Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung on Feb. 13 sent an urgent message asking the four northern provinces and cities of Hanoi, Hung Yen, Hai Duong and Hai Phong to finish land clearance and residential resettlement for the Hanoi-Hai Phong Highway project by the end of next month.

The message is the result of fears the project will not meet its target to be operational by 2014, due to the issue of land clearance.

Hanoi is asked to hand out more than 60ha of land in Gia Lam and Long Bien districts, while Hung Yen province is asked to remove telecommunications cable systems and finish building residential resettlement areas in An Thi district by the end of next month.

Hai Duong province is asked to remove telecommunication cables and tension wires and draw up compensation policies for households awaiting removal, while Hai Phong city is asked to finish land clearance in An Lao and Duong Kinh districts and speed up construction of a residential resettlement area in An Lao district.

Dung also asked localities to find appropriate methods to properly deal with complaints about compensation policies in order to hasten land clearance.

He urged relevant localities to adopt preventative measures against infringement cases of land clearance and asked the Ministry of Transport to work in co-operation with localities to finalise land clearance for the project. /.