Check out the latest news in Vietnam today:

Politics

-- General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam Central Committee Nguyen Phu Trong has sent letters and flowers of greetings to top Lao and Cambodian officials on the occasion of the Bunpimay Festival of Laos and the Chol Chnam Thmay Festival of Cambodia.

Society

-- The Ministry of Home Affairs said on Friday that it endorsed the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids, and Social Affairs’ proposal, according to which public workers in Vietnam will be given five consecutive days off to celebrate the upcoming Reunification Day (April 30) and International Workers’ Day (May 1).

-- Two elementary school students, aged eight and nine, drowned while picking edible moss from a stream in Muong Lat District, Thanh Hoa Province, north-central Vietnam on Friday afternoon, a local official confirmed the same day.

-- The Ministry of Health has ordered its subordinate agency in Khanh Hoa Province, south-central Vietnam to investigate a suspected food poisoning incident which left one fifth grader dead and 28 other students hospitalized on Friday. These elementary and middle school students developed symptoms of possible food poisoning after having breakfast offered by different eateries and street vendors around the schools the same day.

-- Vehicles are banned from entering several inner-city streets in Ho Chi Minh City such as Dong Khoi, Le Loi, and Cong Truong Lam Son between 3:00 pm and 11:00 pm on April 6 and April 13 to serve the first edition of the Ho Chi Minh City International Film Festival.

Education

-- The administration of Hai Phong City in northern Vietnam and Singapore’s KinderWorld International Group jointly held a ceremony on Friday to break ground on a Singapore International School project, the first of its kind in this northern port city.

World News

-- A 4.8-magnitude earthquake struck near New York City on Friday morning, the U.S. Geological Survey said, shaking buildings up and down the East Coast and surprising residents in an area that rarely experiences notable seismic activity, Reuters reported.

-- Cloudy skies forecast for Monday could spell disappointment for many of the millions of North Americans hoping to glimpse the continent's first total solar eclipse since 2017, possibly turning this spellbinding celestial phenomenon into a dud, according to Reuters.

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