Vietnam-US Relations:
Chronological Overview (Part 1)
At international gatherings, representatives from the United States and Vietnam now often stand next to each other. But to be able to come that close, beyond the alphabetical order lies between them not only the Pacific but also a long and winding road.'
Former President Bill Clinton in Hanoi in November 2000
Normalisation process
"For long it has been the policy of the government and the people of Vietnam that the United States and Vietnam need to look forward to the future, build a normal bilateral relationship. That's why the government and the people of Vietnam welcome the decision on July 11, 1995 by President Bill Clinton and are ready to reach an agreement with the U.S. Administration on a new cooperation framework on the basis of equality, respect for sovereignty and independence, non-interference into each other's domestic affairs, for mutual benefit and conforming to basic principles of international laws. I wish that the governments and the peoples of the two countries will cooperate effectively in further resolving humanitarian issues left by the war at both sides, expand the relations in areas of mutual concern with priorities given to economic, trade, scientific and technological ties..."
Former Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet, Announcement on the Vietnam-US normalisation of diplomatic relations on July 12, 1995
The starting point for work to establish the bilateral relationship dated back to the early 1990s, when U.S. Secretary of State James Baker met for the first time with Vietnam's Foreign Minister Nguyen Co Thach in New York. The two focused in their meeting on issues of bilateral ties on September 29, 1990, but before that, U.S. General John Vessey, who served in Vietnam during the war, made two short visits to the country in 1987 and 1988 to discuss humanitarian issues. Vessey later worked as a special emissary to Vietnam on the question of American service personnel missing from the war.
U.S. soldiers missing-in-action (MIA) were considered crucial in slowing progress of normalisation.
The year of 1991 witnessed substantial steps forward in normalising bilateral relations with the United States introducing a roadmap that made solutions on POW/MIA issues and the withdrawal of Vietnamese troops from Cambodia as prerequisites.
Vietnam had pulled out its last soldiers from Cambodia in September 1989 and held no POWs after the end of the war as claimed by some groups in the United States. These people, including some Congressmen, military officers and families of the U.S. soldiers who did not return after the war, had strongly opposed the normalisation process.
But in November 1991 the U.S. Administration allowed American tourists, veterans, journalists, businessmen to visit Vietnam despite the strong lobby of opposition groups. Several American businessmen and companies started arriving in Vietnam already in 1992 to explore new opportunity.
Deputy Foreign Minister Le Van Bang, who was Vietnam's first ambassador to the United States since the 1975 end of the war, said that President Bush (Senior) allowed more U.S. companies to establish business relations with Vietnam in late 1992, a signal that he would soon remove the embargo and allow diplomatic missions to be established in the two countries.
With the presidential authorisation, on April 25, 1993, consultancy firm Vatico became the first U.S. company to open a representative office in Vietnam. More than two months later, President Bill Clinton gave Vietnam access to foreign credit, which brought loans from the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to the country in Southeast Asia.
In July 1993 the International Monetary Fund refinanced Vietnam's foreign debt worth $140 million. In October 1993, Deputy Prime Minister Phan Van Khai went to the United States to discuss loans with the World Bank and also worked with the U.S. Congress on speeding the normalisation process. "In the United States, the feeling of loss, sorrow and even bitterness are still felt in many places, particularly where Vietnamese Americans are the majority. "Vietnam" has always been referred to after 9/11 and during the U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and surprisingly throughout Presidential elections.
In Vietnam, tens of thousands of military cemeteries can be seen throughout the country and some 300,000 MIAs are yet to be found. Between 2 and 4 million Vietnamese people are affected with Agent Orange/dioxin and thousands of others, mainly children, have been killed or maimed by landmines planted during wartime", said But The Giang in a Vietnam-USA Society's report in 2006.
Embargo lifted
"The years between 1975 and 1995 were difficult, as we faced both differences over history and our commitments to resolve POW/MIA questions and to deal with the tens of thousands of refugees flowing out of Vietnam. Progress since 1995 has been much smoother, quicker, and more sustainable. As an example, our successful and cooperative emigration programs have paved the way for nearly 500,000 Vietnamese citizens to resettle permanently in the United States,
Ñ Testimony of Ambassador Douglas Peterson, Jackson-Vanik Waiver for Vietnam, June 15, 2000 Ñ
On February 3, 1994, President Bill Clinton announced the lifting of the trade embargo against Vietnam and the U.S. Senate was quick in approving it a week later.
