Hanoi  - Vietnamese police have arrested a woman for procuring call girls who masqueraded as university students, a police official said Thursday.

Police in Ho Chi Minh City arrested Le Thi Anh Tuyet, 29, on Wednesday after surprising four couples engaged in liaisons she arranged at a hotel.

Mai Van Tan, director of Ho Chi Minh City's Department of Social Order Crime Investigation, said Tuyet, a former sex worker herself, had advertised that the 20 call girls in her employ were university students to attract customers.

Hanoi - A survey has found significant numbers of two endangered primate species in a national park in central Vietnam, conservationists said Wednesday.

Hanoi  - Vietnamese officials Wednesday harshly criticized the US Supreme Court's decision not to hear an appeal of a lawsuit against the American manufacturers of the toxic defoliant Agent Orange that was thrown out by lower courts.

Tran Xuan Thu, head of Vietnam's Association of Victims of Agent Orange, called the decision "nonsensical and incorrect."

Thu's words echoed Tuesday's statement by the official spokesman of Vietnam's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Le Dung, that "the Vietnamese people are completely disgusted" with the US court's decision.

Hanoi - With public controversy building over the construction of a luxury hotel inside a popular Hanoi park, the European chain slated to manage the hotel said Tuesday that all of the project's legal permits were in order.

Construction of a Novotel hotel inside the territory of Hanoi's Thong Nhat (Reunification) Park began in June 2008. In early February letters of protest to city officials from architects and community organizations prompted a wave of press coverage critical of the project.

Hanoi - The global economic slowdown will cause job losses in Vietnam in 2009 up to five times higher than those in 2008, government officials said Monday.

"This year, according to our forecast, 300,000 workers are likely to lose their jobs in the first half of 2009 and an additional 100,000 will be made redundant in the second half," said Nguyen Thi Hai Van, deputy head of Vietnam's Labour and Employment Agency.

Hanoi  - Vietnam's government denounced an annual US State Department report that criticized the state of human rights in the South-East Asian country, local media reported Friday.

"We reject the biased remarks based on erroneous information about Vietnam that is contained in the US Department of State's 2008 report," Foreign Affairs Ministry spokesman Le Dung said.