(VOVworld) –Vietnam will send 519 athletes to the 27th Southeast Asian (SEA) Games in Myanmar in December 2013. A ceremony for the dispatching of the athletes will be held in Hanoi on November 20. Party and state leaders will be among the 3,000 participants at the dispatching ceremony. Nguyen Manh Hung is Director of Hanoi National Sports Training Center: “The ceremony to dispatch Vietnamese athletes will comprise of two parts: the ceremonial part will include an incense burning at President Ho Chi Minh monument and the rites of Vietnamese athletes. The second part will be art performances involving 500 artists”.
The Vietnamese athletes will compete in 29 out of 33 events at the Games, eyeing 70 gold medals and 3rd rank at the event, according to Vietnam's Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. The SEA Games is a biennial sport gala. Vietnam claimed third place at the 26th SEA Games held in Indonesia in 2011 with 288 medals, including 96 golds.