On July 7, at Vinh Thanh Trung Commune People's Committee, the Military Command (CHQS) of An Giang province - The Standing Agency of the Provincial Steering Committee 515 organized a Conference to draw experience from the work of taking samples and handing over samples of martyrs' remains at Chau Phu Martyrs' Cemetery.
At the conference, delegates listened to reports on the results of organizing sample taking and handing over samples of martyrs' remains at Chau Phu Martyrs' Cemetery.
According to reports, the whole province currently has 20 martyrs' cemeteries with 35,931 graves, of which 15,747 graves have no information to be sampled for DNA testing. Chau Phu Martyrs' Cemetery alone has 694 graves, of which 37 graves were selected for samples in the first practice phase.
After two days of deployment, the task force exhumed 37 graves, collected 32 samples, and 5 graves were not sampled. The entire process was carried out in accordance with the technical procedures of the Ministry of National Defense, ensuring strictness and safety, without any errors or mixing samples.
The conference focused on analyzing the achieved results, and at the same time pointed out difficulties and limitations in the implementation process such as: the preparation of facilities has content that is not really scientific; this is a new task, so some departments are still confused in implementing the sampling and information digitization process; many graves have been restored, gilded with granite, solid structures, so excavation and completion of graves take a lot of time; the software for managing information samples of martyrs' remains sometimes still has errors, affecting the progress of digitization; rainy season weather conditions also affect the task implementation process.
Speaking at the conclusion of the conference, Colonel Cao Minh Tam - Deputy Political Commissar of An Giang Provincial Military Command - emphasized that the selection of Chau Phu Martyrs' Cemetery to implement first has helped the Provincial Steering Committee 515 comprehensively assess the organization process, coordination work between forces and issues arising in reality. Colonel Cao Minh Tam requested agencies and units to fully absorb contributed opinions, quickly complete the process, consolidate forces, strengthen professional training, ensure full equipment and specialized materials and promote the application of information technology in data management, determined to synchronously deploy DNA sampling at martyrs' cemeteries in the province.
According to the plan, after the experience-drawing conference, the Steering Committee 515 of the province will continue to deploy the sampling of martyrs' remains at the remaining cemeteries in the area, striving to complete the sampling of martyrs' graves with unidentified information by May 2027. Thereby contributing to accelerating the progress of identifying the identities of heroic martyrs by DNA testing, meeting the aspirations of martyrs' relatives and effectively implementing the "Gratitude" policy.
