(RTTNews) - Vietnamese police said Wednesday that four men were killed instantly in the southern province of Tay Ninh when a war-era bomb exploded when they were trying to price it open to remove explosive material to be used in fishing.

The dead, two pairs of brothers, were aged between 24 and 27, said a police official. He said the men's bodies were dismembered by the blast.

The police are investigating what sort of bomb it was. Tay Ninh province, which borders Cambodia, was bombed heavily by U.S. warplanes during the Vietnam War.
Despite hazards, many poor Vietnamese continue to saw apart old unexploded ordnance to sell it for scrap, and to use the explosive material for fishing--a practice that has been notified as illegal in Vietnam.

According to a report by the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation and Vietnam's Ministry of Defense, over 10,500 persons were killed in the country's central provinces by bombs, landmines and artillery shells, left over from the war, which ended in 1975.

by RTT Staff Writer

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