On March 8, 1974, 15 journalists and techniciansof Algerian press agencies such as El Moudjahid and APS together with nine Vietnamesejournalists and three aircrew were killed in a plane crash in Hanoi’s Soc Sondistrict while accompanying then Algerian President Houari Boumediene during an officialvisit to Vietnam.
To commemorate the incident, both Algeria andVietnam erected memorial steles.
The stele in Vietnam was unveiled at theaccident site in Soc Son district during a State visit by then AlgerianPresident Abdelaziz Bouteflika in October 2000. The Algerian Government,meanwhile, built a monument and named a street “Journalistes du Vietnam(Journalists from Vietnam) 8/3/1974” in Algiers in 2013.
A wreath-laying ceremony held annually by theVietnamese Embassy demonstrates the Vietnamese people’s tradition of expressinggratitude towards the previous generations for their contributions tothe traditional friendship between the two countries and two peoples.
It is also meant to help the embassy’s staffmembers, especially the younger ones, and Vietnamese people in Algeriaunderstand more about bilateral relations as well as their responsibility tounceasingly enhance mutual understanding between the two peoples, which wasalso the task the Algerian journalists and technicians and Vietnamese journalistson the flight had been performing before the accident happened.
On March 6, Ambassador Vinh also attended aforum held by the Echaab daily to commemorate the victims of the plane crash 47years ago./.
VNA