HANOI

China and Vietnam evacuated hundreds of thousands of people from low-lying coastal areas on Wednesday as Typhoon Lekima lashed the region with torrential rains and heavy winds. The storm passed over the central Vietnam province of Quang Binh on Wednesday night and blew westward toward Laos, officials said.

South Africa supports Vietnam’s bid to be a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council in 2008/09, President Thabo Mbeki said on a visit to Hanoi on Thursday. Mbeki and Vietnam President Nguyen Minh Triet agreed to broaden friendly relations, which stretch back to the 1970s when Mbeki’s then-exiled African National Congress was fighting apartheid and the communists unified Vietnam.

A Vietnamese pig farmer says he has found a novel way to boost productivity, by exposing his 3 000 hogs to the melodies of Beethoven, Mozart and Schubert while they have their snouts in the trough. Nguyen Chi Cong (44) said he started playing recordings of classical symphonies over loudspeakers six years ago for the benefit of his workers.

Presidents and prime ministers, kings, communists and one or two former generals — Apec brings together one of the world’s most diverse groups of leaders, who show unity with one of the world’s most unique fashion shows. After Sunday’s summit, the 21 Apec leaders will don Vietnam’s ao dai silk tunic for the closing ceremony.

North Korea will have to ”demonstrate in concrete terms” a commitment to denuclearisation when six party talks on ending its nuclear programme resumes next month, Japan’s foreign ministry spokesperson said on Wednesday. North Korea declared after it exploded a nuclear device on October 9 that it should be recognised as a nuclear power.

Flooding killed dozens of people in the days after Typhoon Xangsane raked the Philippines and Vietnam, officials said on Thursday as the combined death toll rose to at least 169 with 79 others missing. The Vietnam government said 59 people died and seven were missing after the typhoon hit on Sunday, but state-run media accounts indicated a higher death toll of at least 68.

Three people were reported killed in central Vietnam on Monday as a tropical storm lashed the coast, officials said. Military units were on alert and fishing boats had been called to shore ahead of the storm, which was the first tropical cyclone to directly hit Vietnam this year.

A Vietnamese man who once appeared on national television to demonstrate his ability to resist electric shocks has been electrocuted while repairing a generator, an official said on Tuesday. Nguyen Van Hung, aged in his early 40s, was killed in Tay Ninh province near the Cambodian border while repairing the generator without first cutting the power supply, a local official said.

Flooding, landslides and lightning have killed 15 people and left one missing since Friday night in Vietnam, bringing the country’s toll in a week of torrential rain to 42, reports said on Sunday. Thousands have been evacuated to higher ground as water levels in the northern region’s main rivers were expected to continue rising.

After nearly two decades of ridicule, a Vietnamese father has agreed to change his son’s name from ”Fined Six Thousand and Five Hundred” — the amount he was forced to pay in local currency for ignoring Vietnam’s two-child policy. Angry he was being fined, Mai Xuan Can in 1987 named his son after the amount he was forced to pay.

A Vietnamese company plans to turn catfish fat into biofuel to run diesel engines, with industrial-scale production set to start next year, an official of the firm said Tuesday. Catfish exporter Agifish said it had won government approval to build a factory in the southern Mekong delta province of An Giang in 2007 and produce about 10-million litres of the fuel per year.