Vietnam pushes to finish its 500-day campaign to identify fallen soldiers

Vietnam's campaign to find and identify the remains of fallen soldiers is being pushed forward with a deadline in sight: Cần Thơ says it will complete its sampling work no later than October 2026.

On September 8 and 9, a delegation led by Senior Lieutenant General Lê Quang Minh, deputy head of the General Department of Political Affairs, visited Cần Thơ, Vĩnh Long and Đồng Tháp. The delegation reviewed and urged progress under the national 500-day campaign for searching, recovering and identifying soldiers' remains.

Cần Thơ has formed two teams with 94 personnel to search for remains and collect samples. The teams have surveyed information about graves in several localities, including Phong Điền, Trường Long Tây, Thới Lai, Trường Thành, Lâm Tân, Mỹ Tú, Châu Thành, Gia Hòa, Vĩnh Viễn and Nhu Gia.

So far, the city has recovered 48 sets of remains. Officials have identified information for one set, collected 46 biological samples and held memorial, reburial and burial ceremonies for 38 sets.

The campaign also covers unidentified graves in the city's 21 martyrs' cemeteries. They contain 25,678 graves, including 8,190 without identifying information. Of those, 3,098 had already been sampled in 2019. The campaign therefore needs to sample 5,092 more graves. Teams have excavated 3,049, collected 2,333 samples and handed 1,689 to the Military Forensic Institute.

Officials said about 80 graves lie outside former temporary cemeteries, including rice fields. Teams have excavated 48 and will continue after farmers finish harvesting. General Minh called for determined and creative work from Cần Thơ and units in Military Region 9.