Vietnamese face U.S.-Vietnam ties<\/p>\n
By Karen Lowe<\/p>\n
LOS ANGELES (AFP): Many Vietnamese refugees in the United
\nStates seem sadly resigned to Washington normalizing ties with
\nHanoi, though some hope it will be the wedge to pry open their
\nhomeland to democracy.<\/p>\n
President Bill Clinton was expected to announce full
\ndiplomatic relations with Vietnam as early as next week after
\ndetermining Hanoi had complied in accounting for U.S. servicemen
\nmissing since the Vietnam War.<\/p>\n
Doi Dung, a former district chief in Binhdhuan Province in the
\nformer South Vietnam and now executive director of the Vietnam
\nAmerican Civic Association in Boston, Massachusetts expressed
\ndismay at the prospect.<\/p>\n
\"Obviously, we don't want to support this decision,\" Dung
\nsaid. \"First, a lot of the American soldiers are still
\nmissing ... They still have a lot of the political prisoners in
\nVietnam.<\/p>\n
\"They have no human rights in Vietnam. Why do Americans have
\nto have formal diplomatic ties with Vietnam,\" asked Dung.<\/p>\n
He was a political prisoner in Vietnam from 1975-88 and among
\nthe first group of former political prisoners who were sent to
\nthe United States in January.<\/p>\n
He said former political prisoners will be \"very, very upset\"
\nabout normalizing ties with Hanoi, but said those Vietnamese
\nrefugees who arrived years earlier won't be so angry.<\/p>\n
Cam Nguyen, the editor of the Vietnam Daily News in Orange
\nCounty, California, said much of the Vietnamese community in
\nCalifornia -- a community numbering several hundred thousand --
\nhad anticipated normalization and reluctantly accepts it.<\/p>\n
\"We know that this is the decision that Clinton has to make\"
\nfor political and strategic reasons, said the 46-year-old editor
\nwho left Vietnam in 1975 where he was an engineer for the
\nagriculture department before the fall of Saigon.<\/p>\n
\"But the human rights issue has been forgotten. There are many
\nVietnamese who still have relatives there and are concerned about
\nthem.<\/p>\n
\"I have mixed feelings about normalization. This may be
\ngood ... a way to expand democracy in a country still under
\ncommunism. If that happens, that would be good,\" he added.<\/p>\n
The decision would come after more than a year of debate
\nwithin the administration on whether Vietnam has cooperated fully
\nin determining the fate of 1,619 American personnel still listed
\nas missing in the war.<\/p>\n
Full cooperation was one of the last remaining hurdles for
\nnormalizing ties and Clinton in May said Hanoi had been more
\ncooperative \"than ever before.\"<\/p>\n
But Nguyen said normalization removes needed leverage for
\nimproving human rights in Vietnam and is more likely the result
\nof economic and strategic expediency than cooperation over
\nmissing U.S. servicemen.<\/p>\n
Washington and Hanoi see their bond as a counterweight to an
\never strengthening China while U.S. businessmen have been eager
\nto tap economic opportunities -- petroleum in particular -- in
\nVietnam, Nguyen said.<\/p>\n
Eo Kimh, 53, of the Vietnam Daily News and a former major in
\nthe South Vietnamese army, expressed deep mistrust of the
\ncommunist regime and little hope of improvements in human rights.<\/p>\n
Arrests of priests and monks are routine, writers critical of
\nthe government are imprisoned and prisons outnumber schools, said
\nKimh, who spent seven and half years in a prison camp and arrived
\nin the United States in 1993.<\/p>\n
\"Absolutely, there are no human rights there. If relations are
\nnormalized, \" he said through a translator, \"we would feel bad.
\nThe only thing we could do is stand by to help those seeking
\nfreedom.\"<\/p>",
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