percent, and in 2010, there were
four. The following year, the northeastern and northwestern regions recorded
a 20 percent poverty rate.
Assistance in
providing jobs and healthcare services has been part of
Between 2006 and
2010, more than 150,000 workers received free vocational training courses and
60 percent of them were able to find a job or become self-employed.
Between 2010 and
2012, an additional 1.1 million workers were provided vocational training
courses. Of that number, 11 percent were living under the poverty line and 5
per cent were near-poor.
According to a
report from Ministry of Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs, 468 vocational
training centres have been built in 51 provinces where several ethnic
minorities live.
The Ho Chi Minh
City Department of Education and Training held a meeting on October 2 to
launch special education tasks for the 2014-2015 academic year, with more
support to be given to children with disabilities and development disorders.
Nguyen Thanh Tam,
Director of the city’s rehabilitation and education centre for children with
disabilities, said a number of activities have been undertaken to integrate
the group into the community over the past years.
The centre has
coordinated with hospitals to send doctors to local nurseries in order to
detect children with special needs, while schools of special education have
organised refresher courses to improve the capacity of their teaching staff,
he added.
However,
representatives of some special schools said they are not well connected with
authorised agencies in giving early detections and diagnoses of disabilities,
and current facilities are insufficient and unsuitable for special education.
Additionally,
textbooks designed for primary students with disabilities have not yet been
issued, causing many difficulties for the teaching, the meeting heard.
Nguyen Tien Dat,
Deputy Director of the municipal Department of Education and Training, said
the sector will increase support for the target children by applying
different therapies and giving professional training to teachers and
education officials.
It will build more
special schools and equip existing ones with appropriate facilities, he
added.
Khanh Hoa
vows to implement WB-funded environmental programme
The central coastal
Vinh attended a
meeting on October 2 with a delegation from the bank on the implementation of
the WB-funded Coastal Cities Environment and Sanitation programme, which is
running a project in
According to the
delegation, the project is 96 percent complete, with US$72.3 million out of
the total US$93.6 million disbursed so far.
The project in
Germany’s
unification day marked in HCM City
A ceremony to mark
the 24th Unification Day of Germany (October 3) took place in Ho Chi Minh
City on October 2, hearing hopes for bolstering multifaceted links between
the two sides in the future.
Nguyen Huu Thien,
Chairman of the Vietnam-Germany Friendship Association’s
He noted that the
relationship between the city and German localities has seen remarkable
advances in many fields.
The launch of the
HCM City-Frankfurt direct air route since 2005 along with strong political
commitments of the two governments contributed to boost trade cooperation
between the city and German partners, he affirmed.
About 70
German-invested projects worth US$173 million currently operating in
Speaking at the
event, German Consul General in HCM City Hans-Dieter Stell underlined the two
countries’ increasing friendship, saying that the elevation of the bilateral
relations to a strategic partnership helped strengthen future cooperation and
solidarity between
A series of
activities scheduled for 2015 towards the 40th anniversary of Germany-Vietnam
diplomatic ties would contribute to further fostering the all-around
relations, he added.
Vietnam-UK
Research Institute makes debut in Da Nang
The British Council
in collaboration with
The institute,
based at the
It will include the
UK-ASEAN Research Centre which is designed to develop scientists’ research
capacity in the fields of electronics-telecom, bio-technology, and
finance-banking.
The centre will
also serve as a venue for the
Speaking at the
ceremony, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Bui Van Ga said the
institute is considered an international higher education and scientific
research facility in the central region, paving the way for the establishment
of the
The
On this occasion,
Tate and Lyle Plc, a UK-based multinational agribusiness firm, committed to
granting scholarships worth 210,000 USD to outstanding students from
disadvantaged areas to help them pursue education at the
JTC former
President Tamio Kakinuma and other key executives admitted to the charge of
bribing officials in several countries, including
Japanese
prosecutors on Oct. 1 opened court against Tamio Kakinuma, 65 - the former
president of Japan Transportation Consultants (JTC) Inc., Tatsuro Wada, 67 –
former transport consultant, and Koji Ikeda, 58, who were charged with
providing tens of millions of Yen to officials to win contracts funded by
Japanese official development assistance (ODA), according to Japan's Kyodo
News.