The President said he was "absolutely convinced it offers us the best way to resolve the fate of those who remain missing and about whom we are not sure".
In January 1995 the two countries opened their Liaison Offices in each other's capitals. On July 11, 1995 President Clinton announced the establishment of diplomatic relations between the United States and Vietnam.
Within a month, the two countries upgraded their Liaison Offices to embassy status. On August 5 the United States sent Secretary of State Warren Christopher to inaugurate the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi. Christopher thus became the first U.S. Secretary of state to visit Vietnam.
In May 1997 Vietnam and the United States exchanged ambassadors: Mr. Le Van Bang, a diplomat since 1982 and who worked as Vietnam ambassador to the United Nations before taking the new job, went to Washington DC. Mr. Douglas Peterson, who served in the U.S. Air Force and fought in Vietnam during the 1960s where he was incarcerated as POW, arrived in Hanoi's Noi Bai airport.
"Last month, I made my first visit to Vietnam. I found a nation bursting with energy, blessed with a young and literate population, eager to become more fully integrated into multilateral economic and political institutions, and cooperating with us in our priority of accounting, for Americans still missing from the war in Southeast Asia.
...My message was clear. The United States wants full normalization of relations with Vietnam. We want to see the people of Vietnam prosper. But we also believe that economic progress will proceed far more rapidly if accompanied by a healthy dose of political reform. Overall, I am optimistic about Vietnam. Its people face many obstacles. Its government is still hampered by habits of the past. The country still has a very long way to go. But Vietnam is a nation on the move, and it is moving in the right direction."
U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright, speaking before the Los Angeles World Affairs Council on July 23, 1997
The war has left severe wounds on both sides, as more than 58,000 Americans and around 3 million people in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia had been killed.
Diplomatic ties between Vietnam and the United States were given a new impetus with the visit to Vietnam as part of an Asian tour by U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright in June 1997 that also took her to Cambodia and Hong Kong.
While in Vietnam the State Secretary witnessed the return of remains collected by both countries of U.S. servicemen MIA during the war. The U.S. side highly appreciated the good will of Vietnam in this humanitarian issue.
The visit also took her to Ho Chi Minh City where she laid down a brick to launch the construction of the U.S. consulate general. The site chosen was the same place in Saigon where the U.S. embassy was located before 1975.
On its part, Vietnam opened a consulate in San Francisco.
"U.S.-Vietnam relations since that day have gone a long way," Mr. Le Van Bang said in his farewell remark in June 2001, as prospects built up for the U.S. Congress to approve the bilateral trade agreement signed in Washington DC in July 2000.
The Jackson-Vanik amendment to the Trade Act of 1974 denied most favoured nation status to countries with non-market economies that restricted emigration rights. The U.S President had the authority to grant a yearly waiver to the provisions of Jackson-Vanik.
President Bill Clinton granted the first such waiver to Vietnam on March 11, 1998.
Trade agreement
In July 1999, Vietnam signs a trade agreement in principle with the United States in Hanoi.
A year later, Trade Minister Vu Khoan and Trade Representative Charlene Barshefsky signed the landmark Vietnam-U.S. bilateral trade agreement (BTA) in Washington DC a quarter of a century after the war ended. The BTA came into force in December 2001, a factor hailed by diplomats as the final touch in normalising economic relationship between the two countries.
With the BTA in place, trade value between the two countries surged to $12.5 billion in 2007 or six times above the $225 million posted in 1994 when the trade embargo was lifted. The agreement has also prompted a rise in U.S. investment in the country.
"The Agreement addresses issues concerning trade in goods and services, protection of intellectual property, and investment relations between the two countries. Enactment of the Agreement would mark a major step in the normalization of economic relations between the two countries", the Vietnam Embassy to the United States said in a statement on July 25, 1999.
Clinton's visit
"Our Agreement represents progress for the United States and Vietnam, but also for the world trading system. This is an example of how two nations once divided by war can employ trade as a tool to work toward reconciliation."
