Vietnam’s sole oil refinery, Dung Quat, Wednesday began a shutdown for maintenance scheduled for two to four weeks, newswire VnExpress reported.

Nguyen Hoai Giang, chief executive of the Binh Son Refining and Petrochemical Co, which operates the refinery in the central province of Quang Ngai, said during the maintenance  several technical problems would be fixed.

Last July the refinery was shut down for two months for its first maintenance, which cost US$40 million and saw 75 technical defects fixed.

Built by the state-owned oil and gas group PetroVietnam at a cost of over $3 billion, Dung Quat went into operation in 2009. It produces 6.5 million tons a year, meeting 30 percent of the country’s requirements. 

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Vietnam has jumped 14 spots to 20th in the rankings of the best places to be a mother in Save the Children’s 13th State of the World’s Mothers report.

In the developing countries category, Vietnam is the biggest mover in Southeast Asia.

“Tremendous progress has been made in reducing poverty in Vietnam over the last two decades through government policies and partnerships with NGOs aimed at boosting job creation, mass education, healthcare, and social protection,” Pham Sinh Huy, Vietnam country director of Save the Children, said.

“It shows that the combination of political will, NGOs, and donor funding can produce rapid results for those who need it most."

Vietnam has achieved its Millennium Development Goal target of reducing under-five mortality rates by two-thirds ahead of 2015 and is also on track to hit the maternal mortality target of 58.2 deaths per 100,000 live births, he said.

“Vietnam’s strong public health system has contributed to this, with over 100,000 community health station midwives/health workers who provide … nutrition counseling and birth assistance to mothers, screen children for malnutrition, treat diarrhea and pneumonia, and counsel mothers on feeding infants and young children.”

The report says Vietnam is among the top 15 countries in terms of reducing child malnutrition between 1990 and 2010, achieving 4.3 percent improvement annually.

However, the nation has a long way to go to eradicate malnutrition, remaining one of the worst affected countries with about 23 percent of children suffering from stunting.

Globally, malnutrition is the underlying cause of at least a fifth of maternal mortality and more than a third of child deaths.

The report describes Niger as the worst place to be a mother – replacing Afghanistan for the first time in two years – while Norway comes in at first place for the third consecutive year. The ranking compares 165 countries around the world based on factors like maternal health, education and economic status, and critical child indicators like health and nutrition.

State of the World’s Mothers focuses on nutrition as one of the key factors in determining mothers’ and their children’s well-being. The report details a vicious cycle of how mothers, who may themselves have been stunted in childhood, go on to give birth to underweight babies who have not been adequately nourished in the womb.

Save the Children’s research found that the simple measure of supporting mums to breastfeed can improve the nutritional status of children and save a million children’s lives a year. It added that the best method for breaking this vicious cycle and protecting the pregnant mother and her baby from malnutrition is to focus on the first 1,000 days starting from pregnancy.

To help promote exclusive breastfeeding, the government of Vietnam, together with UN agencies and NGOs, has put in a proposal to the National Assembly for increasing maternity leave in the country from four months to six. The proposal is expected to be approved by the house this month.

Ho Chi Minh City has reported two more fatal cases of the hand, foot and mouth disease this month.

A two year old boy, only identified as H.C.P., died on the night of May 9 after being admitted with fever and blisters to the HCMC Children’s Hospital No.1 the next day, Tuoi Tre reported Sunday.

Earlier, another boy of the same age named T.T.P. died at the hospital on May 1, after falling sick on April 29.

Inspections around his neighborhood found four more children were infected with the disease and being treated at home while another was at the city’s Tropical Diseases Hospital.

The two deaths have raised the nationwide death toll of the disease to four this year among nearly 2,700 infections, which is double the same period last year.

Most cases in Vietnam were caused by Enterovirus 71 (EV-71), which is found in the throat of 71 percent of healthy people, studies have found.

Doctors so far have not found a vaccine or specific medication for the disease, which causes mouth sores and blisters on hands and feet and so far, has killed only children, mostly under 3.

Parents and teachers have been asked to maintain good hygiene as the best prevention method.

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Computer viruses cause Vietnam "time damage" worth VND559 billion (US$26.7 million) every month, according to a new report by Vietnam Internet security firm Bkav.

The estimation, released May 10, was based on the incomes of the computer users and the time their work was interrupted by virus attacks, Saigon Tiep Thi reported.

Vietnam was hit by nearly seven million computer virus attacks last month, says the Hanoi-based Back Khoa Anti-virus center.

It says the country loses VND6.7 trillion ($320.2 million) to cyber viruses a year and each person suffers an average annual damage of VND1,342,000 ($64).

The center also says that most of the computers were infected through USBs, which were found involved in 88 percent of the virus attacks.

