VN news/business news (Apr 24-25)

[Dam Son <son@fermi.phys.washington.edu>]

April 25: Chinese fishermen pay fines to Vietnam 
April 25: Vietnam wrestles with real estate 'fruits of revolution'
April 25: Reckless driving causes sharp spurt in Vietnam's traffic accidents
April 25: Vietnam criticises Peru hostage assault as "regrettable" 
April 25: Vietnam-Belarus : Hanoi and Minsk pledge stronger ties 
April 25: U.N. seeks last-minute homes for HK Vietnam refugees
April 24: Vietnamese Newspaper Highlights - April 24, 1997 
April 24: Vietnam Nutrition Scheme Aims To Produce Anaemia
April 24: Vietnam Sets Up Asia-Pacific Science/Tech Institute
April 25: Vietnam says annual inflation at 1.6 percent in April 
April 24: Telecom Privatizing In Vietnam


Chinese fishermen pay fines to Vietnam 

Hanoi (dpa) - A group of 48 Chinese fishermen caught in Vietnamese
waters in March have been released from custody after collectively
paying a fine of 32,000 dollars, officials said Friday.

A second group of 64 Chinese fishermen, caught in the same waters off
of Vietnam's central coast, remain in Vietnamese coast guard custody
in Danang, officials there said.

A group of eight fishermen from the first batch was allowed to return
to China to fetch the money to pay the fine and the same arrangement
is being made for the second group, a coast officer said.
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Vietnam wrestles with real estate 'fruits of revolution'

Hanoi (dpa) - Rights to houses taken over by communist victories in
northern Vietnam in 1954 and South Vietnam in 1975 remains a stormy
issue, with government agencies apparently the most resistant to
efforts to return property to their origianl owners, according to a
local report Friday.

The issue has provoked a spirited debate in the country's parliament
which is currently in a twice-yearly, monthly session.

Property rights to thousands of homes are at stake all over the
country with the greatest concentration in Hanoi, and Ho Chi Minh
City, the country's biggest city formerly known as Saigon.

The issue, which has simmered uneasily for years, was addressed by the
National Assembly back in 1991 when it issued its first legal
ordinance that ``in essence'' favoured the former owners, according to
a report in the official Vietnam News.

Meeting intense resistance, especially among government offices that
had moved into previously private property, the resolution has gone
largely unimplemented.

The ``main cause of the impasse'' was that ``the strong-will of
government-owned offices that flatly refused to return places to their
genuine owners,'' according to some delegates the paper reported.

Some are now expecting the government to move out first to set an
example to other individuals, it added.

``But they said one thing should be absolute, and that was the
government now should declare that it would not return houses to
original owners who evacuated to the south in 1954 and those who fled
the country after April 1975,'' it added.

France, the colonial power for some 80 years was expelled from North
Vietnam in 1954, leading to a division of the country, which was only
reunited after the American-backed South Vietnam regime fell in 1975.

The issue is most complicated and emotional in Hanoi, with delegates
from the capital reportedly insisting the government settle the matter
once and for all and not let it drag into the next century.
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Reckless driving causes sharp spurt in Vietnam's traffic
accidents

Hanoi (dpa) - More than 1,500 Vietnamese died in traffic accidents
around the country during the first three months of the year,
representing a sharp increase over last year's figures, according to
police statistics made public Friday.

Another 5,697 other were reported injuries during the same period,
according figures made public in the People's Army newspaper (Quan Doi
Nhan Dan).

The first quarter fatality figures represented a 28.2 per cent
increase over last year's statistics for the same period and injuries
were up 25.2 per cent over last year.

Road accidents accounted for 95 per cent of the deaths with the rest
occcuring in boating tragedies and railroad collisions, the report
said.

Most accidents were caused by speeding, illegally overtaking other
vehicles and in nearly 200 cases from drunken driving, according to a
police study of the causes.

``Most accidents were caused by people's ignorance of the traffic
law,'' said the report.

Police have made various attempts to stem the alarming death tolls on
Vietnamese roads, where most are new drivers who exhibit none of what
Westerners would consider ``normal'' sense of safety or courtesy.
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Vietnam criticises Peru hostage assault as "regrettable" 

HANOI (AFP) - Vietnam said Friday it "regretted" the "brutal" end to
the four-month hostage crisis in Peru.

