Socialist Republic of Vietnam

Several US veterans who fought in the Vietnam War are calling for the launch of well-organized theme tours to Vietnamese sites where they operated, an ex-interpreter during the War has informed Thanh Nien.

Le Thanh Giai, in an e-mail to the newspaper, said many US veterans, inspired by the story of a young North Vietnamese doctor’s diary they read on Thanh Nien’s English-language website, www.thanhniennews.com, were hoping to return to Vietnam.

Vietnam's consumer price index (CPI) is estimated to have risen 8.3 percent in October from a year earlier, the General Statistics Office said on Monday.
That compares with an increase of 7.8 percent in September and 7.3 percent in August.

The government last week forecast that inflation would be around 8 percent in 2005, higher than its initial target of keeping it below 6.5 percent.

Vietnam, reliant on oil product imports and hard-hit by bird flu outbreaks that reduced food supplies, saw inflation reach 9.5 percent last year.

Vietnam has decided to loosen restrictions on the use of foreign currencies in the country.

In a decree issued October 18, the government said Vietnamese and foreigners were now free to pay in foreign currencies and send foreign currencies within the country’s territory without permission.

The French group Technip is to inaugurate the construction Dzung Quat, Vietnam’s first oil refinery in central Quang Ngai province on November 21-25, an Asia Pacific representative of the group said.

The preparation for the construction had been carried out smoothly, Gerard de la Rosa, an official of Technip Asia Pacific told leaders of Quang Ngai, 850km (530 miles) south of Hanoi, during a meeting last Saturday.

The Dzung Quat plant included the refinery, a seaport, storage facilities and pipelines.