The Star Malaysia

Vietnam arrests senior party official who led PetroVietn­am

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HANOI: Vietnamese police arrested a senior Communist Party official for alleged wrongdoing while he was head of energy giant PetroVietn­am, state media said.

The state-run Tuoi Tre newspaper reported that police arrested Dinh La Thang, a member of the party’s elite Central Committee and deputy head of the party’s economic committee, for allegedly violating economic management regulation­s.

Earlier yesterday, the National Assembly’s Standing Committee voted to remove Thang from its membership, paving the way for his arrest.

Thang, 57, was fired as party secretary of the southern commercial hub of Ho Chi Minh City in May after being dismissed from the all-powerful Politburo.

The official Vietnam News Agency reported that Thang is connected to two serious cases being investigat­ed by police.

The first case involves Ocean Bank, for which PetroVietn­am bought 20% of its shares for 800 billion dong (RM142mil) in 2008.

The State Bank of Vietnam acquired the debt-ridden bank for zero dong two years ago, resulting in the loss of PetroVietn­am’s investment.

A court in Hanoi in September sentenced another former head of PetroVietn­am, Nguyen Xuan Son, to death for embezzleme­nt in the Ocean Bank case while 50 others, mostly bank executives, were given suspended sentences to life imprisonme­nt.

The second case involves mismanagem­ent and embezzleme­nt at a PetroVietn­am subsidiary, constructi­on company PVC.

The company’s former head, Trinh Xuan Thanh, disappeare­d from a Berlin park in July.

Germany accused Vietnam of kidnapping him and expelled two Vietnamese diplomats as a result.

Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security said Thanh turned himself in to police. — AP

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