Speaking at a meeting on June 25, Deputy Prime Minister Pham Thi Thanh Tra said the search, recovery and identification of fallen soldiers' remains remained a political responsibility and a moral obligation of the Party, the state and the people towards those who sacrificed their lives for the country's independence and freedom.
Deputy Prime Minister Pham Thi Thanh Tra speaks at the meeting (Photo: Thu Giang).
According to the Ministry of National Defence, efforts to locate and recover fallen soldiers' remains continued on a large scale during the first six months of 2026.
The ministry maintained 24 search and recovery teams operating in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia.
To date, the teams have recovered 1,255 sets of remains, including 314 within Vietnam, 173 in Laos and 768 in Cambodia. Authorities also discovered three collective graves in Tuyen Quang Province.
The Ho Chi Minh City Command surveys and probes areas suspected of containing mass burial pits in Le Thi Rieng Cultural Park, Hoa Hung Ward, Ho Chi Minh City (Photo: Nam Anh).
Alongside recovery operations, the collection of samples from remains and relatives has been identified as a key task in supporting identification through DNA technology.
All seven military regions have now collected samples from more than 15,400 martyrs' graves.
Authorities have also gathered and stored 93,464 biological samples from relatives of fallen soldiers, with more than 53,000 samples already analysed and integrated into a national database.
According to official figures, DNA testing units have received 8,157 samples of recovered remains from local authorities nationwide.
The Military Institute of Forensic Medicine has analysed 92 samples, including 20 that have yielded genetic sequencing results.
Vietnam has spent decades searching for and identifying soldiers who died during past conflicts, with many families still seeking information about missing relatives whose remains have yet to be identified.