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| Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Truong Thang, Deputy Minister of National Defence (second, left), presents the decisions to three officers departing for peacekeeping duties at the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) (Photo: VNA) |
Hanoi (VNA) – The Ministry of National Defence on July 3 held a ceremony to present decisions from the State President and the Minister of National Defence to three officers departing for United Nations peacekeeping duties at the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS).
Notably, among the three officers, Lieutenant Colonel Luong Truong Vinh will assume the position of Senior Liaison Officer and Head of the Military Observers’ Office within UNMISS. This is a new post and marks the first time a Vietnamese military officer has been entrusted by the United Nations with a senior-level position in a UN peacekeeping mission.
Vinh, deputy head of the Field Affairs Division under the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations, has previously served in the Central African Republic mission (MINUSCA) and UNMISS. He was also the first Vietnamese officer selected to work at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, serving as Planning Officer in the Force Generation and Capability Planning Cell, Office of Military Affairs, Department of Peace Operations (August 2020–August 2024).
Also receiving deployment decisions on this occasion were Captain Nguyen Huy Hoang, replacing Lieutenant Colonel Le Minh Thao as Military Observer, and Captain Do Tran The Anh, replacing Major Tran Viet Cuong in the same role.
All three officers are carefully selected, trained, and professionally prepared personnel from the General Department of Logistics and Technical Services, the Vietnam Border Guard, and the Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations. They have completed pre-deployment training courses as well as specialised UN peacekeeping training programmes both domestically and abroad.
Presiding over the ceremony, Senior Lieutenant General Nguyen Truong Thang, Deputy Minister of National Defence, extended congratulations to the officers and commended relevant units for their effective work in developing, training, and preparing forces for UN peacekeeping missions.
He stressed that the continued trust of the United Nations in inviting Vietnam to assign officers to important positions in peacekeeping missions is a recognition of the competence, resilience, professionalism, and substantive contributions of Vietnam’s peacekeeping forces to international peace and security.
On this occasion, the organising committee also presented commendations to an officer who has completed ASEAN observer duties and deployed a two-member contingent to Cambodia to replace Vietnamese personnel participating in the ASEAN Observer Team (AOT).
After more than 12 years of participation in UN peacekeeping operations, the Ministry of National Defence has deployed nearly 1,400 personnel from the Vietnam People’s Army to missions, UN headquarters, and liaison offices in Belgium.
Currently, Engineering Unit Rotation 5 and Level-2 Field Hospital Rotation 8 are undergoing training and preparation for scheduled rotations in September 2026. The Vietnam Department of Peacekeeping Operations is also coordinating with relevant agencies to establish Engineering Unit Rotation 6 and Level-2 Field Hospital Rotation 9 in preparation for deployments in 2027./.
