This is a completely new regulation in Circular 65/2020/TT-BCA stipulating the duties, powers, forms, content, and procedures for patrolling, controlling, and handling administrative violations in road traffic by traffic police.
Article table of contents
Circular 65/2020/TT-BCA: Vietnam Traffic Police are not required to salute violators (Illustrative image)
Article 8 Circular 65/2020/TT-BCA prescribes that when the vehicle subject to control has stopped at the correct location as directed, the assigned Traffic Police officer shall stand in a suitable and safe position and perform the following actions:
- Notify and request the driver of the vehicle to take safety measures, disembark the vehicle, and present the relevant documents as prescribed.
- Perform the salute gesture according to the People's Public Security Ordinance or greet verbally: “Hello sir, madam, brother, sister…” (except in cases where it is known that the person has committed acts showing signs of crime, caught in the act, or is under an arrest warrant), then say: “Please present your relevant documents and let us inspect the vehicle.”
- Upon receiving the documents (if any), inform the driver and any passengers of the reason for the inspection, then proceed to inspect the items specified in Clause 2, Article 10 of this Circular.
- Upon completion of the inspection, the Traffic Police officer reports the results to the Team Leader, informs the driver and passengers of the results, any violations (if any), the handling measures, and says: “Thank you, sir, madam, brother, sister,… for cooperating with the Traffic Police to ensure traffic order and safety.” For vehicles with over 10 seats, the officer should directly enter the passenger compartment to perform the inspection and notify the results.
- When there are grounds to believe that the participant in traffic, means of transport, or objects are hiding evidence, instruments, or documents used to commit an administrative violation, a search of the person, vehicle, or object is conducted as prescribed by law on handling administrative violations.
- If signs of a crime are discovered, the procedure is carried out according to criminal procedure law.
Circular 65/2020/TT-BCA was issued to replace Circular 01/2016/TT-BCA. The aforementioned procedures were not regulated in the old Circular, previously included in internal documents, and now have been made public for common knowledge among all citizens. The purpose of publishing these procedures is due to the previous situation where a group of Traffic Police officers was very lax in their conduct, not strictly following the prescribed orders, and showing arrogant attitudes towards citizens. Publicizing the actions required of Traffic Police when signaling for vehicles to stop is a necessary action, providing citizens a basis to denounce wrongful and arrogant behaviors of some Traffic Police officers today.
Additionally, the reason why Traffic Police are not required to greet individuals known to be committing acts showing signs of a crime, caught in the act, or under arrest warrants, is because these are dangerous individuals who require immediate professional measures to be restrained. Traffic Police must respect the public, serve the public, and instill public trust but do not need to show deference to criminals who harm the public and negatively impact society.
See more details at: Circular 65/2020/TT-BCA, effective from August 5, 2020.
Nguyen Phu
- Key word:
- Vietnam Traffic Police
- traffic police
