Politics

-- Chairwoman of Vietnam’s lawmaking National Assembly Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan left Hanoi on Tuesday morning for a four-day official visit to South Korea at the invitation of her South Korean counterpart Moon Hee-sang. 

Society

-- The 9th People’s Council of Ho Chi Minh City began convening its 12th plenum on Tuesday, where delegates are expected to discuss issues of public concern including complaints from residents in the Thu Thiem neighborhood in District 2 who are decrying land clearance activities for a new urban area project.

-- A tollgate on the National Highway 1 section passing Binh Tan District in Ho Chi Minh City was on Tuesday evening forced to stop collecting tolls after drivers refused to go past the station, causing heavy congestion. Drivers said the station should have ceased operation from 2016.

-- Two female reporters from Vietnam Television (VTV) and Phu Nu (Women) newspaper have received death threats from an anonymous mobile number after their investigative reports on rampant protection rackets at the iconic Long Bien Market in Hanoi were published in September.

-- The coastal province of Binh Thuan in south-central Vietnam is requesting government assistance in allocating around VND780 billion (US$33.6 million) to projects to stop severe coastal erosion which has been swallowing up its beaches.

-- Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc warned that officials who allow power shortage to occur in 2019 will be laid off as he chaired a government meeting in Hanoi on Monday.

Business

-- Ha Van Tham, former chairman of Vietnamese lender Oceanbank who is serving a life sentence for roles in the bank’s loss of VND2 trillion ($86 million), has been slapped with another charge of “violating accounting regulations, causing serious consequences," a source close to Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper said on Monday.

-- Savings interest rates offered by Vietnamese commercial banks have peaked at 8.6 percent yearly, while bond interest has also climbed to 9.8 percent as local lenders race to prepare capital to meet loan demands at the start of next year.

Education

-- A middle school in the north-central province of Quang Binh, where a teacher stirred public anger last month by asking classmates of a student to take turns in slapping him a total of 230 times for “swearing” in class, has caused further discontent by asking students who participated in the slapping to detail the event through a 18-question questionnaire.

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