An ex-border guard chief in Kien Giang Province, southern Vietnam has been charged with lending a hand to a transnational gasoline smuggling ring and taking bribes, as ‘monthly salary,’ totaling US$560,000 and VND6.2 billion ($265,350) from the kingpin.

The Central Military Procuracy has completed an indictment for the case of ‘smuggling, taking bribes, arranging for others to flee abroad, and failing to report crimes,’ with the involvement of Nguyen The Anh, 49, former border guard commander in Kien Giang and 13 others including many senior coast guard and border guard officials.

Anh has been indicted for ‘taking bribes and arranging for others to flee abroad,’ as prescribed in the Vietnamese Penal Code. 

The trial for Anh and his accomplices is scheduled to take place at the Military Court of Military Zone 7 for three days from July 12.

Phan Thanh Huu, 65, is facing charges of leading a ring that smuggled over 198 million of liters of gasoline, from September 2019 to February 2021. 

Huu was arrested in February last year, but he and his ring members will be tried in a civil trial as their offenses are not subject to the jurisdiction of a military court.

In September 2019, Huu colluded with many others to smuggle gasoline from Kien Giang to Cambodia, with the help of Anh, who was then deputy head of the Standing Office of the National Steering Committee for Combating Smuggling, Commercial Fraud, and Counterfeit Goods, also known as Steering Committee 389, according to the indictment.

As agreed, Huu paid $30,000 and VND100 million ($4,280) to Anh every month from October 2019 to February 2020, translating to US$150,000 and VND500 million ($21,400) in total.

In March 2020, Huu and his accomplices wanted to smuggle gasoline from Singapore into Vietnam so he asked for Anh’s support and the official demanded that Huu pay $60,000 and VND950 million ($40,660) per month in return for his and other relevant agencies’ aid.

Huu agreed and paid $360,000 and VND5.7 billion ($243,950) as bribes to Anh from March 2020 to August 2020.

A month later, as Anh was transferred from the Steering Committee 389 to become the border guard chief in Kien Giang, Huu had bribed Anh $10,000 monthly for the five months through January 2021, one month before Huu’s arrest. 

As such, the total bribes Anh received from Huu in the case amounted to $560,000 and around VND6.2 billion ($265,350), according to the indictment.

Huu did not pay such monthly bribes directly to Anh but through the latter’s cousin, Nguyen Van An, the document said.

On March 3, 2021, nearly a month after Huu’s arrest, Anh arranged for An to illegally cross the border into Laos, where he was captured and handed over to Vietnamese authorities by Lao police a month later.   

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