Catch up on the news in Vietnam today:

Politics

-- Vietnam always attaches much significance to the strategic partnership with the Philippines, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh said at a reception for Enrique A. Manalo, secretary of Foreign Affairs of the Philippines, at the government headquarters on Wednesday afternoon, reported the Vietnam News Agency.

Society

-- The Ho Chi Minh City Department of Transport has proposed the municipal People’s Committee spend VND90 billion (US$3.8 million) repairing an erosion-hit embankment in Thanh Da Peninsula in Binh Thanh District.

-- The Ministry of Transport has passed a plan to include 36 rest stops on the underway 2,000-kilometer Eastern North-South expressway stretching from Lang Son Province in northern Vietnam to Ca Mau Province, the southern tip of Vietnam, with an average distance of 59 kilometers between two stops.

-- Six sailors escaped from a cruise ship after a fire broke out on the vessel off the coast of Cat Hai District in Hai Phong City, northern Vietnam, on Wednesday afternoon.

Business

-- The People’s Committee of District 1 in Ho Chi Minh City wants to invest in food and beverage services to spur the night-time economy, heard an event held on Wednesday to introduce the F&B Networking Fair 2023 slated for August 25 in the downtown district.

-- Each of residents who intend to buy an electric car might receive financial support of $1,000 from the government, according to a proposal recently sent by the Ministry of Transport to Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha to speed up the shift from gasoline-powered cars to electric vehicles.

Tourism

-- The international tourism segment began bouncing back, with the number of Chinese visitors returning to Vietnam expanding at a much faster pace over the past seven months compared to Thailand, which has been Chinese travelers’ traditional Southeast Asian destination for long, according to an HSBC report released on Wednesday.

-- The Mekong Delta province of Kien Giang welcomed 1.1 million domestic and foreign tourists in July, with over 43,670 arrivals on Phu Quoc Island, a popular island destination in southern Vietnam, down 14.2 percent month on month, so the province is working to launch various tourism promotion programs to lure visitors from China, India, Thailand and Malaysia in the coming months, said the province’s tourism official.

Sports

-- A child spectator was hospitalized after a flare was ignited and thrown on the auditorium area of Hang Day Stadium in Hanoi during a match of V-League, Vietnam’s top-tier football league, between Hanoi FC and Hai Phong FC on Wednesday night.

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