VỤ THÔNG TIN BÁO CHÍ, BỘ NGOẠI GIAO NƯỚC CHXHCN VIỆT NAM

Press & Information Department, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of SR of Vietnam

7 Chu Văn An - Hà Nội, Điện thoại: 199 2516, Fax: 823 4137

No: 02/TCBC-NGĐ                                               Date: January 31^st , 2005

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I- MAIN DIPLOMATIC ACTIVITIES IN THE 2^nd HALF OF JANUARY 2005

   (In chronological order)

INWARD VISITS

1.                        From 16^th -18^th January 2005, at the invitation of  Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, Prime Minister of the Republic of Poland Marek Belka paid an official visit to Vietnam.

2.                        From 19^th-23^rd January 2005, at the invitation of Vietnamese State President Tran Duc Luong, Mongolian President Natsagin Bagabandi paid an official visit to Vietnam.

3.                        From 28^th-29^th January 2005, a Lao military delegation led by Minister of Defense, Lieut. General Douangchai Phichith paid a working visit to Vietnam.

II- ANSWERS BY FOREIGN MINISTRY SPOKESMAN LE DZUNG TO QUESTIONS FROM CORRESPONDENTS (in chronological order)<!-- Lotus-Domino (Release 4.6.1 (Intl) - 3 March 1998 on Windows NT/Intel) -->

On 20^th January 2005,

VNA and some correspondents:  Please advise Vietnam's reaction to the January 8 shooting by Chinese maritime police who killed, injured and captured many Vietnamese fishermen and called them "pirates."

Answer:

Those Vietnamese attacked, killed, injured and captured by the Chinese maritime police are honest fishermen, who were fishing in the western side of the Tonkin Gulf delimitation line in the common fishing area.

The use of weapons by Chinese maritime police to kill innocent Vietnamese is a serious violation of international laws, the Agreement on the Delimitation of the Tonkin Gulf, the Vietnam-China Fishery Cooperation Agreement and agreements by high-level leaders of the two countries, hurting the friendship between peoples of the two countries.

Immediately after the incident, the Ministry Foreign Affairs of Vietnam requested China to take immediate measures to prevent and put an end to similar wrongful acts, carry out investigations, strictly punish the killers, repatriate the detainees and the bodies of the dead as well as return their ships and property, compensate the Vietnamese fishermen for their losses, promptly arrange a consular visit by Vietnamese representative agencies to the injured and detained fishermen and hold, at an early date, a meeting of the Joint Commission on Fishery Cooperation in the Tonkin Gulf to discuss measures to stabilize the situation.

Following that request, the representatives of the Vietnamese General Consulate in Guang Zhou will visit the detainees on January 21st.

END