Another cause of virus attacks were careless users who are easily tempted to click on strange links recommended through Yahoo Messenger and Facebook, it said.

Internet experts have warned that clicking on those links can expose the computers to virus codes or reveal the users’ passwords for the programs they are using.

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Vietnam’s second satellite successfully went into orbit early Wednesday morning.

“It is an important project in terms of politics, the economy, and society, and it helps reiterate Vietnam’s sovereignty in space,” said Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, who watched the launch via videoconference.

Dung added that the successful liftoff of Vinasat-2 represents a major leap forward for Vietnam’s telecommunication industry and asked the Vietnam Post and Telecommunication Group (VNPT) to put Vinasat-2 into use soon so it can coordinate with with Vinasat-1 (Vietnam’s first satellite) in expanding the nation’s telecommunication industry.

Vinasat-2 was positioned at 131.8 degrees east at 5.49 a.m. after leaving the Ariane 5 rocket, which took off at the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana, VnExpress reported.

Vinasat-1 was launched in 2008 and VNPT says they have exploited some 90 percent of its capacity.

With a total investment of between US$260-280 million, Vinasat-2 will continue to function for the next 15 years and will cover Southeast Asia and neighboring countries, the news website reported.

VNPT’s officials said they plan to begin operating the second satellite for commercial purposes in July, and expect to recoup their investment in ten to 12 years.

The hope is that the two satellites will work together providing Vietnam with backup capacity, increased security and stability in providing telecom services to customers.

Two 16-year-old students from Quang Nam Province were arrested Tuesday after they fatally stabbed a school guard who had caught them stealing at the school canteen.

Police said Vo Cong Lam and Hoang Van Lam, tenth grade classmates at Nuoc Oa Boarding High School in the province, had planned to take revenge on the 40-year-old guard Duong Van Ly after he caught them stealing.

The boys attacked Ly while he was sleeping at the school at around 1 a.m. Cong Lam was the look-out while Van Lam did the stabbing, the boys told police.

Ly was found dead around 20 meters from the scene as he had tried to reach someone but soon succumbed to his chest and stomach wounds.

An official at the southern province of Ca Mau’s social affairs department and his subordinate have been disciplined for receiving over VND200 million (US$9,600) in bribes from the contractor of a cemetery project.

Pham Van My, vice director of Ca Mau’s Department of Labors, War Invalids and Social Affairs, told Thanh Nien on Tuesday that Nguyen Thanh Phong, chief of the department’s finance office, was demoted from his position at the department’s Communist Party Unit.

His subordinate, Nguyen Trung Tam, deputy chief of the office, was dismissed from the Party unit.

The officials are also facing punishment, possibly dismissal, from the department, according to My.

Earlier, inspectors from the department’s Party unit concluded that Tam had received VND200 million from Le Thanh Phuong, director of Phuong Nam Consultancy and Construction Company, during a project to upgrade a martyrs’ cemetery in Nam Can District.

Phong, meanwhile, received over VND50 million ($2,400) from Phuong and another contractor.

Chung Ngoc Nhan, director of the department, was also accused of receiving VND575 million ($27,600) from Phuong.

However, since she is a member of the Ca Mau Province Party Unit, the inspectors have asked the provincial unit to handle the case, a report on VnExpress said Tuesday.

According to the newspaper, the corruption case began some three months ago when a member of the department’s Party unit accused several local officials of corruption. The member, whose identity was not revealed, also sent five audio files that had Phuong mentioning that he gave the money to Tam.

Two months later, Phuong was arrested on suspicion that he had slandered many officials by claiming that they had received his money after he won a VND11-billion ($528,000) contract for the project. The accused officials denied the claim.

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The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has reiterated Vietnam’s opposition to China’s unilateral promulgation of a ban on fishing in the East Sea, which took effect Wednesday, Vietnam News Agency reported.

Ministry spokesman Luong Thanh Nghi on Tuesday told the press that Vietnam’s stance on the ban was demonstrated by his statement on January 20.

He added that Vietnam regards the ban as null and void.

On January 17, a Chinese fisheries website posted the announcement by the ministry saying China will conduct the ban on fishing in the East Sea, including some marine areas of Vietnam, between May 16 and August 1.

On January 20, Nghi told the press the ban violated Vietnam’s sovereignty over the Hoang Sa (Paracel) Islands and its sovereignty and jurisdiction rights over its exclusive economic zone and continental shelf.

He added that the ban violated the Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the East Sea (DOC) and made situation in the East Sea more complicated.

“Vietnam has undisputed sovereignty over Hoang Sa and Truong Sa (Spratly) archipelagoes, and sovereignty and jurisdiction rights over its exclusive economic zone and continental shelf under the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea,” the spokesman said.

The Vietnam Fisheries Society, on behalf of Vietnamese fishermen, has also voiced its protest against the ban.

