Vietnamese fisherman allegedly shot dead by foreigners in Vietnam’s waters  A staffer of the Binh Chau Commune Fishery Association in the central province of Quang Ngai is seen using a communication system to contact the local fishing boat, whose crew member was reportedly shot dead by foreigners in Vietnam's waters on November 26, 2015. Tuoi Tre One member of a crew of 15 aboard a Vietnamese fishing boat from the central province of Quang Ngai was reportedly shot dead by a group of foreigners from an unidentified foreign vessel when the local boat was sailing off Vietnam’s Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelago on November 26. Nguyen Thanh Hung, chairman of the Binh Chau Commune Fishery Association in the province’s Binh Son District, broke the bad news on Sunday. Hung added that he continued to keep in contact with the boat, coded QNg 95861, after the death of Truong Dinh Bay, 42, of the district’s Binh Chau Commune. The incident occurred when Bay and his colleagues were fishing about 30 nautical miles off Suoi Ngoc Island, part of Truong Sa in the East Vietnam Sea, Hung said. At 6:15 pm on November 26, when the fishing vessel was anchored in the waters, a foreign ship appeared, sailing close to it, before a group of five armed foreigners boarded the local ship. One of the foreigners then used a gun to shoot at Bay while he ran to the prow of the fishing ship in an attempt to cut off the anchor line so that his boat could escape, Dat Viet newspaper reported. The attackers left immediately after they shot Bay dead, and the case was reported to the Binh Chau Commune Fishery Association, said Bui Van Cu, the owner and captain of the fishing boat. The sea area where the shooting happened is the traditional fishing ground of Vietnamese fishermen, the association said, adding there had been no attacks on local fishing vessels by foreign ships in the waters before the November 26 incident. Bay’s son, who was also a member of the crew, passed out repeatedly after his father died, the association, citing the victims, reported. Association chairman Hung said that the crew kept four cartridges from the shooting. Phung Dinh Toan, deputy chairman of the Quang Ngai Province Fishery Association, told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper on Sunday evening that he had yet to be briefed on the case. “Tomorrow [Monday] we will verify the information,” Toan said. Meanwhile, Lieutenant General Vo Trong Viet, Deputy Minister of Defense, Commander of the Border Guards, said on Sunday afternoon that an investigation into the case was underway, Dat Vietreported. At a press briefing in Hanoi on Friday last week, Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Le Hai Binh said Vietnam vehemently opposes the use or threat of force against its vessels. Binh made the statement in reply to reporters’ questions about the reports that some Chinese coast guard and military ships threatened to use force against a Vietnamese supply ship off Truong Sa on November 13. That day, four Chinese vessels, including two coast guard ships and a warship, bullied and scared away the Vietnamese supply ship Hai Dang 05 off the archipelago, the captain of the local boat, Tran Van Nga, said. The incident occurred when Hai Dang 05 was on a supply mission to the lighthouses in Truong Sa, Captain Nga said. During the bullying, the warship exposed a 37mm artillery gun by removing its wrappings, and more than 10 people in camouflage battledress armed with AR assault rifles were deployed in different positions on board, pointing their guns at the local ship, the captain recounted. This threat of force took place from 11:00 am to 1:30 pm, when all of the Chinese vessels left, he added. TUOI TRE NEWS