China building illegal islands in East Sea

US urges China to stop illegal island building in the East Sea

June 12, 2015 

(VOVworld) – US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter has asked China to stop building artificial islands in the disputed waters in the East Sea.

Fan Changlong, Vice Chairman of China's Central Military Commission and US Secretary of Defense Secretary Ashton Carter (R) in Washington, DC (Photo: Paul J. Richards/ AFP)

Carter made the call at a reception in Washington on Thursday for the visiting Fan Changlong, vice chairman of China’s Central Military Commission. The Pentagon said in a statement that Carter reiterated the US’s concern over the East Sea situation and called on all parties to seek a peaceful solution to territorial disputes in accordance with international law

Earlier Carter accused China of being out of step with international rules in its conduct in the East Sea.
The same day, the Philippines’ media quoted former Environment Minister Angel Alcala who is also an internationally prestigious scientist as saying that China’s construction in the East Sea can cause negative impacts on biodiversity, ecological balance, and fisheries resources adding that Vietnam and the Philippines will likely be the most affected.
Also on Thursday Australian Foreign Minister Julie Bishop reiterated Canberra’s stance, rejecting China’s possible establishment of an air defence identification zone (ADIZ) in the East Sea.
Speaking to the Lowy Institute in Sydney, Bishop said Australia was concerned that any unilateral action in the region could raise tensions and could ultimately end in some form of conflict.
She said Australia would object if Beijing unilaterally announces an ADIZ in the East Sea

Vietnam invites foreign native English teachers

The Ministry of Education and Training has signed two cooperation agreements on January 16 in Hanoi for implementation of the National English Teaching Project 2020.

At the signing ceremony

The first agreement was signed with an English Language Company in Sydney in Australia to supply native English teachers from the US, Canada, New Zealand, and Ireland.
Native English teachers will be assigned to primary schools, junior high schools, colleges and universities under the program ‘Teach and Travel Vietnam (TTV).’
Staff preparing for the National English Teaching Project 2020 will work with the English Language Company to provide training, management and allocation of foreign teachers to schools, as and when needed.
This year there are plans for around 300-500 native English teachers to come to Vietnam.
The second agreement was signed with Greg Ellis, an Australian teacher, who has been developing teaching software for English language and IELTS tests.
Under the agreement with the Ministry, Ellis will give the software for the National English Project 2020 for teaching of the four skills in the English language.
Ellis has written the software based on 10 year research of students in Ho Chi Minh City as well as students in Melbourne, Australia.
The software has already been used to teach students preparing for IELTS tests at the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology. Ellis has also helped the University of Pedagogy in HCMC in English teaching methodology.
The Ministry believes that the participation of foreign teachers and the new teaching software will enhance English learning in students in Vietnam.

Vote of confidence on PM and President scheduled in May

Posted:

VietNamNet Bridge – On January 16, the National Assembly Standing Committee agreed on the resolution guiding the implementation of the vote of confidence on the titles elected or ratified by the National Assembly and the People’s Council.

The first vote of confidence will be held in May 2013.

The resolution also guides the titles that are the subjects of the vote of confidence at the commune, ward or township levels. These positions include Chairs and Vice Chairs of the People’s Council and the People’s Council of communes, wards and townships.
If a person simultaneously holds multiple positions elected or ratified by the National Assembly, the People’s Council, the vote of confidence shall be made to the highest position.
The time for the periodical vote of confidence is at the first annual meeting since the second year of each term of the National Assembly and People’s Councils at all levels.
About the contents on the report and accountability of the officials who are subjects to the vote of confidence, the National Assembly Standing Committee requested the compilation board to amend in the direction of simplifying explanation contents.
NA Standing Committee’s members also made suggestion on the contents of the regulations.
Because some comments were collected at the meeting on January 16, the guiding resolution on the vote of confidence will be signed and promulgated by National Assembly Chairman Nguyen Sinh Hung to take effect from February 1, 2013, the time that National Assembly’s resolution on the vote of confidence vote of confidence takes effect.
Le Nhung

Smith's killer get Life imprisonment-Phuket

Phuket criminals enjoy official protection, says consul

Larry Cunningham, Australia's honorary consul in Phuket, has told The Age newspaper that Thai police deserved praise for quickly bringing the killers of Perth travel agent Michelle Smith to justice.

