UK newspaper dubs Vietnam a safe place to visit

U.K.-based newspaper the Telegraph has classed Vietnam as a pretty safe country to travel to in a recent survey, but highlighted the risks traffic accidents pose to visitors.

On Tuesday the newspaper released a series of graphics that remap the world in a wide range of perspectives, from gun ownership, energy consumption and criminal executions, to happiness, obesity and Miss World competitions.

Vietnam was one of the few countries listed as "safe to visit”.

Asian neighbors such as India, Japan, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines and Thailand were considered "not completely safe", with the U.K.’s Foreign Office advising against traveling to parts of these countries.

The report named Vietnam, together with Japan, Bolivia, Ecuador and five European countries, as destinations with a “low” terror threat. More than 30 countries received a "high" terror threat rating, including holiday favorites such as Spain and France, as well as popular Southeast Asian countries such as the Philippines and Thailand.

According to the Institute for Economics and Peace, there are only ten countries in the world that are free from conflict right now, and Vietnam is one of them.

However, that changes when you decide to walk down the street in Vietnam.

Vietnam is listed among the more dangerous country in terms of road deaths. The Telegraph ranked the countries based on the number of road fatalities per 100,000 inhabitants per year, and the ratings range from 1.9 in Maldives to 40.5 in Libya.

The report did not mention the figure in Vietnam, but according to new statistics from the National Traffic Safety Committee, it would be 9.4. The committee said road crashes killed 8,685 people in Vietnam in 2016, which means one every hour.

Traffic in Vietnam seems to either puzzle, impress or annoy outsiders, and even locals sometimes. The seemingly chaotic streets have even inspired Enomoto Kaori, a 30-year-old Japanese woman and game designer who arrived in Vietnam in July 2015, to create a mobile game called Vietnamese Road that trains people how to cross the streets.

The game has become so popular that last October it received a US$40,000 grant in the form of tools and services from a Facebook start-up fund.

But thanks to other strengths such as its delicious food and beautiful beaches, Vietnam is becoming an increasingly popular destination, with foreign visitor numbers hitting a record high of more than 10 million in 2016, up 26% from the previous year.

Nearly 255,000 of them arrived from the U.K., up 20% from 2015. Tourists from the U.K. can now visit Vietnam for 15 days without a visa.