Below are some of the main stories published today, November 15, in the Vietnamese press.

Politics -- At a meeting with visiting US Secretary of Treasury Jacob J. Lew in Hanoi on Thursday, Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has called for the prompt signing of the Vietnam–US double taxation avoidance agreement and conclusion of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) negotiations this year as committed by leaders of member nations.

Society -- After entering the coast between Phu Yen and Binh Thuan Provinces last night, storm Podul has weakened into a tropical depression, which is forecast to hit the region this morning and then continue to weaken into a low pressure system, the national weather forecasting agency reported. -- Police in Gia Lai Province have detained 24-year-old Hoang Khac Thang, a resident in Thanh Hoa Province, for falsely claiming that he was keeping a bag of explosive while waiting for a flight at the Pleiku Airport on Thursday. Airport security forces arrested Thang and handed him over to local police. -- The Vietnamese Embassy in the typhoon-hit Philippines said on Thursday that it has given reliefs to 36 Vietnamese people in Ormoc City who are suffering difficulties caused by super typhoon Haiyan that slammed the country on November 8.  The relief included rice, food, drinking water, medicines, and other essential consumer items. Vietnamese survivors of the disaster said that three Vietnamese people remained missing.

-- Vietnam has experienced 19 storms and tropical depressions so far this year, three higher than the record figure in 1964, the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting reported. In 1964 Vietnam suffered 16 storms and tropical depressions, but this record has been broken recently, with 13 storms and six depressions having so far hit the country. The 1964 record has been broken although there is a month and half ahead before the year 2013 closes.

Business -- After suffering a serious reduction in revenue for a long time, many commercial banks has laid off thousands of employees. In the first six months of this year, more than 1,200 employess from Vietinbank, BIDV, ACB and SHB were dismissed. Recently, in the third quarter of this year,  ACB continued to removed700 staff members from its payroll. -- The first cacao processing plant in Vietnam was inaugurated in the Giao Long Industrial Park in Chau Thanh District, southern Ben Tre Province on Thursday. The plant has a maximum capacity of 5,000 tons of cacao per year, which are produced in a closed process.   

Sports

-- Vietnamese football squad will compete with Uzbekistan rivals at the My Dinh Stadium in Hanoi at 7 pm today, November 15, within the scope of the Asian Cup 2015 qualification.