Exhibition on AO/dioxin pain, lawsuit underway in HCM City
An exhibition highlighting the pain of Vietnamese Agent Orange/dioxin victims and the lawsuit filed by Tran To Nga, a Vietnamese French woman, against multinational companies for producing and selling chemical toxins sprayed by US forces in the war in Vietnam, is being held in Ho Chi Minh City from May 8-13.
HCM City (VNA) – An exhibition highlightingthe pain of Vietnamese Agent Orange/dioxin victims and the lawsuit filed by Tran To Nga, a Vietnamese French woman, against multinationalcompanies for producing and selling chemical toxins sprayed by US forces in thewar in Vietnam, is being held in Ho Chi Minh City from May 8-13.
The event is jointly organised by the Tre (Youth) Publishing House, Tuoi Tre (Youth) Newspaper and Duong Sach Co., Ltd. in HCMCity.
Ondisplay are over 100 documents, photos, illustrations selected from thedocuments of newspapers, witnesses, researches, and the War Remnants Museum,which depict the entire information and statistics on long-term effects of AO/dioxinon humans, nature, and the environment.
Manyimages help visitors understand more about the AOherbicide containing toxic dioxin, which has left devastating impacts on millions of Vietnamese.
Many photosand documents also describe the progress of the lawsuit, legal and scientific foundations, the companionship and support of friends around the world, and AOvictims for the lawsuit.
Theorganisers said that visitors can scan QR codes on each document and image atthe exhibition to get more information from the archives, thus helping them betterunderstand about the chemical and the lawsuit.
Nga, born in 1942, filed the lawsuit in May 2014. Among the companies named inher suit, there are such names as Monsanto (now under the Bayer Group of Germany)and Dow Chemical.
With the support of several non-governmental organisations,Nga accused the companies of causing lasting harm to the health of her, herchildren and countless others, as well as destroying the environment.
Among her three children, the first child died of heartdefects and the second suffers from a blood disease.
On April 16, 2015, the Crown Court of Evry cityheld the first hearing on the case, but since then, lawyers for the chemicalcompanies have tried every way to draw out procedures.
The trial was scheduled to open in October 2020 but waspostponed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
From 1961-1971, US troops sprayed more than 80million litres of herbicides - 44 million litres of which were AO, containingnearly 370 kilograms of dioxin - over southern Vietnam.
As a result, around 4.8 million Vietnamese wereexposed to the toxic chemical. Many of the victims have died, while millions oftheir descendants are living with deformities and diseases as a direct resultof the chemical’s effects.
Nga claims compensations for health problems.
The French court is expected to rule on the lawsuit on May10./.
Over the past days, the international media continue running articles highlighting Vietnamese-French Tran To Nga’s lawsuit against 14 multinational companies for producing and selling chemical toxins used by the US army in the war in Vietnam, which have destroyed the environment and affected the health of generations of Vietnamese people.
Vietnam supports Agent Orange/dioxin victims in requesting legal responsibilities from US companies producing and selling the toxic chemical used during the war in Vietnam, stated Foreign Ministry’s spokesperson Le Thi Thu Hang on February 4 while commenting on a French court’s acceptance of the lawsuit filed by Tran To Nga, a French Vietnamese, against 14 US chemical companies.
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Visitors at the exhibition (Photo: VNA) 
