Four defendants detained ahead of ODA-funded railway case trial

The Hanoi People’s Court has issued a detaining warrant for four defendants in a power abuse case in the railway sector which is due to go before court on October 26.

The four are Tran Van Luc, former director of the Railway Project Management Unit (RPMU) under the state-owned Vietnam Railways Corporation (VRC); Tran Quoc Dong, former Deputy Director General of the VRC and former director of RPMU; Nguyen Van Hieu, former RPMU directors; and Pham Quang Duy, former deputy director of RPMU.

They are all charged with “abusing position and power while performing official duties”.

Together with two other defendants – Pham Hai Bang (former Deputy Director of the RPMU) and Nguyen Nam Thai (former head of project execution section 3 under the RPMU), they will remain in custody until their trial on October 26 and 27.

According to the indictment, from September 2009 – February 2014, Bang, the then director of the project on Line No.1 of Hanoi urban railway system, requested for financial aid from Japan Transportation Consultants Inc. (JTC) which led a consultancy joint venture of Vietnamese and Japanese companies for the project. JTC then transferred a total of 11 billion VND (493,716 USD) to Bang, Thai and Duy. The three men spent the money on various purposes for both collective and individual benefits.

Luc, Dong, Hieu, Duy were aware of the illegal activities but opted not to report the case.-VNA