Thousands of selfie-taking Ho Chi Minh City residents crammed into train carriages Sunday as the traffic-clogged business hub celebrated the opening of its first-ever metro line after years of delays.Huge queues spilled out of every station along the $1.7 billion line that runs almost 20 kilometres (12 miles) from the city centre — with women in traditional “ao dai” dress, soldiers in uniform and couples clutching young children waiting excitedly to board.”I know it (the project) is late, but I still feel so very honoured and proud to be among the first on this metro,” said office worker Nguyen Nhu Huyen after snatching a selfie in her jam-packed train car.”Our city is now on par with the other big cities of the world,” she said.It took 17 years for Vietnam’s commercial capital to reach this point. The project, funded largely by Japanese government loans, was first approved in 2007 and slated to cost just $668 million. When construction began in 2012, authorities promised the line would be up and running in just five years.But as delays mounted, cars and motorbikes multiplied in the city of nine million people, making the metropolis hugely congested, increasingly polluted and time-consuming to navigate.The metro “meets the growing travel needs of residents and contributes to reducing traffic congestion and environmental pollution”, the city’s deputy mayor Bui Xuan Cuong said.Cuong admitted authorities had to overcome “countless hurdles” to get the project over the line.- ‘Frustrating’ delays -According to state media reports, the metro was late because of “slow capital disbursement, unexpected technical problems, personnel difficulties and the Covid-19 pandemic”.”The delays and cost overruns have been frustrating,” said professor Vu Minh Hoang at Fulbright University Vietnam, who warned that with just 14 station stops, the line’s “impact in alleviating traffic will be limited in the short run”.However, it is still a “historic achievement for the city’s urban development”, he added.With lessons learnt, “the construction of future lines will be increasingly easier, faster, and more cost-efficient”, Hoang told AFP.Back on the train, 84-year-old war veteran Vu Thanh told AFP he was happy to experience below ground in a more positive way after spending three years fighting American troops in the city’s famous Cu Chi tunnels, an enormous underground network.”It feels so different from the underground experience I had years ago during the war. It’s so bright and nice here,” he said.Reflecting on the delays, he added: “We built the tunnels to hide from our enemies in the past, so building a tunnel for a train should not be that hard,” he added.”Finally, we made it!”

Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said Saturday the government would shut down social network TikTok for at least a year from 2025.”We are going to chase this thug out of our neighbourhood for one year”, Rama told a meeting with Albanian teachers, parents and psychologists in Tirana.The government would launch programmes to “serve the education of students and help parents follow their children’s journey”, he added.The blocking of the controversial social network comes less than a month after a 14-year-old student was killed and another injured in a fight near a school in Tirana.The fight had developed from an online confrontation on social media.The killing sparked a debate in the country among parents, psychologists and educational institutions about the impact of social networks on young people.”In China, TikTok promotes how students can take courses, how to protect nature, how to keep traditions,” said Rama.”But on the TikTok outside China we see only scum and mud. Why do we need this?”Several countries have begun debating measures against TikTok, part of a wider debate on the influence of social media on vulnerable groups, such as children and adolescents.”The problem is not the children but our entire society,” Rama argued.- TikTok’s controversial ‘challenges’ -TikTok’s huge global success has been partly built on the appeal of its “challenges” — an interactive call that invites users to create videos featuring dances, jokes or games that sometimes go viral.The platform attracts young people with a never-ending scroll of ultra-brief videos. It has more than one billion active users worldwide.Neighbouring countries such as Kosovo, North Macedonia and Serbia have also reported a negative impact of the platform, especially on the youth.At least 22 cases of self-harm among girls from different schools in Kosovo southwestern city of Gjakova reported two months ago were blamed on a TikTok challenge.Two weeks ago, local media in North Macedonia reported that hospital there had treated dozen of teenagers for injuries sustained after attempting the “Superman” TikTok challenge.It involves one child leaping on to the linked arms of a few others.And in Serbia, in the southwestern city of Novi Pazar there were reports that children in several high schools had taken part in a “choking” challenge.A search for this on TikTok now produces a warning message from the platform that some challenges can be dangerous, and links to a short guide on how to spot them.TikTok has faced accusations of espionage in the United States, and is under investigation by the European Union over claims it was used to sway Romania’s presidential election in favour of a far-right candidate.The platform also has been banned for use by personnel in state institutions in several countries.AFP, among more than a dozen other fact-checking organisations, is paid by TikTok in several countries to verify videos that potentially contain false information.