The society asked the fishermen to continue fishing to maintain their traditional fisheries and assert the country’s sovereignty.

The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has ordered municipal and provincial authorities to maintain normal fishing activities on Vietnam’s territorial waters.

It has instructed fishermen to go fishing in groups in order to receive better assistance and notify relevant authorities of possible incidents in a more timely manner.

The military command of Khanh Hoa Province has established two platoons of marine militiamen stationed in the two communes of Vinh Phuoc and Ninh Thuy. The two communes have the highest numbers of fishing boats that frequent the Truong Sa (Spratly) Islands for long fishing trips.

Spontaneous vehicle fires that remain a mystery, a fatal skin disease in the central province of Quang Ngai that has yet to be identified, farmers in the southern province of Dong Nai threatening to take the law into their hands in a desperate attempt to get compensation from a polluting company.

These events have all made headlines recently and are unrelated except for one fact they underline: authorities seem to love passing the buck and delaying decision-making as much as they can.

Since 2010 more than 400 vehicles have gone up in flames around Vietnam, but the phenomenon still remains a mystery as official agencies, despite numerous tests and reports, have yet to arrive at a thorough or satisfactory conclusion.

In its latest report last Thursday, the Ministry of Public Security suggested five causes for the fires, including “technical problems.”

But when asked what kind of problems they were and why they happened, no official was able to explain further. Worse still was the fact that this shabby report had only considered 65 percent of the cases in 2010 and 2011, and a mere 22 percent this year.

Major General Tran Anh Dung, deputy chief of the ministry’s General Department of Social Security, evaded persistent questioning by the media by saying these are just “preliminary” conclusions and further investigations would be done.

The mysterious skin disease that plagues two districts in Quang Ngai Province has claimed 19 lives in the past year and affected hundreds of others.

Though experts from various agencies, including the Ministry of Health, have been sent to the area to investigate, the disease or its causes have yet to be identified. It continues to be labeled “strange,” and a treatment regimen has yet to finalized.

It has been reported that the health ministry plans to seek help from the World Health Organization, but locals are still waiting to see action on the ground.

Such delays can well be attributed to a lack of expertise. But how about the pollution scandal involving Sonadezi Long Thanh Joint Stock Company in Dong Nai Province?

More than eight months have passed since the company, which operates a waste treatment factory at the Long Thanh Industrial Zone, was caught dumping untreated wastewater into the Ba Cheo Canal.

The findings on the effects of the pollution on the canal, which flows into the Dong Nai River, and on local farmers were also released last month.

But the affected farmers have yet to receive a dong in compensation. They gathered near the canal last Friday and threatened to bury the industrial zone’s drainage pipes if they do not get their compensation soon.

One of them said they had to do something so that local authorities became aware of the fact that the company was ignoring them and their sufferings.

The authorities intervened, stopping them from burying the pipes, with assurances that they would calculate the farmers’ losses and help them get the compensation.

When will this happen? No one knows. It could probably become like the vehicle fires and skin disease, with people waiting and suffering.

Ho Chi Minh City has made a costly effort to separate cars and motorbikes on several busy roads but it has only worsened the congestion.

The city Transport Department has set up around 40 kilometers of street dividers worth nearly VND50 billion (US$2.5 million) on big streets such as Truong Chinh, Xo Viet Nghe Tinh, Nguyen Van Linh and parts of National Highways 13 and 22, separating motorbikes and cars.

But the planners failed to account for the fact that there are much more motorbikes than cars, and the plan to install dividers has failed totally.

During peak hours, traffic police can no longer direct motorbikes into other lanes which are almost empty.

The city spent around VND4.1 billion on separating lanes with dividers on nearly three kilometers of Truong Chinh Street. When the new arrangement opened on May 3, motorbikes and public buses had to use the same lane. The buses were shifted to the car lanes later, but the motorbikes are still squeezed into a narrow portion of the road.

Tan, a xe om (motorbike taxi) driver 52 years old, called the separation “unreasonable.”

“Every day at around 7 a.m. or 5 p.m., the area is stuck for hours. The two ends of the separation are jammed and no one can move,” he said.

Dr Pham Xuan Mai, a college lecturer in the city, told the Tuoi Tre newspaper: “It’s right to separate cars and motorbikes, but the city has to calculate the real demands of the city residents who use many more motorbikes than cars.”

Similar congestions have also occurred on the Xo Viet Nghe Tinh Street, which connects the city’s outskirts to District 1.

The two-way street tends to be crowded in one direction as  people flock the city’s downtown areas in the morning and return in the evening. And people have so far flexibly encroached into the opposite lane to smooth out the traffic.

But since the separation, commuters are crushed into a single lane, and the other side is mostly unused at peak hours.