VN News (June 9)

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

New company to break Vietnam telecoms monopoly
Vietnam's Communist Party holds crucial meeting
Vietnam to decide on first refinery in one month
Power cuts loom in northern Vietnam
Hong kong man jailed in Vietnam sex-ring case
Three Vietnamese charged with drug trafficking in southern China
Kuala Lumpur concerned over Vietnam's plan to ban palm-oil imports
RUSTY ARMS
Schiphol works on Vietnam and Philippines studies

  _________________________________________________________________

New company to break Vietnam telecoms monopoly

HANOI, June 9 (Reuter) - Vietnam has allowed a small break in the state
post and telecommunications monopoly by licensing a joint-stock company to
provide networks and services in Ho Chi Minh City, a senior company
official said on Monday. 

"It is the first joint stock company in this field," the official of
Saigon Post and Telecommunications Joint Stock Corporation (Saigon Postel)
said. 

"We are aiming for a five-percent share of Vietnam's telecom market by
2000, with 200,000 subscribers," he added. 

Until now, state-owned Vietnam Post and Telecommunications (VNPT) has had
a monopoly. 

Saigon Postel was established last October with 50,000 shares with a face
value of one million dong ($85.70) each share, makings its total capital
$42.85 million. 

The official did not say who the shareholders were or how much of the
capital was held by the state. Under Vietnamese Company Law, a joint-stock
company must have at least seven shareholders. 

Ho Chi Minh City-based Saigon Postel will operate and trade in mobile
phones, wireless telephones, paging systems and other value-added services
in southern provinces and Hanoi. 

A subsidiary of VNPT, telecoms equipment and cable manufacturer SACOM,
announced in April that it planned to sell 49 percent of its equity to
private shareholders for $10.3 million. 

Official reports say Vietnam's telecoms market is currently growing at
around 30 percent a year, one of the fastest rates in the world. 
  _________________________________________________________________

Vietnam's Communist Party holds crucial meeting

By John Chalmers

HANOI, June 9 (Reuter) - The powerful Central Committee of Vietnam's
ruling Communist Party met behind closed doors on Monday for talks on a
range of issues which sources said would include possible leadership
changes later this year. 

Official media reports said the 170-strong committee would discuss public
administration reform and how to select and train the right people to
represent the party in all walks of life. 

"The...Central Committee is to hold its third plenum this year to discuss
ways of building and consolidating the Vietnamese state and selecting
personnel for the new period of industrialisation and modernisation," the
Vietnam News Agency (VNA) said. 

The committee prepared for its meeting months in advance, sending out
draft documents for discussion to senior officials and experts at central
and local levels for comments and suggestions. 

The party agreed at a landmark congress a year ago to tackle the failings
of state management, especially the bureaucracy, which remain despite a
decade of economic reforms. 

"State management of business has been loose, and despite improvements,
multi-stop administrative procedures still exist," the Saigon Times Daily
said in a report ahead of the plenum. 

"In fact, land transfer paperwork must go through 19 gates in cities and
eight in rural areas," it said. "In the land, housing, electric power and
water supply areas, there are currently more than 1,000 overlapping legal
documents." VNA's report on the agenda for the plenum made no mention of
possible changes to the leadership triumvirate of party secretary general,
president and prime minister -- which is a taboo subject in the
tightly-controlled media. 

However, political sources said it was certain that the posts of president
and prime minister would be considered because their five-year terms come
up for renewal by a new National Assembly, which will meet for the first
time in September. 

In theory, 76-year-old General Le Duc Anh and 74-year-old Vo Van Kiet
could be reappointed president and prime minister respectively for another
five years. 

Anh, Kiet and Party Secretary General Do Muoi, 80, had been expected to
step down at the 1996 congress, but last-minute manoeuvring saw their
terms in office effectively extended. 

However, Anh suffered a stroke in November and although he has recovered
sufficiently to make some brief public appearances, analysts believe he
will not stay on. Sources quote Kiet as saying he is tired and ready to
go. 

Whether Anh and Kiet stay or go will become clearer later this month, when
the list of candidates for the July 20 elections to the National Assembly
is published. 