"It was a regrettable act of violence," the Nhan Dan, the official
mouthpiece of the Vietnamese communist party, said in a strongly
worded commentary.

"It is clear the military assault was not the only solution open to
the Peruvian government," he added.

"It is ironic that the rebels, who were well armed, never turned to
violence against the hostages and yet that government troops showed
themselves to be extremely brutal" during the assault, the Nhan Dan
said.

Criticism across the world has grown against Tuesday's assault on the
Japanese ambassador's residence in Lima in the light of reports some
guerrillas were killed while unarmed and after giving themselves up.

All 14 Tupac Amaru (MRTA) rebels died in the attack, as well as two
soldiers and one hostage.

"The fact that (Peru's) President Alberto Fujimori prepared for a
military solution for several months showed the Peruvian government
had no intention of following serious negotiations but wanted to
mislead international opinion," the daily added.

"The Peruvian military machine can assassinate a group of guerrillas
but violence cannot help Mr Fujimori overcome his country's problems,
including social inequality, poverty and unemployment," the newspaper
said.

The commentary was published as Hanoi prepares, according to sources,
to welcome Fujimori next month. He will be the first Peruvian
president to visit Vietnam since they established diplomatic relations
in November 1994.
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Vietnam-Belarus : Hanoi and Minsk pledge stronger ties 

HANOI (AFP) - Vietnam and Belarus have decided to ratchet up relations
following the visit here by Belarussian president Alexander
Lukashenko, the Vietnam News Agency reported Friday.

Lukashenko, who held meetings on Thursday with his Vietnamese
counterpart Le Duc Anh and Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet, said he hoped
to see Belarus establish a diplomatic representation in Hanoi as well
as the creation of a joint commission.

"Relations and cooperation have not reached the potential and the
needs of the two countries," Lukashenko was quoted as saying by the
official VNA. Hanoi and Minsk established diplomatic relations in
1992.

He said that cooperation need not be confined to economics, and could
also include fields of science, technology, culture and the military.

It is possible that military purchases had been discussed, sources
said, noting that the Vietnamese arsenel consists chiefly of equipment
supplied by the former Soviet Union.

The Vietnamese president accepted an invitation to visit Minsk, VNA
reported. But the Anh's term will expire in a few months and it is
unlikely that he will continue his official functions after that.

Anh, who holds the military rank of general, said that two accords
signed on Thursday "opened attractive perspectives and broadened
cooperation."

The two countries signed a treaty on friendship and cooperation and an
accord on the avoidance of double taxation.

Discussions held Thursday between economics, trade and industry
ministers from the two countries focused on exploring areas of
possible cooperation in agricultural processing, and industry.

Specifically they discussed the possibility of providing tractors,
trucks and machine tools, as well as rubber processing.

Belarus is the 27th largest foreign investor in Vietnam, with one
38-million-dollar rubber processing project licenced in the southern
port of Vung Tau Ba Ria.

Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet noted that commercial relations between the
two countries had sunk below levels enjoyed before the collapse of the
former Soviet Bloc, VNA reported.

According to official sources, two way trade between the countries was
less than 15 million dollars last year.
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U.N. seeks last-minute homes for HK Vietnam refugees

Hanoi (Reuter) - The United Nations said on Friday it was hoping for
last-minute offers from third countries to receive 1,300 Vietnamese
refugees who face an uncertain future after Hong Kong is handed back
to China in just over two months.

Assistant U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Sergio de Mello told a
news conference that he hoped countries such as the United States,
Canada and Australia could make a special display of ``humanity and
charity.''

``We're hoping that at this eleventh hour...traditional resettlement
countries will take a final and generous look at this group of 1,300
and accept a significant number,'' he said.

``Though I must confess that this is more a wish on my part than a
likely outcome. I'm afraid that the majority will not be accepted.''

The 1,300 people have been living in the British colony's detention
camps -- some for as long as a decade. Unlike more than 100,000 other
boatpeople, they have not been deemed illegal migrants who should be
returned to Vietnam.