"We hope the agreement will help speed Vietnam's integration into the economy of the Asia-Pacific and the world. It provides a solid basis for Vietnam to work towards joining the 142 members of the WTO. We look forward to contributing to that effort."
U.S. Trade Representative Robert B. Zoellick said on December 10, 2001
In September 2000, the White House announced that President Bill Clinton will pay an official visit to Hanoi in mid-November, after attending a meeting of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum in Brunei.
U.S. President Clinton arrived on November 16 to start his official visit to Vietnam, making him the first U.S. President to ever step foot in Hanoi and the first President to visit the unified Vietnam. Earlier Richard Nixon spent only hours in South Vietnam during the height of the war in July 1969.
"The U.S. President has made important contributions to lifting the US embargo against Vietnam, normalising the Vietnam-U.S. diplomatic relations and boosting economic and commercial cooperation, thus meeting the interests of the two nations," the Nhan Dan Daily said in an editorial.
On November 18, President Bill Clinton met with General Secretary of the Communist Party of Viet Nam Le Kha Phieu in Hanoi after talks with President Tran Duc Luong and Prime Minister Phan Van Khai.
The U.S. President announced a grant of $2 million in technical assistance each year for Vietnam over the next three years to help it implement the BTA agreement. He also reaffirmed U.S. support for Vietnam's bid to join the World Trade Organisation.
President Bill Clinton promised to consider increases in assistance to Vietnam in clearing unexploded bombs and ordnance left over by the war and stressed the importance of bilateral cooperation in the research on impacts of Agent Orange on the nature and people of Vietnam as well as U.S. servicemen involved in the war.
He handed over to President Tran Duc Luong computer disks containing documents to help search for information on Vietnamese people missing in the war. He promised to provide other documents containing information on the sites where the U.S. forces had stored toxic chemicals before 1975.
Actions
"My visit to America this time is the first ever trip by a Head of Government of Vietnam. It coincides with the 10th anniversary of the normalization of relations between the two countries, an event that has come down in the history of our relations as an important milestone. Our visit, especially my talks with President Bush at the White House, proves that we have together dispelled the shadow of the past so as to shed the light of our future cooperation - a future relationship of equality, mutual respect and benefit.
The scope of our bilateral cooperation, however, remains modest, particularly given the fact America is the world leading power in economic, cultural, science and technology development with tremendous interests Asia and the Pacific, of which Vietnam is an important part.
The purpose of my visit to the United States this time is to relay to the American people a clear and strong message that is the Government and people of Vietnam wish to develop friendly relations, constructive partnership, and comprehensive, stable and long-term cooperation with the United States on the basis of equality, mutual respect and benefits. I am pleased to note that President Bush also shares with me that message."
Prime Minister Phan Van Khai's remark at the Gala Dinner in Washington on June 21, 2005
The year of 2001 was more eventful in the history of the two countries.
"Our trade and investment relationship with Vietnam today, however, remains hampered by two major features. First, as a country covered by the Jackson-Vanik amendment, Vietnam remains only one of six in the world that lacks NTR status. As a result, Vietnamese products face tariffs approximately 10 times higher than those of virtually all other trading partners.
Second, economic reform within Vietnam has progressed slowly, particularly in recent years, owing to the Asian financial crisis, weakening the economy's overall potential and creating obstacles for American exporters.
Ambassador Charlene Barshefsky, U.S. Trade representative, said in September 2000.
In June President George Bush decided to grant a waiver of Jackson-Vanik amendment to Vietnam.
In October U.S. Senate approved the Vietnam-U.S. bilateral trade agreement and the BTA received President Bush's signature on its ratification.
In November Vietnam's National Assembly approved the BTA.
In December, Vietnam's Trade Minister Vu Khoan and U.S Trade Representative Robert Zoellick exchanged ratification letters, putting the BTA into effect.
The year of 2001 ended with a visit to the United States by Permanent Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung in December, during which he had meetings with officials of the U.S. administration and senators.
On the same day, the United States gave most favoured nation treatment to Vietnamese products in December, 2001.
"And that meant that U.S. tariffs for Vietnamese goods went from an average of 40 percent to an average of about three percent. So, from that point of view, for American investors in Vietnam who are interested in the American market, or Vietnamese interested in the American market, it immediately opened it up," the U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam Raymond Burghardt told the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council in June, 2002.
