Vietnam traffic offender skips fine by writing 50 lines

"I promise not to travel in the wrong direction on a one-way street again, I promise not to..."

A Vietnamese police force is winning plaudits after letting a woman avoid a traffic fine by writing 50 lines promising not to repeat the offence, it's reported.

Police in the central city of Da Nang imposed the unusual school-style penalty after catching the 20-year-old driving down a one-way street in the wrong direction, according to the Tuoi Tre News website.

Local police chief Tran Viet Hoa says officers gave the nervous-looking driver the benefit of the doubt after she claimed not to have seen the one-way sign. They told her she could write "I promise not to travel in the wrong direction on a one-way street again" 50 times, or pay a fine. The woman gratefully accepted the cheaper option, according to Mr Hoa, and immediately got on with the job while perched on the kerbside.

Mr Hoa says his department is more concerned with raising public awareness - and doing their job in a friendly way - than rigidly enforcing the rules, even though fining people is quicker. For first-time offenders, fines can create negative feelings towards the police and are of "low educational value", he tells the website.

Many social media users voiced their approval for the unusual tactic, with a post on the local Toi Yeu Da Nang organisation's Facebook page receiving more than 2,600 likes.

The city's traffic officers appear to have form in their relaxed approach - Tuoi Tre News cites a previous example of an offender being given the penalty of buying chewing gum from an elderly street vendor.

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