Sources say it had always been foreseen that the refugee group, which
includes drug addicts, former criminals and chronically ill people,
would be the hardest nut to crack in international efforts to bring
the boatpeople saga to a close.

De Mello said 376 people returned to Vietnam on two planes from Hong
Kong on Friday, taking the total number of voluntary and forced
repatriations since 1989 to more than 109,000.

Friday's repatriation left 2,694 ``screened-out'' illegal migrants
still in the colony, including 300 non-nationals whose identity or
places of origin remained to be determined.

``Although we still have to bring that figure down in the days and the
weeks to come, this is a significant achievement,'' De Mello said.
``One of the longest and perhaps most tragic refugee problems of this
century has been, I believe, successfuly brought to an end.''

De Mello said he was due to meet Vietnam Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen
Khanh and Foreign Minister Nguyen Manh Cam to discuss a strategy for
bringing back as many of the screened-out cases before the handover of
Hong Kong at midnight on June 30.

Hinting that it was the UNHCR and Hong Kong which were dragging their
feet, Hanoi said last week that it wanted all of those it has agreed
to take back returned by May 31.

However, De Mello said he was convinced that Vietnam would be flexible
and said it was better not to talk about deadlines.

The assistant high commissioner will go on from Hanoi to Thailand --
where just 44 of the boatpeople who fled to that country remain --
Hong Kong and then Beijing.

China has said it wants all of the boatpeople out of the territory
before it takes over at midnight on June 30.

De Mello said the UNHCR's request to China would be to tolerate the
continued presence of boatpeople in Hong Kong after the handover until
their fates can be determined -- either through voluntary repatriation
or resettlement in third countries.

About 1.4 million migrants, virtually all of whom fled their homeland
in flimsy boats after the communist's 1975 victory in the Vietnam War,
have been resettled in third countries or returned home.
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Vietnamese Newspaper Highlights - April 24, 1997 

HANOI (VNA) - Highlights of Vietnamese Newspapers today are as
follows:

NHAN DAN:

- Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko began his three-day official
visit to Vietnam yesterday at the invitation of State President Le Duc
Anh. During his visit, Belarus and Vietnam are expected to sign a
friendship and bilateral cooperation treaty and an agreement to avoid
double taxation.

- To mark the anniversary of Liberation of South Vietnam (April 30)
and May Day (May 1st), Hanoi will organise running and bicycle races
for peace on April 27.

HANOI MOI:

- In the first quarter of this year, Hanoi's industrial sector grossed
its export value of US$8 million, an increase of 24.5 percent over the
same period of 1996.

VIETNAM NEWS:

- The Tan Thuan and Linh Trung export processing zones in Ho Chi Minh
City has licensed 114 foreign companies for operations as of April 22.

- Exports from 23 companies under the Ministry of Industry have earned
US$170 million year-to-date, a year-on-year increase of 34 percent.
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Vietnam Nutrition Scheme Aims To Produce Anaemia

Hanoi (VNA) - In 1995, Vietnam announced a national nutrition
programme to eradicate by the year 2000 any clinical symptoms of
Avitaminosis, to basically eradicate iodine-related disorders, and to
reduce the percentage of anaemia among pregnant women from 50-60
percent at present to under 40 percent.

This national programme has been carried out in combination with other
programmes such as population and family planning, poverty
alleviation, job generation, wasteland and barren hill regreening,
anti-malnutrition among children and the granting of bank loans to
poor farmers.

The national nutrition programme aims to ensure an adequate supply of
nutritious foods to pregnant women, breastfeeding mothers and
children, provide good health care to them, and improve their
awareness of the need to have nutritious foods and to prevent
diseases.

Recently, the government has launched a campaign for using iodised
salt and has granted hundreds of millions of VND for this campaign.

Last year, iodised salt was supplied to 90 percent of the people in
the mountain provinces of Lao Cai, Yen Bai, Son La, Cao Bang, Land
Son, Bac Thai, Ha Giang, Tuyen Quang, Hoa Binh and Vinh Phu in the
North, and 50 percent of those in the plains.