But he said many of the criminals targeting tourists are never brought to justice and some have official protection.

"The major problem has always been the application of the law in Phuket where assaults continue unabated virtually every night and there are little or no arrests of the guilty parties, mainly because they have patronage protection," Australia's consul told The Age.

The death of 60-year-old Mrs Smith during a bag snatch attempt on June 20 prompted intervention from Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra and Thailand's top police, who ordered a crackdown on violence against tourists on Thailand's biggest resort island.

Justice, in Mrs Smith's case, was swift after the killers were sentenced to life imprisonment.

Vietnam latest news - | Three shark species attacked swimmers in central Vietnam: study

Vietnamese scientists have identified three shark species that have attacked people at least ten times off the coast of Binh Dinh Province's Quy Nhon Town from 2009-2010.

According to a report released by the Nha Trang Oceanography Institute on July 13, a pigeye shark (Carcharhinus amboinensis) attacked Nguyen Quang Huynh on July 18, 2009 causing a deep cut in his foot. Huynh was swimming some 150 meters off shore.

A blacktip shark (Carcharhinus limbatus) attacked Mang Duc Hanh on January 9, 2010 when he was swimming just ten meters from shore. Hanh suffered severe injury in his hand.

Meanwhile, the graceful shark (Carcharhinus amblyrhynchoides) may be responsible for eight other attacks.

Vo Si Tuan, deputy director of the Nha Trang Oceanography Institute, who led the research team, said the sea off the coast of Quy Nhon Town is the natural habitat of several tropical sharks that often search for food near the shore.

“The Quy Nhon Bay offers easy access for sharks to swim near the shore,” he said.

Tuan said nearby lobster farms have also attracted hungry sharks to the area while the El Nino (from July 2009 to June 2010) increased the water's temperature and solidity causing many sharks to mistake human beings as prey.

The report proposed solutions like moving lobster farms farther away from beaches and creating a protective the swimming zone enclosed by a large net.

According to the International Shark Attack File (ISAF), the 79 unprovoked attacks of 2010 was the highest total since 2000, when 80 attacks were recorded. 

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“The number of shark-human interactions occurring in a given year is directly correlated to the amount of time humans spend in the sea. As world population continues its upsurge and interest in aquatic recreation concurrently rises, we realistically should expect increases in the number of shark attacks and other aquatic recreation-related injuries,” it said.

As in recent years, North American waters had the most unprovoked attacks in 2010 with 32. Elsewhere, 14 attacks occurred in Australia, eight in South Africa, six in Vietnam and Egypt, with a single incidents occurring of the coast of the Bahamas, Brazil, Fiji, Madagascar, Mascarene Islands, Solomon Islands, Canary Islands, Tonga and the United Arab Emirates.

Surfers, swimmers and waders were the recreational groups most often involved in shark attacks in 2010 as those involved in snorkeling, scuba diving and those using inflatable rafts and inner-tubes were less likely to become victims of shark attacks.

8 million visitors first half 2012 Hanoi

Ha Noi welcomes over 8 million visitors in first half of 2012

June 26, 2012

LookAtVietnam – Ha Noi has attracted about 8.33 million visitors during the first six months of this year, according to the Hanoi Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

Photo: Internet

The city, which was listed as one of the cheapest global tourist destinations for the summer of 2012 by the world’s largest travel website TripAdvisor, lured over 1.03 million foreign tourists during the first half of the year, a rise of 20 percent over the same period last year.
The capital city also saw 7.3 million domestic tourists arrive during the first half of the year, an increase of 24 per cent, compared to the same period last year.
Visitors to Ha Noi came from over 160 territories and countries including western Europe, North East Asia, Australia and North America amongst others.
Ha Noi would strive to attract about 2.5 million international and 14 million domestic visitors by 2015, which could earn the capital about US$2.1 billion, added the department.
VietNamNet/Viet Nam News

Vietnam finds banned anorexiant in Chinese weight loss supplement | Look At Vietnam - Vietnam news daily update

Vietnam finds banned anorexiant in Chinese weight loss supplement

November 6, 2011 about Health

The Vietnam Food Administration has found sibutramine in a batch of Cishi Qingguo Capsule products imported from China.

