[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
VN news (Mar 27, 1997)
Vietnam puts heat on Drug Traffickers: Report
Nike Suspends Vietnam Plant Manager Over Abuse Charges
Vietnam plans new laws for more "lively and democratic" elections
Two Hong Kong men get 10 years for procuring Vietnam prostitutes
Heroin trial of two Hong Kong men to begin Friday in Vietnam
[INLINE] Vietnam puts heat on Drug Traffickers: Report
By ANDY SOLOMAN, Asia Times
Public burnings of opium are becoming increasingly common as
Vietnamese authorities step up their fight against drug use and
trafficking.
The Hanoi People's Court destroyed 109 kg of opium and 895 grams of
heroin last Thursday, official press reports said. Police in the
opium-producing hub of Nghe An province, bordering Laos in central
Vietnam, burned 221 kg of the drug in late December.
Nghe An authorities have disposed of 1.3 tonnes of opium in three
public burnings so far, the English language daily Vietnam News said.
Until the early 1990s the government bought opium from farmers for
export to former COMECON countries for pharmaceutical use. Cultivation
was outlawed in 1992 and the size of the crop has been substantially
reduced, dropping from 16.8 tonnes to an estimated 2.6 tonnes in 1995.
The United Nations Drug Control Program (UNDCP) in Hanoi said
production was no longer sufficient for Vietnamese consumption.
With 200,000 opiate addicts in Vietnam, drug use is on the rise. But
the larger fear is that the country is becoming a major transit and
trafficking point.
In 1995 the US government listed Vietnam among 29 countries that
produce, or are transit points for, drugs headed for US markets.
"Trafficking has appeared very recently with the opening up of the
country. Vietnam is being targeted as a transit country for opiates
coming from golden triangle countries... and being shipped out mainly
via Ho Chi Minh City, which seems to have emerged as a new hub for
international drug trafficking," Jorn Kristensen, senior program
coordinator for the UNDCP in Hanoi, said.
Kristensen said that in recent years it had become more difficult to
get refined heroin out of the region. But as a result of increased
efforts to discourage trafficking across China and Thailand, the
narcotics trade had grown in Vietnam.
Drug seizures, while modest when compared to other countries in the
region, have shown marked increases in the past four years. Figures
rose from 1.5 kg of heroin and 323 kg of opium seized in 1991 to 32.3
kg of heroin and 2,019 kg of opium in 1994.
In 1995 there were more than 13,000 arrests, along with seizure of 4.7
tonnes of opium and 82 kg of heroin. Eight people were sentenced to
death and 19 others imprisoned for life.
Enforcement remains a problem. A lack of cooperation between
enforcement agencies, and insufficient training and equipment, leave
gaps for traffickers to slip through. Current legislation is limited
and inadequate, according to the new Vietnam Drug Control Masterplan,
which has pledged US$31 million over the next five years to the fight
against narcotics.
Other problems include an increasing number of city addicts, growing
international traffic and the danger of the establishment of organized
crime trafficking routes and drug money laundering.
At present there are no known heroin refineries in Vietnam.
Vietnam is not a signatory to any international drug control
conventions, but is considering joining the 1961 Single Convention on
Narcotic Drugs and the 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances. It
is also seeking admittance to the 1988 United Nations Convention
Against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances.
___________________________________
Thursday - Mar 27, 1997 ... Back to headlines
[INLINE] Nike Suspends Vietnam Plant Manager Over Abuse Charges
ARLINGTON, Va. (AP)--Nike Inc. (NKE) suspended a manager of its plant
in Vietnam in response to a U.S.-based labor group's report that
alleges worker abuse in factories where the company's shoes are made,
USA Today reported.
The paper said in Thursday's editions that Thuyen Nguyen of Vietnam
Labor Watch inspected Nike facilities in Vietnam last month in
escorted and surprise visits.
He said he found violations of minimum wage and overtime laws as well
as physical mistreatment of workers.
The paper said Nguyen's report was to be released today in New York.
''While Nike claims it is trying to monitor and enforce its code of
conduct, its current approach to monitoring and enforcement is simply
not working,'' the paper quotes Nguyen as saying.
Nike spokesman McLain Ramsey confirmed Nguyen's visit to the Ho Chi
Minh City plant and also told the paper that Nike officials are ''as
distressed as he is'' about the report.
Among other things, Nguyen said 56 women were forced to run laps as
punishment for wearing non-regulation shoes and that 12 of them
fainted and had to be taken to a hospital.
''Nike has a full investigation going and encouraged local police to
do the same,'' she told the paper.
She also told the paper a manager accused of making women run laps has
been suspended.
___________________________________
Thursday - Mar 27, 1997 ... Back to headlines
[INLINE] Vietnam plans new laws for more "lively and democratic"
elections
By Frederik Balfour
HANOI (AFP) - Vietnam plans to pass a new law that will yield
"livelier and more democratic" elections as well as an enlarged
National Assembly with more non-communist party members, an official
said Thursday.
Vu Mao, chairman of the National Assembly office told a media
conference that the assembly's next session beginning on April 2 will
pass a law on the election of representives that will include giving
them access for the first time to television, radio and print media to
conduct their campaigns.