According to the constitution, the president and prime minister must be
members of the National Assembly. 

Analysts said they expected Muoi, who is seen as a balancing influence
between reform-minded Kiet and conservative Anh, to stay on until a
mid-term party congress 18 months from now. 
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Vietnam to decide on first refinery in one month

By Raj Rajendran

KUALA LUMPUR, June 9 (Reuter) - Vietnam's state oil and gas firm
Petrovietnam said on Monday it expects a government decision on building
the country's first oil refinery in about a month and did not rule out
foreign particpation. 

"We are waiting for approval from the government. Maybe by next month we
would be a getting a reply," Ngo Thuong San, Petrovietnam's president and
chief executive officer told reporters on the sidelines of an oil
conference. 

He said the government was evaluating two feasibilty studies submitted to
develop the refinery. 

The first proposal was jointly submitted by Petrovietnam, South Korea's LG
Group and Malaysia's state oil firm Petronas. This indicated that the
foreign consortium remained interested in being involved in the project. 

Another official said, "The door is still open for everybody to
participate, not just LG and Petronas." The second proposal was submitted
solely by Petrovietnam at the end of March. Petrovietnam has said it is
ready to build the $1.3-billion refinery on its own. 

The 130,000-barrel-per-day refinery is to be located in Dung Quat Bay near
Danang, in the central province of Quang Ngai. 

The refinery, which Vietnam says it desperately needs by early next
century to cut a growing import bill for oil products, has long been a
subject of controversy. 

Early this year, Petrovietnam rejected demands for further commercial and
financial incentives from a consortium comprising LG, Petronas and U.S.
refiner Conoco, a unit of DuPont Co that had planned to take part in the
project. 

The consortium companies had asked for a chance to compete at the
distribution and retail level on their own or in joint venture with local
firms as well as for guaranteed prices for refinery products. 

The consortium has been put together to replace France's Total SA , which
withdrew from the project in 1995 after deciding the location made it
"economically unviable." Petrovietnam has said that switching the proposed
location from Dung Quat, an undeveloped area 1,000 km (600 miles) north of
the country's oilfields and major consumption base, was out of the
question. 

San said Vietnam was also planning to build a second refinery in the north
near the coast, so that it can take advantage of existing port facilities. 
  _________________________________________________________________

Power cuts loom in northern Vietnam

HANOI, June 9 (Reuter) - Electricity supplies in northern Vietnam have
dropped to critical levels and power cuts are likely to become more
widespread if rain does not feed the reservoirs of hydropower plants soon,
an official said on Monday. 

Bui Thuc Khiet, deputy general director of Electricity of Vietnam (EVN),
told Reuters that a high voltage transmission line which normally supplies
the south of the country from the north was operating in reverse for the
first time. 

He said the reservoirs feeding the Hoa Binh and Thac Ba plants had fallen
to "dead" levels because of unusually hot and dry weather in the north
since mid-May, which meant that supply would fail to meet record demand. 

Supplies of electricity to some remote areas were cut at the end of last
week, although Khiet said EVN was working to prevent power cuts in towns
and cities. 

He said Hoa Binh, the country's biggest plant, could operate effectively
for another five or 10 days if there was no rain. 

Weather forecasters said showers were expected in the north of the country
later on Monday, although they said heavy rains were unlikely before June
20. 

EVN is planning to produce some 19.7 billion kilowatt hours (kwh) of power
this year and is aiming for capacity between 26 and 29 billion kwh by
2000. It intends to continue capacity building after that to meet growing
consumption needs, which experts believe could top 60 billion kwh in less
than a decade from now. 
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Hong Kong man jailed in Vietnam sex-ring case

HANOI, June 9 (Reuter) - A Hong Kong man has been sentenced by the Ho Chi
Minh City People's Court to 10 years in jail for sending Vietnamese women
to brothels in Macau and Cambodia, a court official said on Monday. 

Eight Vietnamese nationals who were accused of complicity in the
women-trafficking racket were given prison sentences ranging from one year
suspended to 10 years. 