The Vietnam Food Administration announced on October 27 that it found sibutramine – an oral anorexiant banned by the Health Ministry – in a Chinese-made weight loss dietary supplement sold on the Vietnamese market.
The administration has seized the batch of Cishi Qingguo Capsule products imported by Delta Vietnam Medical Equipment Joint Stock Co. based in Hanoi from its store.
In April 2011, the Drug Administration of Vietnam (DAV) banned the circulation of drugs containing sibutramine and ordered hospitals to stop prescribing the products. It also ordered drug manufacturers, importers and distributors to recall the products from nationwide stores.
According to the DAV, sibutramine increases the risk of heart attacks and strokes in patients with a history of cardiovascular disease.
Sibutramine has been withdrawn from the market in countries and regions, including Australia, Canada, China, the European Union, Hong Kong, India, Mexico, Thailand, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

By Nam Son, Thanh Nien News

Vietnam finds banned anorexiant in Chinese weight loss supplement | Look At Vietnam - Vietnam news daily update

Amazon launched its cloud computing service in Asia Pacific

Launches server and storage on demand from Singapore data centres.
Amazon.com has launched its cloud computing services in the Asia Pacific region with services being available from undisclosed data centres in Singapore as of today.

Amazon.com told iTnews the Singapore-based versions of Amazon Web Services (Enterprise Cloud Compute and Simple Storage Service) will provide Australian customers with lower latency times (ie better response times) than connecting to the AWS cloud compute in the United States.
Amazon.com senior vice president of web services Andy Jassy told iTnews that the Singapore facilities are a beachhead on a wider expansion plan (read the full interview with Jassy hereg).

The company has hopes of launching its own presence in Australia in the near future.

Amazon's pricing for the Asia Pacific region [see tables below] is in line with prices the company offers customers in Europe, which in some cases (such as on-demand instances of Windows servers) is actually cheaper than the same service offered from the West Coast of the USA.

The only sting in the tail is the price of data transfer out (sometimes referred to as "egress") - which is 4c per GB higher in the Asia Pacific, some twenty to thirty percent more expensive than Amazon services elsewhere in the world.

The cost of international traffic has been a common deterrent for some Australian enterprises from porting their apps to the Amazon cloud.

An import/export service, via which customers can mail Amazon.com physical disk rather than uploading their data onto the cloud via the network, won't be available from day one. But Jassy said it "will be available eventually."
Better performance
Jassy said many Australian customers that already connect with Amazon's EC2 and S3 services in the United States should enjoy better performance connecting to the Singapore cloud.

"You will see a similar latency [between Australia and Singapore] to what you would experience between the East and West coast of America," Jassy said.

"Remember that EC2 was only available to the East Coast of America for a very long time - but now most of our customers are on the West Coast, in the Bay area. But for a time, there were lots of workloads for which people are happy with that level of latency."
Why Singapore?

The Singapore service will be based in multiple data centres on the island in order to create an "availability zone" between separate facilities.

Salesforce.com and Microsoft (Azure) have also released cloud-based services from data centres in Singapore.

Jassy said the country was chosen on how many places it can serve from its data centre presence (Singapore is close to the big guns of Asia), the cost and robustness of infrastructure (some of the world's largest data centre builders, including Equinix, have built multiple data centres in Singapore), whether the right talent is available and the ease with which Amazon.com can work with the Government.

"We had to pick a country to start because we couldn't do them all at once," he said. "In the fullness of time we intend to have a number of countries.

"We are very interested in Australia - it has some very interesting businesses and we are very hopeful and optimistic about have a data centre presence in Australia in the near future."

Will Australian companies export to a Singapore-based cloud? Read the full interview with Jassy here.

ASIA PACIFIC PRICING