"We want elections that are more democratic and lively," he said,
adding that the number of elected deputies will increase from the
present 395 to a possible maximum of 450 when elections for the next
five-year term are held on July 20.
The next elected legislature will include a majority of new faces,
including an increase in the number of non communist party
representatives, he said.
The party representation, which now makes up 92 percent of delegates,
could fall to about 80 percent he said, while as much as 60 to 70
percent of present deputies will be replaced.
The national assembly session beginning next month is expected to last
more than one month, and will also pass bills taking tougher measures
to fight against corruption, child sex abuse and drug abuse which have
been identified as top priorities by the government.
Stiffer penalties for drug trafficking and production will be imposed,
according to proposed ammendments to the penal code.
They will include sanctions aimed at opium growing in Vietnam, a
particularly sensitive issue as it involves the main source of
livelihood for some of Vietnam's ethnic minorities, Mao said.
Vietnam is said to have more than 200,000 drug abusers according the
United Nations Drug Control Programme, and drug use among the youth is
growing at an alarming rate.
The assembly will also pass a law to replace the turnover tax with a
value added tax, a new law on corporate income tax and a trade law.
However the government decided to postpone a long-awaited banking law
that had been originally tabled for this session, but was found
wanting.
"The National Assembly is very aware of these banking problems. We
don't want to have a situation like in Albania where a lot of people's
credits collapsed," he said.
"But we came to the conclusion that the draft of two new banking laws
(for the central bank and commercial banks) don't meet our
requirements," he said.
Mao did not provide details of the problems faced by Vietnam's banking
industry.
Banking analysts have warned of a looming banking crisis in Vietnam
where there is an estimated 1 billion dollars in overdue letters of
credit, representing about 25 percent of the country's import bill.
Mao said the government would not rule out letting certain troubled
banks collapse.
"We have a law on bankruptcy pertaining to all enterprises and banks
are enterprises," he said.
When the elections are held in July, more candidates are expected to
contest each constituency than in the previous 1992 election he said.
The new deputies might be drawn from groups of scientists,
intellectuals and bureaucrats, and may include candidates who nominate
themselves.
However all National Assembly hopefuls will still need to be vetted by
the Vietnam Fatherland Front which is under direct control of the
Communist Party of Vietnam.
When the newly elected members of the National Assembly meet for their
first session in September of their biggest tasks will be to consider
"very important questions, including changes in personnel," he said.
Although he also said that "present leaders could remain" although it
is likely that president Le Duc Anh, who has been absent from the
political scene since suffering a stroke in November, will be
reelected to a new five-year term.
___________________________________
Thursday - Mar 27, 1997 ... Back to headlines
[INLINE] Two Hong Kong men get 10 years for procuring Vietnam
prostitutes
Hanoi (dpa) - Two Hong Kong citizens were sentenced to 10 years in
prison by a Vietnamese court for helping to lure Vietnamese women to
work as prostitutes in Macao, a local newspaper reported Thursday.
Fung Wai Keung and Yuen Hok Yan, who were arrested in September 1995,
were sentenced by the criminal court in southern Ho Chi Minh City
Wednesday, the report said.
The sentence was the highest possible under Vietnam's penal code,
reported the Saigon Times.
Three Vietnamese accomplices were also sentenced but the newspaper did
not report the sentences they received.
Keung and Yan, who previously worked as laundry men for Macao's
Skynight Dance Hall, were sent to Vietnam in early 1993, the report
said.
Attractive Vietnamese dancers were recruited to work in Skynight,
doubling as prostitutes, and the pair is reported to have arranged for
up to 80 Vietnamese women to take up new employment.
Vietnamese recruiters were paid 100 dollars per recruit and the women
were sent to Macao as tourists, the report added.
``In the verdict, the jury commented that the activities of the
defendants seriously violated social order and virtue and could cause
dangerous diseases such as AIDS,'' the paper reported.
The two were arrested by Vietnamese police, the Hong Kong-based South
China Morning Post reported earlier.
___________________________________
Thursday - Mar 27, 1997 ... Back to headlines
[INLINE] Heroin trial of two Hong Kong men to begin Friday in Vietnam
HANOI (AFP) - The trial of two Hong Kong men who could face execution
for drug trafficking will open in Vietnam Friday, a court official
said Thursday.
Sun Chi Kin and Chan Chun Hung Sam My, Hong Kong residents holding
British passports, were arrested in March last year after 18.1
kilograms (39.82 pounds) of heroin was allegedly found in their cases
as they arrived at Ho Chi Minh City's airport from Bangkok.
The trial is expected to last one day, the official said.
Possession or transporting more than one kilogram (2.2 pounds) of
heroin is punishable by death in Vietnam.
A Canadian woman of Viwetnamese origin was sentenced to death last
week for possession of 5.45 kilograms of heroin, the fourth foreigner
to receive the death sentence.
To date only one foreigner has been executed for drug related crimes.
Wong Chi-Shing, a Hong Kong resident and holder of a British National
Overseas passport, was executed in Ho Chi Minh City for trafficking
after he was caught smuggling five kilogrammes (11.2 pounds) of heroin
into the country.
Executions in Vietam are carried out by a firing squad of five rifles
aimed at the body, followed by a sixth shot to the head.