In June 2005, Vietnam's Prime Minister Phan Van Khai visited the United States. He became the first leader of Vietnam to ring the bell at the New York Stock Exchange.
On the agenda there were issues such as setting the framework of the relationship in the 21st century, U.S. President's support for Vietnam's accession to World Trade Organization, permanent normal trading relations, recognition of Vietnam as a market economy with the removal of the Jackson- Vanik amendment.
Vietnam's Deputy Prime Minister Vu Khoan later described the visit as a success that "has helped dispel any false information being spread about Vietnam, and is also an opportunity to introduce America to a country that is reunified, strongly developed, stable and integrated."
During the visit, the U.S. side showed strong support for Vietnam's bid to join the World Trade Organisation. Nearly a year later, in May 2006, Vietnam and the United States signed an agreement on Vietnam's accession to the WTO.
"This is a very good agreement for the United States. It opens a new and growing market for American agricultural goods, services, such as financial services, and manufactured products," said U.S. Trade Representative Rob Portman.
On November 17, 2006, U.S. President George W. Bush made his first visit to Vietnam to attend the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Summit in Hanoi and also visited Ho Chi Minh City.
"I think that the United States and Vietnam have different histories, have different legal systems, and that's why it's natural that we have different perceptions on different things."
"...Vietnam has experienced long years of war, and during that period, Vietnamese people did not enjoy full human rights. Many of us were arrested, were put into prison, tortured, without recourse to the court. We conducted the liberation war in order to regain our human rights. And therefore, more than anybody else, we love human rights, and we respect them. Perhaps you cannot truly understand or sense how much high regard we hold for human rights."
Excerpts of President Nguyen Minh Triet's interview with CNN in June 2007
While in Hanoi, President Bush and the First Lady went to Cua Bac Cathedral for a Sunday service, after which he said: "Laura and I just had a moment to converse with God in a church here in Hanoi. We were touched by the simplicity and the beauty of the moment. We appreciate very much the congregation for allowing us to come and worship with them."
On December 8, 2006, U.S. House of Representative approved a bill to extend the Permanent Normal Trade Relations (PNTR) status to Vietnam. The very next day the bill was passed in the U.S. Senate.
Shortly before that, former U.S. President Bill Clinton returned to Vietnam on December 5 as Chairman of the Clinton Foundation's HIV/AIDS Initiative. The foundation has been assisting HIV/AIDS programmes since 2005 in partnership with the Vietnamese government since 2005.
Year of 2007 is marked by the visit of President Nguyen Minh Triet to the United States between June 18-23. The visit is expected "to create a new momentum for tightening the friendship between the people of Vietnam and the United States, bringing the bilateral relations to a new stage of more in-depth and comprehensive development," Foreign Minister Pham Gia Khiem wrote in Vietnam-U.S. Magazine prior to the visit.
During the visit, President Nguyen Minh Triet held talks with President George W. Bush to discuss cooperation in economics and trade areas. He also met with lawmakers and witnessed the signing of six investment and cooperation deals between Vietnamese and U.S. companies worth around $5 billion.
Vice Minister of Trade Nguyen Cam Tu and Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Karan Bhatia signed Trade and Investment Framework Agreement on June 21.
Meeting with U.S. President Bush in the Oval Office on June 22, President Triet said that through discussions, both sides agreed that the relationship has continued to develop in a sustainable and effective manner. The two presidents also had direct and open exchange of views on matters related to religion and human rights.
"And our approach is that we would increase our dialogue in order to have a better understanding of each other. And we are also determined not to let those differences afflict our overall, larger interest," President Triet said.
In November 2006 the World Trade Organisation's General Council approved Vietnam's accession package and the country became the WTO's 150th member on 11 January 2007, an event viewed as its major achievement in general and which also marked in particular the completion of the full normalisation of the economic relations between Vietnam and the United States.
Vietnam-US relations: Chronological Overview (Part 2)
Vietnam partners the world
Vietnam joined the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in 1995, and began implementing the roadmap of the ASEAN Free Trade Area (AFTA) while making significant contributions to the group's development by actively participating in all activities and often coming up with initiatives for actions. At the 6th ASEAN Summit in Hanoi in December 1998, Vietnam introduced the Ha Noi Plan of Action to help translate the Vision 2000, an ideological groundwork to establish an ASEAN Community, into real action.