Kyodo News reported
the three defendants had paid around 70 million Yen in kickbacks to three
senior officials in
Japanese tax
authorities unveiled the scandal in April 2013 and ordered JTC to pay 103
million Yen in back taxes.
An agreement on labour
cooperation has been signed between Nguyen Thanh Hoa, Deputy Minister of
Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs and his Saudi Arabian counterpart Ahmed
Al-Fahaid in the capital city of
The agreement was
reached during Hoa’s official visit to
The agreement aims
to improve Vietnamese labourers working conditions and incomes in
During their stay,
a seminar on labour cooperation between Vietnamese labour export enterprises
and Saudi Arabian partners was also held.
The Russian
Government has approved a new draft agreement on information technology and
mass communications cooperation with
The Russian
Ministry of Communications and Mass Media (MCMM) issued its stamp of approval
after reaching final agreement with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the
Federal Security Service (FSB) on a few snags holding up the deal.
The MCMM will sign
the deal after reaching agreement with
The new agreement
is expected to broadly bolster cooperation in communication, IT and mass
media between the two nations and have far reaching positive effects on radio
and television programming.
Among its many
provisions,
It will be valid in
five years, replacing the existing agreement, which has been in effect since
September 15, 1994.
Thousands
hit by water supply cuts
Over a thousand local residents are undergoing this nightmare
shortage of water without explanations or announcements. - Photo baomoi
Residents of Ha
Dong's Mo Lao commune have spent twenty days without fresh water.
"Over a
thousand local residents are undergoing this nightmare shortage of water
without explanations or announcements," said Dao Thi Suu, Mo Lao's Head
of Street Population Group/Residential Block 12.
Suu said she had
made more than ten calls to Nam Tu Liem district's Thong Nhat Co-operative
and was given weak responses.
Deputy director of
the co-operative Le The Hung explained that three requests had been sent to
water supplier VIWACO, but the company "had no solutions yet."
VIWACO director
Nguyen Anh Viet blamed the problematic water pipe, which had previously
broken.
Some 150 children
in the block were under five and badly needed water, said local resident
Nguyen Thi Tinh. Adults were sending children to relatives' homes for fresh
water and avoided using reserved water by taking showers at their offices and
using muddy water to clean toilets.
Neighbour Vu Van
Huy said he had gotten used to staying up from 11pm to 5am to pump fresh
water from the houses at the start of the water pipe.
Wells built ten
years ago, before fresh water was delivered to the area, were also being used
as a temporary solution, said Le Van Tuyen, a third local. While the wells
were primitively structured with two filtering layers that could not ensure
water hygiene, his family and others had to use water from the wells for
their daily living activities since they had no other choice.
Ha Noi sees
surge in child patients
As summer shifts
into autumn, the number of children with respiratory diseases, pneumonia and
bronchitis is increasing, said Nguyen Tien Dung, head of
About 300 children
have had health checks at the ward every day during the past month, most of
whom had respiratory diseases. The ward saw nearly 140 patients on Wednesday,
whereas in other seasons there were only about 90. Many children came down
with the diseases again and again, Dung said, warning that the situation could
last until the end of the month.
In the
The cool autumn
nights increased the amount of bacteria in the air while decreasing children's
resistance to them, said Dung.
Nguyen Thanh
Pre-Tet
crackdown ordered on smuggling
Deputy Prime
Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc has asked the Ministry of Industry and Trade and
localities to launch a campaign to fight smuggling and trade fraud before the
Tet (Lunar New Year) festival next February.
Phuc, who doubles
as head of the National Steering Committee on Anti-Smuggling, Counterfeit
Goods and Trade Fraud, said more inspections should be made to prevent
smuggling goods crossing the border, particularly tobacco, fertiliser and
helmets.
He said local
authorities should work closely with other forces to crack down on smuggling
rings operating en routes from northern border provinces to Ha Noi and
south-western border provinces to
He told them to
raise public awareness about carrying or buying smuggled, copied or cheap
products.
