News In Brief

Dozens of Viet casualties are reported by China

China said Wednesday several dozen Vietnamese soldiers had been killed or wounded when Chinese forces retaliated with artillery fire against what Peking called armed Vietnamese intrusions along its southern border. It was the third day of artillery exchanges and coincided with stepped-up fighting along the Thai-Cambodian frontier.

A Thai military spokesman in Bangkok said Thai forces had managed to plug gaps along the mountainous border with Cambodia to prevent further Vietnamese incursions. He said Thailand and Vietnam had moved reinforcements to the Thai-Cambodian border, where fighting entered its 11th day Wednesday. Cross-border artillery exchanges were still going on, the spokesman said.