The United States is working actively to implement elements of the ASEAN-U.S. Enhanced Partnership agreement, which was adopted in July 2006. The United States has also negotiated a Trade and Investment Framework Agreement (TIFA) with ASEAN and a Free Trade Agreement (FTA) with Singapore, and has begun FTA negotiations with Malaysia and Thailand. In addition, the U.S. Pacific Command is deeply involved in military exchanges and joint drills with a number of Southeast Asian nations.
In the relationship with the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC), Vietnam gained its membership in 1998 and has since been actively participating in the forum. At the APEC summit hosted in November 2006 in Hanoi, which was attended by leaders from 21 member economies including U.S. President George W. Bush. Vietnam introduced the Ha Noi Action Plan that would not only be a guide for economic and trade cooperation within APEC members over the next 15 years, but would also strengthen and improve APEC's cooperative mechanism.
As a WTO member since January 2007, Vietnam has made many economic achievements, thus contributing to the overall success of the global trading club.
Emerging to the world arena, Vietnam has become a non-permanent member of the United Nations Security Council since January 2008 after receiving on the first ballot 183 votes out of the UN General Council's 192 members in October 2007.
In July 2008 Vietnam will take its turn in holding the Security Council presidency, a position that rotates monthly according to the English alphabetical listing of member states. In recent months it has been actively raising its voice in all UN Security Council documents to protect principles of international law and the UN Charter towards respecting independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of nations.
Military exchange, MIA
In one of the earliest military exchanges between the two countries since 1995, U.S. Defence Secretary William Cohen made a three-day visit to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in March 2000. He visited the Military Institute, the Command of Military Zone 7, Air Force Regiment 921 and also went to an MIA excavation site in the northern province of Ha Tay. The United States has opened MIA office in Hanoi since 1990.
In November 2003 Vietnam Defence Minister Pham Van Tra visited the United States and a week later a U.S. Navy frigate, the Japan-based Vandegrift with its 200 soldiers aboard, arrived at Saigon Port in Ho Chi Minh City, the first U.S. warship to make a port call since the end of the war. The events were described in a research to the Congress in late 2003 as "two incremental steps in forming a new, as yet undefined, security relationship."
So far the U.S. military activities with Vietnam include various expert exchanges, annual U.S. Navy ship visits, and medical assistance and training. The two also work to address significant U.S. interest to locate, identify and return remains of MIAs.
Funded by the U.S. Defence Department, the United States helped train Vietnamese in the disposal of unexploded ordnance and demining, treatment of burn victims.
"The United States and Vietnam have shared interests in many areas including a long standing interest in finding persons missing from combat, humanitarian assistance/disaster relief, weather warning and other areas where our interests intersect and we can work together," Lieutenant General Dan Leaf, U.S. Pacific Command Deputy Commander, in May 2007 during a visit that took him to Hanoi and Nha Trang.
During the visit, the Vietnamese delegation asked about the possibility of sending students for study at U.S. military academies, participating in military medicine and information technology training, and procuring replacement parts for existing equipment.
The two sides also discussed opportunities for weather forecasting training that would help Vietnam better predict and prepare for tsunamis and storms.
In April 2008 the U.S. Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command (JPAC), in cooperation with the Vietnam Office for Seeking Missing Persons (VNOSMP), held a repatriation ceremony at Danang International Airport to transfer possible remains believed to be those of Americans who died during the war. The remains were recovered from excavation sites in Vietnam's central region.
The ceremony on April 14 was the 106th post-war repatriation of remains from Vietnam. The U.S. Embassy said in a statement that to date, 883 Americans have been identified since 1975, of them 627 from Vietnam, 224 from Laos, 29 from Cambodia, and three from China.
"Seeking the fullest possible accounting of Americans is a matter of the highest national priority for the United States.
The United States
"In crucial areas such as defence and security, we also have agreed with United States to implement IMET (International Military Education Training) and of course steps will be taken for Vietnam to participate Programme. The first step would be English training or training in medical expertise and other military expertise. After that, based on needs and requirements, we will take appropriate steps to increase our participation. During the visit to Washington, I am expected to visit the Secretary of Defense and will announce this issue.
