Hanoi - US and Vietnamese experts and officials opened a weeklong meeting Monday in Hanoi on US aid to remediate the effects of Agent Orange, the chemical defoliant the United States sprayed during the Vietnam War.
US Ambassador Michael Michalak welcomed the fact that the Vietnamese had "begun to focus on facts and answers rather than blame," and hailed their "desire to find mutually acceptable solutions."
Ho Chi Minh City - It was not that long ago that Vietnamese Americans hesitated to do business in Vietnam for fear of being ostracized by their stridently anti-Communist community leaders back in the United States.
But if those days are not yet gone, they are on their way out, said Ryan Hoang Nguyen Hubris, a Vietnamese-American businessman in Ho Chi Minh City.
"I see more Vietnamese Americans here than I do back in Orange County or San Jose [California]," Hubris said. "It has become more socially and politically accepted."
Hanoi - The newly crowned Miss Vietnam is likely to have her trophy revoked after local media reported Thursday she had not graduated from high school, which violates the contest's rules.
Tran Thi Thuy Dung, 18, from the central city of Danang, was crowned Miss Vietnam 2008 at the biennial national beauty contest on August 31, held in the tourist town of Hoi An.
The profile of Dung distributed at the contest stated she had graduated from high school. But the newspaper Tuoi Tre reported Thursday this was not true.
Pham Sy Liem, principal of the Quang Trung High School where Dung used to study was quoted as saying she left the school in the middle of the 2007-2008 academic year, before graduating.
Hanoi - Vietnam turned over a Chinese-American man wanted for embezzling millions of dollars to Hong Kong police, a Vietnamese police officer said Wednesday.
Jimmy Tochin Wu, 41, was transferred to Interpol Hong Kong at the Ho Chi Minh City airport on Tuesday, said Nguyen Anh Tuan of Interpol Vietnam.
In 1994, Wu established the Dor Shing Vietnam Company in the central city of Danang, and asked its parent company in Hong Kong for 4.9 million dollars to fund its operations in Vietnam, according to the newspaper Cong An Nhan Dan.
After sending Wu 2 million dollars, the parent company, Dor Shing Hong Kong, learned that he had not used the money as agreed, but had instead transferred it to his personal bank account and disappeared.
Hanoi - Nine members of one family were found dead in a locked room in their house in southern Vietnam, local media said Saturday.
Ho Chi Minh City firefighters broke into a house in the city's District 12 Friday night after witnesses reported they saw smoke coming from the house and discovered the burnt bodies, the news website VNExpress said.
Eight of the bodies were found lying on a burned mattress, while the other body was found near the door of the room, the report said.
Police arrived at the scene shortly afterwards. The victims were identified as Nguyen Van Cao, 83, his wife Nguyen Thi Kich, 78, their five children and two grandchildren.
Hanoi - The Vietnamese government held an unusual press conference Friday to justify its actions in arresting up to six Catholic protestors over a land dispute at a church in Hanoi.
The government presented an eight-minute video compiled from police surveillance footage, dozens of still photos and copies of documents dating back to 1963 to make its case against the land protests, which on Thursday led to the arrests and clashes between police and roughly 100 protesting parishioners outside a Hanoi police station.
Hanoi - The Vietnamese government held an unusual press conference Friday to justify its actions in arresting up to six Catholic protestors over a land dispute at a church in Hanoi.
