Police in the northern Vietnamese province of Bac Ninh have arrested two men for the murder of a truck driver who was carrying 34 tons of steel last week.

Nguyen Minh Lien, 38, and Truong Viet Cuong, 38, are facing charges of murder and robbery.

Cuong was apprehended at his house in the northern province of Hai Duong while Lien was nabbed while hiding in a motel in the northern province of Quang Ninh.

At the police station, Lien admitted that he and Cuong had murdered Chu Van Phong, 41, from Hanoi, in order to steal 34.3 metric tons of steel on February 14.

During an interview with Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper, Senior Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Cong Khoi, an official from the Bac Ninh Department of Police, said that the agency had exerted all efforts to arrest the two men.

Officers in Hai Duong and Quang Ninh also assisted in the search for the suspects.

According to the case file, Lien was acquainted with Phong, who worked as a truck driver for a steel company, prior to the murder.

The two met at 7:00 am on February 14 with the intention to sell a portion of the steel that Phong was about to transport to Hanoi.

At the same time, Lien and Cuong, who has a long criminal history after being convicted five times of separate crimes, planned to kill Phong and steal the entire load.

At around 1:00 pm the same day, Phong picked up Lien in Kim Thanh District. Lien asked if Phong could give Cuong a ride and he agreed.

As they reached the northern province of Hung Yen, Lien and Cuong stabbed Phong twice in his back and cut his throat.

The murderers then drove the truck to Hanoi to sell the steel before dumping the vehicle along with the victim’s body in Luong Tai District, Bac Ninh Province.

Local residents discovered the corpse on February 16 after noticing the truck parked along a street for several days.

The two men had made a deal with a facility in Hanoi to sell the steel for VND405 million ($17,828) before the murder occurred.

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