Politics

-- Vietnamese Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Pham Binh Minh, during a phone call with Malaysian Foreign Minister Saifuddin Abdullah on Tuesday, made an official request that Vietnamese national Doan Thi Huong, who is being tried in Malaysia on accusation of assassinating North Korean man Kim Jong Nam in February 2017, be given a fair trial and released from detention.

-- Vietnamese Party General Secretary and State President Nguyen Phu Trong on Tuesday extended his sympathies to Ethiopian President Sahle Work Zewde over the recent accident of an Ethiopian plane, which crashed on Sunday near the Ethiopian capital city of Addis Ababa killing all 157 passengers and crew.

Society

-- As the African swine fever epidemic sweeps through 13 provinces and cities in northern Vietnam, consumption of ‘safe’ pork with traceable origin remains largely unaffected thanks to consumers’ trust in modern food distribution channels like supermarkets.

-- Ho Chi Minh City’s VND10 trillion (US$432.5 million) mega-project to curb tidal flooding and mitigate climate-change impacts on a vulnerable 570-square-kilometer urban area inhabited by around 6.5 million people is expected to complete in late 2019, after months of delays due to contractor issues.

Business

-- A company that supplied boat engines for a state-supported program to provide Vietnamese fishermen with steel-clad vessels has been found to have forged papers and supplied sub-quality engines for the program, resulting in the vessels braking down after being in operation for only a short time, Ministry of Public Security investigators concluded in a report after a years-long investigation.

-- Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc on Tuesday requested that the country’s auto industry take the initiative to manufacture car engines and other important parts of a vehicle to improve competitiveness and increase local content.

-- Ho Chi Minh City is on course to receive $1.2 billion in inward remittances in the first quarter of 2019, a similar amount compared to the same period of 2018, according to forecasts provided the local branch of the State Bank of Vietnam.

-- The administration of Ho Chi Minh City has proposed to increase a coefficient used in calculating land-use fees by 0.4 times compared to 2018, the highest yearly raise since 2015, raising concerns among financially-challenged land owners.

Education

-- The latest draft of Vietnam’s revised Law on Education will swing the door open for multiple parties, public or private, to compile different versions of school textbooks based on a single national education program, effectively erasing the current monopoly in textbook publication in the country.

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