The aim is to supply iodised salt to 90 percent of the population
throughout the country.

With UNICEFs assistance, the Vitamin A supply programme which was
started in 1983 has obtained good results.

Since 1993, the programme has supplied Vitamin A capsules to all
under-five-year-olds throughout the country in June and December every
year.

As a result, in 1995 the programme succeeded in reducing the
percentage of xerophthalmia among children to below the level set by
the World Health Organisation.

In 1996, nearly 9 million children in the 6-60 month group were
supplied with Vitamin A.

Also with the assistance of UNICEF and CIDA of Canada, the Vietnam
Nutrition Institute is conducting 3 methods of Vitamin A supply on an
experimental basis to find out the best way of fighting Avitaminosis
among children; supplying Vitamin A in combination with vaccination in
a number of districts; promoting nutrition education and encouraging
nutritious food supply among the families in other districts; and
supplying Vitamin A every day to more districts.

Experiences will be drawn from this experiment, but improvement of the
diet is considered the most basic and long-term method to fight
malnutrition.
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Vietnam Sets Up Asia-Pacific Science/Tech Institute 

HANOI (VNA) - The Institute for Asian-Pacific Science and Technology
Cooperation (IAP) was launched here on April 20 by the Union of
Vietnam Science and Technology Associations.

IAP is tasked with organising research cooperation, applying
scientific and technological advances and foreign socio-economic
management measures, and to providing professional services and
consultancy.

The Director of the Hanoi-based Institute is Prof. Ho Uy Liem.
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Vietnam says annual inflation at 1.6 percent in April 

HANOI (AFP) - Vietnam recorded year-on-year inflation of just 1.6
percent in the month to April 25, its lowest rate in more than a
decade, according to official figures released Friday.

During the month to April 25 prices nationwide fell 0.6 percent,
thanks to softer food prices, especially the price of rice which has
fallen dramatically thanks to a bumper winter crop, the statistics
office said.

Rice prices fell 2.8 percent from March and 9.5 percent from a year
earlier, according to the General Department of Statistics.

The inflation figure was the lowest in Vietnam since the country
launched its economic reforms in the mid-1980s.

Construction materials prices are 1.1 percent down from year-earlier
levels and the country has stockpiles of both cement and steel and a
flood of cheap imports.

In contrast, fuels have been the only major commodity to see double
digit inflation over the past 12 months, up 22.4 percent due to large
fuel price and tax increases last November.

Ho Chi Minh City, which has seen its economy grow at around 15 percent
annually in the past two years, had the country's highest 12 month
inflation rate of 3.8 percent, though prices dropped 0.3 percent from
March.

Prices in Hanoi also fell slightly over the previous month, dropping
1.1 percent from March, and rising just 1.2 percent over a year ago.

Inflation in Vietnam has fallen from 67 percent in 1991 to 17.5
percent in 1992, 5.2 percent in 1993, 14.4 percent in 1994, 12.7
percent in 1995 and just 4.5 percent last year.

The dong has slipped 4.4 percent against the dollar in the past twelve
months according to the official exchange rate, and one percent since
March.

However the dong has lost more value against the dollar on black
market rates in recent weeks.

Vietnam releases its inflation figures around the 25th of the month
rather than waiting until the month is over.
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Telecom Privatizing In Vietnam 

Newsbytes News Network

HONGKONG (NB) - To get government approval, 49 percent of the equity
of a subsidiary of state-owned Vietnam Post and Telecommunications
Corp would be sold to private individuals. Nguyen Thanh Canh, director
of telecoms equipment and cable manufacturer Sacom, reportedly said
240,000 shares would be sold at 500,000 dong (about HK$331.61) each in
early June if approval follows.

Nguyen said it was the right way forward for the company's
development, as the equitization would mean certainty about capital
and output.

The state would keep a 51 percent share in Sacom, whose turnover was
71 billion dong in 1996.

Fifteen percent of the shares would be sold to company employees and
34 percent would be allocated to other workers, probably employees in
the post and telecoms industry.

In recent months, Vietnam's ruling communist party has called for a
drive to speed up partial privatization, or equitization, in the
country's ailing state sector.
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