Eight schoolgirls have drowned in a lake outside Hanoi, dpa cited authorities as saying Thursday. The girls, all aged 14, were among 11 teenagers from a nearby secondary school who were walking near a lake late Wednesday in My Duc district when one fell in, local police chief Le Xuan Van said. The others tried to rescue her, but seven of them also drowned because they did not know how to swim, he said. Authorities recovered the bodies several hours later. Vietnam's child drowning rate is two or three times higher than the global average, according to research by non-governmental organization Alliance for Safe Children. On Tuesday, two boys aged 14 and 15 years old drowned after their motorcycle fell into a reservoir while they were trying to escape traffic police in Dak Nong province in the Central Highlands.
