| Police
charge 9 for deadly train crash Police
in the southern province of Dong Nai have decided to prosecute nine men deemed
responsible for the deadly train car crash on the Ghenh Bridge that killed two
and injured 24 others. The
accident took place on Sunday, February 6, the fourth day of the Lunar New Year. The nine
people to be indicted are: the two train drivers, Nguyen Van Tuy and Nguyen Xuan
Phu; the signal light controller, To Van Toan; four railway guards, Tran Van
Thoi, Tran Viet Hai, Bui Van Thuan and Nguyen Van Luong; and two taxi drivers,
Nguyen Quoc Hung and Nguyen Chau. The
train drivers will be accused for not stopping the train when the signal lights
were not working and for entering the bridge without permission from the guards.
The light controller and guards will be charged with neglect of duty causing
severe consequences, while the taxi drivers will be in the dock for violating
traffic rules and preventing staff on duty from discharging their
responsibilities. Col
Nguyen Phi Hung, deputy director of Dong Nai Public Security Department, told
the Sai Gon Giai Phong (Liberated Sai Gon) newspaper that the accident was the
first ever of its kind in the province. He called on railway staff and locals to
raise their awareness of and compliance with traffic regulations. 21
passengers injured as bus overturns on Lo Xo Pass A bus
overturned on the Lo Xo Pass in Central Highland Con Tum Province’s Dak Glei
District yesterday, Feb 13, at 4am, injuring 21 of the 54 passengers on board.
 | | Local authority representatives
comfort passengers injured when a bus flipped over in the Lo Xo Pass in Kon Tum
Province’s Dak Glei District yesterday, Feb 13. Doctors at the Kon Tum General
Hospital said none of the 54 passengers were in a critical condition. (Photo: VNS) | The
injured passengers were taken to Dak Glei Health Care Centre before 11 of them
with serious injuries were rushed to Con Tum General Hospital later on Sunday
morning. Hospital
director Tran Ai later yesterday confirmed that all of the victims were in a
stable condition. The
worst injured victim, 10-year-old Nguyen Thi Ngoc, from southern Binh Duong
Province, had her right arm amputated. Initial
investigations showed that the accident occurred due to a brake failure. Victim
Trieu Van Truong, 21, said it was lucky that the bus was going slowly at the
time. “I heard
the driver’s assistant shout: “The bus is going to overturn”, but everything
happened so fast that I couldn’t do anything,” he said. Deputy
chairman of Kon Tum Province People’s Committee Nguyen Huu Hai yesterday visited
the injured at Kon Tum Hospital and expressed his sympathies for the victims and
presented each of them with VND1 million (US$50). The
provincial authorities also compensated the other injured people at Dak Glei
Health Centre with VND500,000 ($25) each. Other
expenses for cooking, accommodation and treatment for the injured were also covered
by the province.
Overseas Vietnamese celebrate New Year
Over 200 Overseas
Vietnamese (OVs) from Laos and Thailand attended a get-together in HCM City on
Saturday on the occasion of the Lunar New Year festival. On the
same day in HCM City, around 300 Vietnamese experts and officials with a common
interest in Cambodia held a meeting to mark the Tet festival. The
Vietnamese embassies in Finland, Norway and Morocco also hosted numerous events
to welcome the Tet festival this year.
High post-Tet school dropout rate in Lao Cai
The
dropout rate in schools in the northern mountainous province of Lao Cai has been
relatively high after Tet, particularly in remote villages where only 30 percent
of pupils attend. The main
reasons for students to play truant were that they had to go to the market, take
part in a festival or stay at home to help their parents. Director
of the provincial Department of Education and Training Truong Kim Minh said
although many bold measures had been introduced, it was very difficult to ask
ethnic students to change their long-standing practices.
Nguyen Anh Tuan, head of the Department of Education and Training
in the remote Bat Xat District, said the authorities should consider shortening
the length of the summer vacation and extending the Tet break.
