Aviation security must improve in coming five years: Deputy PM Hai

Vietnam's civil aviation security needs to improve in the next five years to avoid mistakes that could lead to a tragedy, Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai said on December 23.

Countries world-wide are now tightening their civil aviation security more than ever, and Vietnam should not be an exception, Hai said at a meeting to review the five-year programme of civil aviation security run by the National Civil Aviation Security Committee under the Ministry of Transport.

The committee was required to make provisions against foreseeable problems of civil aviation security in the coming time, Hai said.

"Although the country's civil aviation security sector has assured absolute safety for passengers over the past 17 years, it cannot afford to make any mistake related to aviation security in the future," he said.

Any error, even small ones, could have catastrophic results for all of us, he said.

Therefore, Hai ordered the committee to constantly update the top-priority list of issues that could pose threats to the civil aviation security. The move aims to keep up absolute safety for passengers in the coming time, he said.

Hai also expressed his concerns over passengers who ignore regulations of civil aviation security.

His concerns came after the number of passengers accessing aviation services has grown, but many did not know about the regulations. Boosting the dissemination of rules is a solution, he said.

Speaking at the meeting, Minister of Transport Dinh La Thang pointed out shortcomings including inadequate infrastructure, a lack of lighting systems and security camera systems and poor supervision of the unloading of luggage and goods causing loss for passengers; poor co-operation between authorised agencies and aviation forces led to goods smuggling and fraud.

Thang said the committee has to improve the infrastructure; re-train its staff, especially those involved in the supervision of the unloading of luggage and goods to end the loss of luggage; and closely work with authorised agencies to solve other problems.

Statistics showed that the aviation committee had stopped 500 passengers attempting to carry weapons on planes, acted against rumours about bombs or explosives on planes in 40 cases and dealt with 142 passengers violating aviation-security regulations and threatening security staff during the 2011 to 2015 period.

The average growth rate of the aviation sector between 2009 to 2014 was 14 percent in passenger number and 18 percent in cargo volume.