Hanoi - Police in the port town of Ha Long City have identified and are pursuing several suspects who they allege killed six people and wounded one this week in a dispute over coal smuggling, a police official said Thursday.

The victims were shot early Monday in Ha Long City harbour. Police spokesman Nguyen Trinh Dong said police had not yet captured any of the suspects.

Dong said police had determined the killings stemmed from a conflict between two groups competing to smuggle coal from illegal unlicensed mines to nearby China.

Police believe ringleader Pham Huy Nam, 33, alias Nam Bang, ordered his men to kill anyone exploiting coal without his permission in areas he claims to control.

Hanoi - A Vietnam Airlines co-pilot was arrested Wednesday in Tokyo on suspicion of fencing stolen Japanese goods in Vietnam, an airline official said.

Dang Xuan Hop, 33, was arrested by Japanese police after his flight from Hanoi landed at Tokyo's Narita International Airport. Police accuse him of being part of a ring that smuggled items stolen by a Vietnamese gang in Japan to customers in Vietnam.

"We deeply regret this case because it has badly affected Vietnam Airlines' image and confidence," said airline spokesman Trinh Ngoc Thanh. "We have decided to suspend him from flying."

Hanoi - Vietnamese police arrested three people on charges of running counterfeit money from China to Vietnam, a police official said Wednesday.

The three were arrested Wednesday morning in Hanoi's Tay Ho district. Police found 300 million dong (17,000 dollars) in counterfeit 500,000 dong bills hidden in their clothes.

"It took us about one month to break the ring," said Colonel Nguyen Ba Hung, director of Tay Ho's police department.

Hanoi  - Bui Hien Dung says she doesn't know why her husband demanded she have an abortion, why he forced her to pay his gambling debts and why he beat her so often that she finally took their son and fled to a shelter for battered women.

But what really confuses her, she said, is why the shelter staff told her husband where she was staying and pressured her to reconcile with him even after he threatened to kill her.

Hanoi - An exchange of gunfire Monday between two gangs killed six and left several people wounded in the northern port town of Ha Long City, police said.

Vietnamese media reported the killings had occurred at about 5 am (22:00 GMT Sunday) as the gunmen, driving cars and motorbikes, exchanged fire while chasing each other at high speed.

Officer Nguyen The Hung of the Ha Long City police department said police had arrived at the crime scene shortly afterwards and had gathered evidence until noon. He declined to release further details until the investigation is complete.

Hanoi  - On May 28, a currency analyst at Morgan Stanley released a report that hit Vietnam's financial community like a smack in the face.

With Vietnam's inflation and trade deficit soaring, the analyst wrote, its currency was under threat. Twelve-month futures on the Vietnam dong had "gapped" to 23,000 to the dollar, a 50 per cent premium on Hanoi's official rate of 16,600. If Vietnam did not allow rapid depreciation, the dong would likely collapse by year's end.

The Morgan Stanley report was just one of a rash of gloomy mid- year Vietnam reports. Deutsche Bank predicted a 30 per cent fall in the dong. Merrill Lynch said Vietnam was experiencing an "inflation shock" that could prompt massive capital flight.