Rescued fishermen ready to go home
Five fishermen from
the Philippines rescued by their Vietnamese counterparts on the East Sea have
been staying in Tuy Hoa City, the capital of central Phu Yen Province, and are
ready to return home now. As soon as they
reached land, they were received by the coast guard and housed in a hotel in the
city, according to Huynh Van Dinh, deputy chief of staff of the provincial Coast
Guard Force. The provincial
People’s Committee asked the departments of police, border guards, health care
and foreign affairs to take care of the fishermen during their stay in the
country. The Philippine embassy
contacted the provincial authorities and carried out proceedings to repatriate
the fishermen, expected to be early next week, according to Bui Tien Loi from
the province’s Department of Foreign Affairs. The fishermen are from
Calapandayan Subic Zambales, and their ages range from 24 to 46. Le Con, a local
fisherman and captain of fishing vessel PY90441, and his crew saved and provided
first aid to the fishermen on January 30, where they were fishing about 300
nautical miles off the waters of central Binh Dinh Province. However, Con could not
return to land at the time because his ship had set out to sea for only two
weeks to fish for tuna, and every trip cost him hundreds of thousands of US
dollar. Con contacted the
coast guard and transferred three of the rescued fishermen to his colleagues
whose vessels were nearby. The boats reached land on last Wednesday and
Thursday.
Overseas Vietnamese arrested with guns
The Ministry of Public
Security’s Investigation Police last Thursday arrested Vietnamese American Thai
Kelvin Thanh, 41, for travelling with military weapons. Thanh, also known as
Thai Thanh Khoa, was allegedly carrying two guns when he entered Viet Nam on
December 2, 2010.
He was arrested at Tan Son Nhat Airport while checking into a flight from HCM
City to Ha Noi. 30 workers hit
by severe food poisoning Thirty workers of the
Metro Thang Long supermarket were taken to E Hospital last Wednesday for food
poisoning, said doctor Doan Huu Nghi. Doctor Nghi said fried
beans were the likely culprit.
All thirty workers recovered and were discharged from the hospital the same day.
and stone powder to catch fire in the 6.28-km tunnel. Child escapes
death after swallowing screw A two-year-old child
in southern Vung Tau City was able to escape death without medical intervention
after swallowing a three-centimetre screw, said doctor Duong Minh Hung of the
children’s Hospital 2 last Wednesday. Hung said the screw
travelled through the child’s digestive system to his stomach within three hours
of swallowing it. Fortunately, his bowel was not scratched. On the same day, a 13
month-old baby girl in HCM City’s Cu Chi District was saved by doctors after
being trampled by a cow. The child suffered from four broken ribs and a severely
damaged lung, doctors said. Fire
destroys rubber plantation Police in central Binh
Phuoc Province’s Dong Phu District are investigating a blaze yesterday, Feb 13,
that destroyed 8ha of rubber trees and 0.2ha of cashews belonging to seven
households. The loss was valued at
VND950 million (US$47,500), mostly the rubber trees which were six to seven
years old. Police said it was
believed the blaze in the Tan Tien Commune was caused by a household leaf fire.
Two-day cold snap hits the north
The north
would experience a two-day cold spell from yesterday morning, followed by warmer
weather for a few days before another cold front hits the region at the weekend,
according to the National Centre for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting.
In Ha
Noi, the temperature may drop to 11 to 13 degrees Celsius with highs of 13 to
15degrees Celsius. Light rain has also been forecast for the daytime.
Fire kills one, leaves three injured
A fire
killed one member of a family and injured three others in Phu My Village, Tu
Liem District, Ha Noi, yesterday, Feb 13. The fire
started when some alcohol that had been spilt was set alight by a spark from
some exposed electrical wiring the father, a 39-year-old self-employed mechanic,
was repairing. Three
motorbikes and a gas cylinder also caught alight, causing big explosions. One of
the mechanic’s daughters was killed in the accident while he, his other
daughter, his wife, and his brother were all injured.
VNN/VOV/VNS
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