The Ministry of Public Security has called on local police forces to strengthen the fight against robberies at banks, banking transaction centres and gold shops.— Photo danviet.vn

HÀ NỘI — The Ministry of Public Security has called on local police forces to strengthen the fight against robberies at banks, banking transaction centres and gold shops.

The Ministry of Public Security has also sent an official letter to the State Bank of Việt Nam requesting the intensification of security methods in the banking network.

According to the Ministry of Public Security, although the police force has quickly investigated, arrested offenders and recovered property stolen during robberies at bank branches and gold shops, any insecurity within the system can cause great anxiety among the people.

The ministry reported that since the beginning of this year, many robberies at bank branches, bank transaction centres and gold shops have occurred in the provinces of Bắc Giang, HCM City, Bà Rịa-Vũng Tàu, Khánh Hòa, Tiền Giang, Sơn La and Hà Nội.

Offenders used weapons and homemade guns to intimidate bank employees and body guards and rob a large amount of property.

Seeing the number of bank and gold shop robberies, police realised that the security measures in place at banks and gold shops have many loopholes and inadequacies.

Awareness of officers, employees and security teams at bank branches, transaction offices and gold shops is low.

The number of security staff is still poor, and they generally lack professional knowledge, experiences and skills to act in urgent or unexpected challenges. The monitoring and warning camera systems at offices and gold shops are also generally of poor quality, police say.

To pro-actively prevent robberies, the ministry urged local police units to expeditiously implement key tasks.

Local police forces should intensify the dissemination of information about criminal methods to raise awareness of the need for crime prevention by banks and gold shops.

Local police should co-ordinate and guide banks and gold shops to regularly check, review and supplement security plans, as well as strengthen the security monitoring system and deploy the guard force.

Grass-roots police forces will organise training courses for bank officials and gold shop owners to raise vigilance and learn to take initiative in preventing robberies. Police must co-ordinate with the law enforcement agencies in applying crime prevention measures, aiming at protecting the agencies, properties and lives of officials and employees.

The ministry has also warned local police to actively analyse, evaluate and forecast criminal behaviour and review the locations where banks, credit funds, ATMs and private gold shops are located, especially in rural areas and outlying districts, in order to implement preventive measures.

Local police must aggressively crack down on criminal offences nationwide, implementing drastic measures and plans to fight bank robbery.

For bank robbery cases, local police forces have been mobilised to investigate and arrest criminals, to revoke stolen property and to co-ordinate with the court to bring criminals to trial.

Local police would receive and handle timely information related to bank and gold shop robbery, and co-ordinate with local authorities and relevant agencies to fight this type of crime effectively. — VNS