On May 21, at Giong Rieng Martyrs' Cemetery (An Giang), the groundbreaking ceremony for taking biological samples of remains of unidentified martyrs took place.
This is an activity of profound political and humanistic significance, expressing the gratitude and responsibility of the Party, State and people to the heroic martyrs who bravely sacrificed for the independence and freedom of the Fatherland. The event is within the framework of the "500-day and night campaign to promote the search, repatriation and identification of martyrs' remains", towards the 80th anniversary of War Invalids and Martyrs' Day (July 27, 1947 – July 27, 2027).
Currently, the whole country still has nearly 300,000 martyrs' graves whose identities have not been identified. The journey to find the names of heroic martyrs is not only a political task but also an order from the heart, expressing the deep gratitude of the entire Vietnamese nation.
Speaking at the ceremony, Professor, Dr. Chu Hoang Ha, Vice President of the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, member of the National Steering Committee for searching, repatriating and identifying martyrs' remains (National Steering Committee 515) emphasized that the Campaign carries profound humanistic values, reflecting the morality of "When drinking water, remember the source", "Gratitude" of the Vietnamese nation. At the same time, it is also a sacred responsibility to respond to the desire and aspiration to find the identity and bring the heroic martyrs back to their families and homeland after many long years of waiting.
In 2025, the new DNA testing technology process (NGS-SNP) has been practically applied at Tra Linh Martyrs' Cemetery, Cao Bang province. The results show that the new technology process has the potential to significantly increase the success rate of testing compared to previous procedures; DNA has been successfully extracted and SNP data is obtained that meets the conditions for comparison of 54/58 samples, reaching a rate of 93%. From the collected data, it has been compared with relatives from 14 martyrs' families and DNA testing results to identify martyrs' remains have been awarded to 2 families of martyrs' relatives.
Based on that result, the implementation of excavation and collection of specimens of martyrs' remains at Giong Rieng Martyrs' Cemetery on a larger scale is an important step to test and evaluate the widespread implementation of the new generation DNA testing process in identifying missing martyrs' remains.
According to Mr. Le Van Phuoc, Vice Chairman of An Giang Provincial People's Committee, the locality currently has 20 martyrs' cemeteries with nearly 36 thousand martyrs' graves, of which more than 17 thousand martyrs' graves have not been identified and more than 13 thousand graves are still missing information. Among them, at Giong Rieng Martyrs' Cemetery, there are still 962 graves with unidentified martyr information.
The fact that units coordinate to perform the task of taking biological samples of martyrs' remains that have not been identified is the humane companionship of international organizations and leading scientific agencies. The cooperation between the Vietnamese Agency for the Search for Missing Persons (VNOSMP), the US Embassy, the International Commission for the Search for Missing Persons (ICMP) and the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology, the DNA Examination Center is proof of outstanding efforts to apply the most advanced scientific technology to decode and identify the identities of heroic martyrs.
This is an activity of profound humanitarian significance, somewhat easing the pain and daily longing of relatives and families of martyrs who have not found their remains, and at the same time showing the spirit of responsibility, determination, closing the past, towards the future and cooperation for development between countries.
