Police in Ha Tinh Province have arrested five ex-officials of Ben Thuy Shipyard, a subsidiary of the Vietnam Shipbuilding Industry Group (Vinashin), for “intentionally violating the State’s economic management regulations and causing serious consequences.”

>> Court upholds 20-year sentence for Vinashin ex-chairman>> Vinashin ex-officials ask court to lower sentences, damages>> Former Vinashin chairman gets 20 years in jail The arrested include Tran Quang Vu, 54, former director of the shipyard and head of the projects’ management board; Vo Quang Vinh, 50, ex-deputy director general of Vinashin Investment and Construction Company; and Le Dinh Trinh, 40, former deputy director of Consultancy Investment and Construction Joint Stock Company. The two others are 45-year-old Nguyen Van Linh from Construction Joint Stock Company No.21; and 33-year-old Nguyen Cao Cuong from Nghe An Oil and Gas Company and former head of the projects’ management board. Vu, Vinh and Trinh are residents of Hanoi while Linh and Cuong are from Nghe An Province. The five will be detained for 4 months for investigation. According to investigators, the shipyard, located in Ha Tinh's Nghi Xuan District, carried out a project in 2005 to upgrade its capacity. In 2006, the shipyard implemented an expansion project. Total investment in the two projects was nearly VND1 trillion (US$48 million). During the course of the work on the projects, the five defendants committed wrongdoings in preparing, verifying and approving the projects, as well as in the spending of state budget funds. In addition, they also failed to develop the project in accordance to their designs and made false reports on using construction materials to appropriate money.

(From L) Le Dinh Trinh, Nguyen Van Linh, and Nguyen Cao Cuong (Photo: Lao Dong)

Their illegal acts caused the total loss of tens of billions of dong  to the State budget, the investigators said. [VND1 billion = $48,000] As previously reported, atan appeal hearing that opened on August 28, eight defendants involved in the high-profile scandal at Vinashin petitioned the Supreme People’s Court to mitigate their sentences. The hearing was opened to consider the appeals of eight out of the nine defendants who had been sentenced by the Hai Phong city People’s Court in March for “intentionally violating the State’s economic management regulations, which causes serious consequences”. They had caused a total loss of US$43.5 million. On August 31the top-level court rejected every appeal of the defendants, saying that there was no ground for any commutation to be given to any of them. Accordingly, their sentences at the first instance trial were maintained, withBinh receiving 20 years in jail while the other defendants received 10-19 years imprisonment.