The daily Vietnam News said that Lam Yu was charged with selling 11
Vietnamese women to Macau and Cambodia to work as prostitutes between June
and August last year. 

He and his accomplices were arrested in August after they were caught
interviewing and taking photographs of nine women in a Ho Chi Minh City
hotel. 

Vietnam News said that a Hong Kong woman named Ly, who had paid $100 for
each new "recruit", was still at large. 

Prostitution rings have become more active, especially in freewheeling Ho
Chi Minh City, since communist Vietnam eased social controls, shifted to a
market economy and opened its doors to the outside world in the late
1980s. 

In recent years, the government has stepped up efforts to clamp down on
what it refers to as "social evils", including prostitution, pornography,
drug abuse and gambling. 

Official figures estimate there are about 70,000 prostitutes in Vietnam.
Many of them left lives of poverty in rural areas to head for towns and
cities. 

Prostitutes who work abroad can do even better. Vietnam News said the
women who were smuggled to Macau by Lam's ring earned $3,500 -- about 12
times the average annual per capita income -- for a three-month contract. 
  _________________________________________________________________

Three Vietnamese charged with drug trafficking in southern China

HONG KONG (AFP) - Authorities in the southern Chinese province of Guangxi
have charged three Vietnamese with heroin trafficking, it was reported
Monday. 

The two female and one male Vietnamese were separately charged in court
over the weekend in Nanning with trafficking in heroin, the China-backed
Ta Kung Pao said in a report. 

One of the three was a 53-year-old female farmer, who allegedly smuggled
350 grams (12.25 ounces) of heroin into the Chinese border county of
Ningming, after being asked to by her nephew. 

The other Vietnamese woman, aged 23, allegedly sneaked 63.5 grams (2.2
ounces) of heroin through the Chinese border for a drug trafficking
syndicate. 

Meanwhile, the independent Chinese-language newspaper Ming Pao, citing
official figures, said there were 520,000 drug addicts across China who
have registered with the government. 

But the daily estimated that once non-registered addicts were included the
true figures could be 10 times as high. 
  _________________________________________________________________

Kuala Lumpur concerned over Vietnam's plan to ban palm-oil imports

KUALA LUMPUR -- Malaysia has voiced its concern over Vietnam's plan to
impose a temporary ban on imports of palm oil saying it breaks Asean's
spirit of trade liberalisation, reports said on Saturday. 

International Trade and Industry Minister Rafidah Aziz said Malaysia stood
to loose about US$100 million (S$141 million) in revenue from palm oil and
cocoa butter exports to Vietnam if a temporary ban comes into effect on
July 1. 

"I have personally written to my counterpart in Vietnam informing him that
Malaysia is viewing the matter seriously," she said. 

Ms Rafidah suggested to Vietnam the matter be discussed at the forthcoming
Asean economic ministers retreat in Jakarta this week. 

"We must also ask Vietnam to justify the reasons for the temporary ban as
the products that will be affected are of direct interest to Malaysia,"
she was quoted as saying by the Straits Times. 

Asean, which admitted Vietnam in 1995, has given Hanoi a grace period to
join the Asean Free Trade Area, which is expected to be realised by the
year 2003. -- AFP. 
  _________________________________________________________________

RUSTY ARMS: Vietnam's army newspaper said yesterday that its military
hardware was suffering under the country's harsh tropical environment. 

The Quan Doi Nhan Dan (People's Army) newspaper reported that a survey had
found that in one army unit, only 50 per cent of the weapons and
facilities were still usable after two years. -- Reuter. 
  _________________________________________________________________

Schiphol works on Vietnam and Philippines studies

AMSTERDAM, June 9 (Reuter)-Schiphol Amsterdam Airport has formed a
consortium with local partners to look at developing a terminal in Ho Chi
Minh City airport in Vietnam. 

Separately, the Dutch airport is involved in an airport building study to
in the Philippine's province of Cebu. 

Schiphol Management Services (SMS), the Dutch airport's international
project development arm, is also hoping to be involved in the development
of a new airport in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. SMS helped develop the newest
terminal at Kuala Lumpur's existing airport, Kuala Lumpur Subang.