The case was brought to light last August after thepresident of the Tokyo-based Japan Transportation Consultants Incconfessed to paying kickbacks to foreign civil servants, including asenior official of the Vietnam Railways Corporation, in return fororders it received for ODA projects.
Deputy Minister ofPlanning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung made it clear that theVietnamese government is determined to take steps to prevent anyrecurrence.
Minister-Counsellor of the Japanese Embassy inVietnam Hideo Suzuki hailed Vietnam’s drastic acts against graft overthe past time, expressing his hope that both sides will reach consensuson dealing with the case soon.
Both officials agreed toput counter-corruption initiatives in place in the coming time andreport the outcomes of their meeting to the governments.
Japanis now Vietnam’s second largest ODA donor with a commitment of over 20billion USD. Last year, it disbursed 1.7 billion USD in loans toVietnam, followed by the World Bank and the Asia Development Bank./.