Hanoi - Vietnam reduced retail gasoline prices 5.2 per cent Thursday after world crude oil prices fell below 120 dollars a barrel, a government official said.

The price was reduced from 19,000 dong (1.14 dollars) to 18,000 dong per litre, Deputy Trade and Industry Minister Nguyen Cam Tu said.

"The price of gasoline was reduced because of many factors, and the most important factor is the decline of world crude oil prices," Tu told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa. "We reduced the price for the sake of society."

Hanoi - A deputy transportation minister involved in a major corruption scandal in 2006 was demoted by Vietnam's Communist Party, the Vietnam News reported Wednesday.

The demotion was the latest development in an affair that has become a touchstone for press freedom in Vietnam after two journalists who had aggressively reported the scandal were arrested in May.

Deputy Transportation Minister Nguyen Viet Tien, a senior Communist Party official, was demoted by the party secretariat for "failure to properly supervise Project Management Unit 18," Vietnam News said.

The paper said the secretariat also asked Prime Minister Nguyen Tien Dung to fire Tien from his Transportation Ministry post.

Hanoi  - Vietnam's central bank said the country's currency had stabilized and projected the 2008 trade deficit would be less than 20 billion dollars, state media reported Tuesday.

State Bank Governor Nguyen Van Giau said foreign currency reserves were sufficient to cover the trade deficit and would be bolstered in coming months by rising export revenues and remittances from Vietnamese working abroad.

Hanoi  - Flash floods and landslides triggered by heavy rain from tropical storm Kammuri killed 101 people and left 47 missing in northern Vietnam, officials said Monday.

Total damage in the nine provinces affected was estimated to be at least 720 billion dong (43 million dollars).

Floods and landslides washed away hundreds of kilometres of roads and inundated or damaged more than 4,200 houses and 8,690 hectares of crops, according to the Central Committee for Flood and Storm Control.

Total damages from floods and landslides in Lao Cai province were estimated at 300 billion dong (18 million dollars), according to Thao A Tua, head of the province's flood and storm department.

Hanoi - With this weekend's heavy rains in northern Vietnam beginning to subside, the death toll from floods and landslides rose to 86, and 38 people are still missing, officials said Sunday.

Rain triggered by tropical storm Kammuri, which slashed through Vietnam Friday, caused floods and landslides in the mountainous northern provinces of Lao Cai, Yen Bai, Phu Tho, Ha Giang, Quang Ninh and Bac Kan.

Lao Cai province suffered the most casualties, with 32 people confirmed dead and 31 missing, said Thao A Tua, head of the province's flood and storm department.

Hanoi - Heavy rains triggered by the tropical storm Kammuri killed at least 62 people and left 39 others missing in northern Vietnam, officials said Saturday.

Flash floods and landslides wreaked havoc on the northern Vietnamese provinces of Lao Cai, Yen Bai, Quang Ninh and Phu Tho after the storm made landfall from the Gulf of Tonkin Friday.