Hanoi  - A People's Committee in southern Vietnam held a mass criticism session to reprimand an impoverished mother who threw away her newborn baby, local officials said Tuesday.

Hundreds of people from the commune of Gia Canh in Dong Nai province gathered Monday to criticize Nguyen Thi Huong, 33, who had left the infant in a dustbin immediately after giving birth.

"She thought she could not feed her newborn because she has five other children," said Phan The Nhan, a police officer in Gia Canh.

The newspaper Thanh Nien said Huong had given birth on May 29 in the toilet of a local bank after going into labour while applying for a loan. Initial reports said Huong thought the baby, a 2.4-kilogram boy, was stillborn because he failed to cry.

A bank employee found the baby alive six hours later and took him to hospital. Huong and her husband saw reports of the baby's discovery on local media and went to the hospital to claim him.

Mass criticism sessions are a long-standing feature of Vietnam's Communist governing system but have been used infrequently in recent years as Vietnamese society has become more liberal.

"At the meeting, she admitted her wrongdoing and said she felt remorse for her behaviour," Nhan said. "Because the baby was not dead, she was not prosecuted. We only warned her not to do it again."

Her husband attended the session but was not subjected to criticism at the meeting, Nhan said. Commune officials reprimanded him at his house, the police officer said. (dpa)