The Vietnam News Agency (VNA), the nation’s only newswire, for many years has joined hands with individuals and organisations alleviating the plight of Agent Orange/dioxin victims.

To respond to the “Day for Agent Orange/dioxin Victims in Vietnam ”, which falls on August 10, VNA has sent its representatives to localities and presented gifts to victims.

On August 4, VNA, in coordination with AO Victims’ Association of the central city of Da Nang , presented gifts worth total 200 million VND to 100 AO victims in Hai Chau, Thanh Khe and Hoa Vang districts. The gifts were financed by VNA’s fund “For the Agent Orange Pain”.

According to the President of Da Nang AO Victims’ Association Nguyen Thi Hien, the city now has over 4,000 AO victims with about 1,400 being children. The fund “For the Agent Orange Pain” made effective contributions to alleviating the suffering of Agent Orange/dioxin victims in Da Nang and the central region, she said.

The fund provided gifts to the victims and gave nearly 100 million VND to contribute towards building five houses for AO victims in the central region.

The same day, the fund also presented gifts and 10 wheelchairs to the AO Victims’ Association in the northern province of Ninh Binh, home to over 4,000 people affected with toxic dioxin. Many of them were war veterans and their children.

Also on August 4, the AO Victims’ Association in the northern mountainous province of Hoa Binh gave gifts each worth 200,000 VND to 220 victims in the province. VNA’s bureau in Hoa Binh took this occasion to present gifts each worth 1 million VND to five AO victims with special difficulties in mountainous districts of Mai Chau and Lac Thuy.

The VNA fund “For the Agent Orange Pain” has provided 20 AO victims in the Mekong Delta province of An Giang each with 500,000 VND to help them develop production. It also helped build a house worth 18 million VND for a victim in the province who suffered severe difficulties. This is the fifth consecutive year that the VNA fund has supported the lives of the less fortunate in An Giang.

In another Mekong delta province, Vinh Long, the provincial AO Victims’ Association has coordinated with localities in the province to organise a tour between August 3-8 to present 170 AO victims with gifts and a house worth a total of 65 million VND, to which the VNA fund contributed 10 million VND and the central AO Victims’ Association, 10 million VND./.