We also will have an agreement on intelligence cooperation and in our embassy in Washington and our U.S. Embassy in Hanoi, there will be a staff post to share this intelligence, especially intelligence information on terrorism, transnational crimes and money - laundering, and for the two sides to increase the exchange of intelligence."
Prime Minister Phan Van Khai said in an interview with the Washington Post in June, 2005 welcomes and appreciates the cooperation and assistance of the Vietnamese government in both past and future field operations," the Embassy said in the statement.
There are 1,763 Americans still unaccounted-for from the war in Southeast Asia, including 1,353 in Vietnam.
On the other hand, there is also an ongoing initiative for Vietnamese soldiers who died or considered missing during the war. The work started in 1993 when the Vietnam Veterans of America established the task force to gather information from Vietnam Veterans on where they buried Vietnamese soldiers. Since then the task force has handed Vietnam more than 200 dossiers containing information about more than 9,000 Vietnamese soldiers and also helped collect the remains of more than 900 soldiers.
The Vietnam-U.S. cooperation also achieved significant results in joint actions to fight drug trafficking, trans-national crimes and human trafficking.
Effective from April 2007 the U.S. Department of Defence amended the International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) that allowed the United States to export non-lethal defence articles and defence services to Vietnam.
Agent orange and the cleanup plans
Danang Airport. The gateway for international tourists to check on the long, white sandy beach on Vietnam's central coastline, home to the famous China Beach that was once a popular recreational resort for U.S. soldiers. But the arriving or outflying tourists would pay little attention to some environmental work near the airstrips. Only residents knew last year that they should not, for a while, go to the lake north of the airport for fishing as water, the soil and the food chain around the former U.S. airbase have been contaminated with dioxin which was stored there before 1975. The area has been identified as one of Vietnam's largest hot spots of dioxin contamination.
According to the Committee 33, a governmental agency which helps cleanup chemicals used in wartime, during the 1961-1971 period, the U.S. army sprayed around 20 million gallons of Agent Orange and other herbicides on forests and crops in Vietnam's southern and central regions to stop supplies for the northern Vietnamese troops. Three million Vietnamese people and tens of thousands of U.S. soldiers are affected by Agent Orange - a chemical used by the U.S. government during the war which causes cancer, other life-threatening illnesses, and serious birth defects in children - even those born several generations after the war.
"U.S. veterans received some compensation after years of struggle, but Vietnamese victims have received nothing from the U.S. government that sprayed Agent Orange and the chemical companies who made and profited from it." Merle E. Ratner, Co-President of the Vietnam Agent Orange Relief and Responsibility Campaign (VAORRC) in the United States wrote in a report in June 2007.
In January 2004 the Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA) filed a lawsuit in the United States against the 37 companies that manufactured the chemical. In March 2005 the U.S. court judge dismissed the suit brought by more than 100 Vietnamese Agent Orange victims who then furthered their claim.
In February 2008 the U.S. Appeal Court in New York dismissed the petition. Its verdict denied the fact that AO/dioxin produced by U.S. chemical companies and sprayed during the war left serious consequences on the people and the environment in Vietnam. VAVA said it will appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court against the verdict.
"For decades dioxin remained an unresolved issue between the United States and Vietnam. The United States sought to avoid what appeared to be an open-ended liability; the Vietnamese were concerned that pushing too hard might jeopardise their export-led growth strategy and entry into the World Trade Organization. Today, the environmental and health legacy of Agent Orange/dioxin is still a problem in Vietnam, and it also continues to be an issue of great concern for U.S. veterans of the Vietnam War," the U.S. Ford Foundation said in a statement.
In a joint statement issued in November 2006 during President Nguyen Minh Triet's visit to the United States, the two countries said they "agreed that further joint efforts to address the environmental contamination near former dioxin storage sites would make a valuable contribution to the continued development of their bilateral relationship."
Ford Foundation said it was supporting the U.S.-Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin, which brings together prominent persons from both countries who are seeking to increase awareness and resources around a humanitarian agenda foundation's statement said.
In 2005, a project conducted by the United States Environmental Protection Agency and the Vietnamese Academy of Science and Technology since early 2001 to build capacity in Vietnam for the analysis of dioxins and furans in the environment was completed.
