The authorities at Cam Ranh International Airport in Khanh Hoa Province have said they have only suspended the guard who hit a Chinese passenger.
International check-in area at Cam Ranh Airport
It is said that a dispute had developed when Chinese passengers were allegedly asked to pay bribes at Cam Ranh Airport leading to a Chinese man being hit by the security on May 2.
While Nguyen Van Cuong, head of the customs office at Cam Ranh Airport denied that customs officers had demanded 100 yuan in bribes per passenger, Phan Le Hoan, the airport's director admitted that one of the guard had hit a Chinese passenger, and said his employees had not given him a truthful report previously.
A Vietnam Airlines flight to Shanghai was supposed to take off at 5.55pm but Hong Kong had not accepted the flight so it was delayed until 9.55pm. Passengers had already boarded the plane but were then asked to return to passenger lounge.
The Chinese passengers on flights on that night were unhappy at the attitude of staff, which worsened because of language barrier. It was reported that the airport was overloaded and some passengers were uncooperative, demanding that their procedures were done quickly.
The dispute occurred and led to the situation where the security staff were brought in to deal with passengers with frayed tempers who were standing on some chairs and accusing the airport staff of incompetence and a failure to resolve the problem. The anger of the passengers was worsened by a misunderstanding that a mobile phone had been stolen from one Chinese tourist. The phone later turned up in the possession of this couple’s child.
Many Chinese passengers were upset by the developing incident. A gang of security officers apprehended the man after it is claimed the man grabbed one of the security staff’s equipment. While apprehended by several security staff, one of the guards assaulted the Chinese tourists from behind giving him a forearm smash to the back of his head.
The guard said he was ‘blinded by anger’ as the reason for his lapse in training.
Despite carrying out an assault on a member of the public, the airport security man was only fined VND10m (USD454) and just suspended from the post.
The flight and its passengers departed at 9.56pm on the same day.