Leaders of
localities where smuggling, trade fraud and fake products were common must
take responsibility and punish those guilty, he said.
In the past eight
months of this year, market watch forces nationwide handled nearly 64,000
cases of smuggling, trade fraud and fake products.
Fines for the
offences reached a total of VND188 billion (US$9 million).
Major
expansion for new school model
The Viet Nam
Escuela Nueva Project, a school model in which teachers serve as facilitators
and parents and other community members are more involved, is being expanded
to 600 more primary schools around the country this year, a senior education
official, said.
The model was
applied at 1,747 primary schools during the last school year.
It creates
opportunities for students to conduct their own learning activities with
teachers' support, Assoc Prof Pham Quang Hung, acting director general of
Ministry of Education and Training's International Cooperation Department,
told a Southeast Asian education forum last Saturday.
Students manage
their classes through self-management councils and are encouraged to express
their viewpoints and differences.
Moreover, they are
expected to learn independently, perform self-management activities and
self-assessment, and are inspired to reach their full potential and acquire
necessary capacities and qualities.
Every student in a
class is required to play a certain role in carrying out the council's tasks
ranging from making plans to putting them into action, Hung said.
Individuals take
the initiative in researching, experiencing, and exploring before sharing
their knowledge in pairs and teams.
Hung said the model
aims to "learn to know; learn to do; learn to live in harmony; and learn
to survive."
"It is very
important that the model develops 21st century skills for students including
learning independently and self-managing; critical thinking and problem
solving; communicating and co-operating; and using language and doing calculations."
The forum also
heard about experiences related to improving education and skills of students
in other countries in
The Educational
Forum on Innovations in Teaching Life-Skills and 21st Century Skills at Basic
Education: Best Practices from Different Countries in the Southeast Asian
Region is held by the Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organisation's
Regional Training Centre.
Miner told
to pay up for mud spill
The People's
Committee in northern
The company was
also told to use all its workers to help clean-up the mess.
More than 5,000
cubic metres of mud swamped Doan Ket and Luong Thien villagers and destroyed
much of the rice crop.
The committee also
asked authorised agencies to assess the damage and compensate local
residents.
Court turns
down dairy firm lawsuit
Ha Noi People's
Court has rejected an attempt by an importer of goat-milk products to sue the
city's Market Watch Department for issuing instructions that it claimed had
affected the company's prestige and caused it to lose money.
In July 2013, the
company decided to sue the Market Watch Department for illegally fining the
company and providing incorrect information about the quality of the milk
product.
The company also
sued the department for not preserving milk products its officers had seized.
According to the company, the products were spoiled after being kept in
improper preservation conditions for four months.
The company
estimated its total losses at VND26 billion (US$1.2 million).
According to the
company, on February, 2013, Market Watch Division No 12 seized 6,000 Danlait
milk boxes for testing following suspicions expressed on online forums that
it had made food supplements abroad and sold them at high prices as baby
formula in
The company asked
the department to pay it VND1.25 billion ($59,000) for 5,200 boxes of milk
product that had been seized.
Judge Nguyen Thi
Thu Hang told the court that it was legal for Market Watch to fine the Manh
Cam company for mislabeling Danlait goat milk products as baby formula
instead of a food supplement.
She also said that
the company took back the 5,200 milk boxes from May, 2013, so it was not the
responsibility of the Market Watch Department if the company could not sell
the products.
The Viet Nam Food
Administration said that the products met quality standards as a food
supplement and that this had been certified by the health ministries of both
50,000
needy households in
About 50,000 people
living in poverty or near poverty in
The AVG, in
co-ordination with the Hanoi Department of Information and Communications,
organised a ceremony on October 2 to present the first 30 digital receivers
to families in Cau Giay district.
According to Deputy
Chairman of the Board of Directors of the AVG, Tran Dang Tuan, the digital
receivers will be donated to needy people with free roaming and subscription,
providing them with70 digital channels.
Under the
digital-television transition project, all households will have access to
digital TV under different forms by 2020. Terrestrial digital television will
account for 45%.
Source:
VNN/VNA/VNS/VOV/SGT/SGGP/ND
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Thứ Sáu, 3 tháng 10, 2014
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