Doc Ba Dang – another ‘Truong Son cemetery’ of Vietnam

Doc Ba Dac martyr cemetery is located in Thoi Son commune, Tinh Bien district. During the southwestern border protection war, Doc Ba Dac cemetery was formed and managed under Division 330. After many times of renovation, it is now under the Division of Labour - Invalids and Social Affairs of Tinh Bien district (Photo: VNA)

Anyone who passes by this place and looks up at the gravestones will share a proud and tragic feeling (Photo:VNA)

The statue of a soldier holding a trumpet reminds people of the fallen soldiers. The trumpet leaped toward the grave of the fallen soldiers, from the wind still echoes acclaims and the sound of every footstep following the national appeal. (Photo:VNA)

In the cemetery, people can smell the scent of incense in the wind whenever visiting it. Relatives of martyrs who come to burn incense for the soldiers, the pilgrims or the old comrades come to burn incense on unnamed graves (Photo: VNA)

The fallen soldiers now can return to their motherland, they died when they were only in their twenties, they left their old mothers in their homeland , some gave up the dream of going to universities, they scarified for the country’s independence and freedom (Photo:VNA)

Specially, most of the fallen soldiers who were buried in the cemetery are Vietnamese voluntary soldiers who laid down their lives during the wars in Cambodia. They were young at that time…

Some of the soldiers laid down their lives in their motherland, Vietnam, others in Cambodia. (Photo: VNA)

The old comrades, though previously not being in the same units, now gather together to form the specialised 9th Military Region K90 Task Force and the specialized K93 An Giang team to search for and collect the remains of fallen soldiers in the provinces of Kandal, Kampong Chhnang, Koh Kong, Kampong Speu, Takeo, Kampot (Cambodia). Up to now, Team K93 has held 30 rounds of military search and collect 2,827 martyrs' remains both in Vietnam and in Cambodia (Photo: VNA)

Ngo Van Dinh, manager of the Doc Ba Dac cemetery said during 2017-2018, more than 160 sets of remains were found in Cambodia. However, it is difficult to bring the soldiers who died here home since the terrain has changed, and the witnesses have passed away (Photo:VNA)

The wars ended 40 years ago, but the remains of fallen soldiers have not been repatriated to their home country (Photo: VNA)

At this cemetery, hundreds of living comrades have built empty tombs to wait for their comrades’ remains to return to the home country (Photo:VNA)

During the last days of the year, the ‘Truong Son cemetery’ in the southwest of the country is blanketed with the smell of incense of people who pay visit to fallen soldiers (Photo:VNA)