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Police officers arrest sand thieves in a boat in Tien Giang |
According to the colonel, since the beginning of the year, more than 80 cases of illegal sand mining have been detected in the area, three criminal cases have been handled and three people have been prosecuted. The police officers have been also completing the file to prosecute three sand mining-related people for their alleged involvement in the sand thefts.
According to Colonel Nguyen Van Loc, this is the first time the functional forces have criminally handled sand thefts. Due to many loopholes in the present law, the management of sand thef faces many difficulties. Specifically, dealers including barge or ship owners often hire poor laborers who have already signed contracts to rent the barge to illegally suck sand. Therefore, the functional forces only punish those who directly suck the sand but cannot impose penalties on barge owners or seize the vehicle.
In some cases, local authorities can't even sanction employees who are too poor to pay fines and have no assets to enforce.
Similarly, the handling of the matter is more difficult when the law stipulates that the price of the material evidence must have a value of VND 500 million (US$ 21,132) or more, or it is necessary to prove that the illegal earning is from VND 100 million or more.
Sand mining devours the Mekong River bank. Many hectares of riverbank are lost yearly across the Mekong Delta to excessive sand mining, according to World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the agriculture ministry.
