The Ministry of National Defence (MOD) held a ceremony in Hanoi on August 17 to hand over the State President’s decision on assigning Lieut. Col. Vu Thi Kim Oanh to the United Nations peacekeeping mission in South Sudan.
The event was chaired by Sen. Lieut. Gen. Hoang Xuan Chien - member of the Central Military Commission, Deputy Defence Minister and Head of the MOD’s steering committee for Vietnam’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations.
 |
Sen. Lieut. Gen. Hoang Xuan Chien hands over the President's decision to Lieut. Col. Vu Thi Kim Oanh. |
Lieut. Col. Vu Thi Kim Oanh will serve as a military observer at the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS), replacing Lieut. Col. Tran Van Giang. She has become the fifth Vietnamese female officer to join the UN peacekeeping operations on an individual basis.
So far, Vietnam has dispatched 39 female officers for UN peacekeeping duties, accounting for nearly 16% of its total officers in UN missions – much higher than the average rate of female officers deployed by other countries.
Oanh is expected to depart for the new mission early next month.
At the ceremony, participants also reviewed the performance of Lieut. Col. Nguyen Thi Minh Phuong during her office tenure as a military observer at UNMISS.
Maj. Gen. Hoang Kim Phung, Director of the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations, said that Lieut. Col. Phuong was recognised by the UN as having excellently completed the tasks across all criteria. For her significant contributions, she has been awarded the “For the UN peacekeeping cause” medal by the UN and received a certificate of merit from the UNMISS Commander, Phung stated.
As of August 2021, Vietnam has dispatched 245 military officers to the UN peacekeeping missions in South Sudan and the Central African Republic, as well as to the UN headquarters, in both individual and unit forms.
Source: NDO
