More than 1,250 lawsuits filed by farmers in Ba Ria-Vung Tau provinceagainst Taiwanese MSG-maker Vedan Vietnam have been withdrawn afterVedan paid compensation to the farmers on Wednesday.

The lawsuits were filed to collect compensation for damage to farmlandcaused by the company's illegal discharge of untreated waste water intothe Thi Vai River.

Nguyen Thanh Ngoc, the lawyerrepresenting farmers in the province's Tan Thanh district, withdrew thelawsuits after Vedan paid 26.8 billion VND to 1,255 local farmersaffected.

Tran Van Cuong, deputy head of theprovincial Department of Agriculture and Rural Development, said thecompany on August 17 transferred half of the total 53.6 billion VND (2.8million USD) compensation for Tan Thanh district's farmers.

The company also paid 500 million VND (26,000 USD) to cover costs ofcalculating the losses by Tan Thanh district authorities.

Cuong said the provincial People's Committee would entrust Tan ThanhDistrict authorities to draw up a list of names of farmers and thepayment amounts. The disbursement would then be conducted within thenext five days.

In addition, Vedan on August 17transferred 22.9 billion VND to the bank accounts of farmers in HCMCity's Can Gio district, the only area in the city affected by thepollution.

They also gave 500 million VND (26,000 USD) to Can Gio district authorities to cover the costs of calculating the losses.

In Dong Nai province, farmers have yet to agree on the amount ofcompensation and they continue to file lawsuits against Vedan with morethan 4,000 applications.

Dong Nai provincialPeople's Committee has ordered the Department of Natural Resources andEnvironment to visit the affected areas to talk to farmers and calculatethe amount of financial losses and measure the land area affected bythe pollution./.