U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam Michael Marine said in February 2007 that "the U.S. government understands the concerns of the government of Vietnam and the Vietnamese people about the impact of dioxin on the environment and human health. In response, the U.S. government has been actively engaged since 2001 on various levels with Vietnam on the issue of dioxin contamination."
A $400,000 grant to help with technical support to assist the environmental remediation was announced in his speech.
The U.S. side has since been working closely with Vietnamese researchers to develop programmes for analysing the environment at the contaminated sites and also technical assistance of remediation.
In May 2007 President George W. Bush approved the supplemental appropriation bill for 2007, providing $3 million for the remediation of dioxin contaminated sites in Vietnam and to support health programmes in nearby communities. The Congress has, for the first time since the war ended in 1975, approved the funding.
The total cost to clean up the Danang airbase is estimated at $14 million, according to the U.S.-Vietnam Dialogue Group on Agent Orange/Dioxin and said it gave priority to support the dioxin cleanup and restore the soil at former U.S. military bases, support treatment and educational centres for victims of dioxin-related disorders, help develop a Vietnamese laboratory for dioxin testing, provide training for local communities and also education and advocacy to build support for ongoing efforts.
Vietnam-US relations: Chronological Overview (Part 3)
Humanitarian aid and American NGOs
In March 2000 U.S. Defense Secretary William Cohen made a three-day visit to Hanoi and HCMC.
Three months later the United States pledged $1.7 million in humanitarian aid to help Vietnam detect and destroy mines and unexploded ordnance (UXO).
Landmines and UXO killed more than 42,000 people in Vietnam between 1975 and 2000 and another 62,000 were injured, according to the United Nations.
VietnamÕs Defence Ministry-run Technology Centre on Unexploded Ordnance and Landmine Disposal (BOMICEN) estimated 600,000 tonnes of war-era ordnance remain in the ground throughout the country, contaminating 6 million hectares of land, about one fifth of the countryÕs total land surface area.
In 2001, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Office was established in Hanoi as part of the Bangkok-based Regional (Development Mission/Asia which serves as backstop platform for programmes in several countries in Asia, including Vietnam. USAID said it works with Vietnam to prevent HIV/AIDS, foster economic growth and reform, stop the spread of avian influenza, develop agriculture, foster environmental sustainability, fight trafficking in persons, and improve education, healthcare and employment opportunities for minorities and people with disabilities.
In June 2004, the United States named Vietnam the 15th focus country under the PresidentÕs Emergency Plan for HIV/AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). Now the Emergency Plan-supported programme focuses on six provinces and cities selected because of high prevalence and numbers of people at risk for contracting HIV infection, including Hanoi and HCMC. Combined PEPFAR programmes in Vietnam total $88 million this year.
USAID said in the fiscal year 2005-2006, it allocated $9 million to support efforts to contain Avian Influenza in Vietnam, in addition to $2.75 million to bolster efforts at the regional level. USAID together with FAO and WHO has developed an action plan for Vietnam to support containment and limit the risk of H5N1 outbreaks, strengthen monitoring for importation of the virus in bird populations and enhance pandemic preparedness and planning is for bird flu control.
The United States has announced it will upgrade its USAID in Hanoi office to the status of a full USAID Mission in 2008, reflecting the substantial growth of U.S. development assistance to the Government of Vietnam in recent years and the expectation that the assistance will continue to grow. The amount of assistance provided by USAIDÕs Hanoi office has grown substantially in recent years. It is expected to reach around $70 million in 2008 from $13 million in 2003.
In November 2007 U.S. Ambassador Michael Michalak announced the United States would provide $1 million to help Vietnam flood victims rebuild houses damaged in the floods, support their agricultural production, clean wells and repair water supplies. The money will also be used to he lp children go back to school and provide flood awareness training to them.
Meanwhile Vietnam extended its help to victims of Hurricane Katrina that devastated U.S. southern states in 2005. The Vietnamese government donated $100,000 to help American people overcome the consequences of the disaster and Vietnamese government agencies, social organisations and individuals have also raised funds for the victims.
American non-governmental organisations, which were the first 2 organisations to have arrived in Vietnam after the war ended have also been stepping up their support. They have played an important role in bridging the two countries during the long process of normalisation.
"Without forgetting the past, we have worked through war legacy issues, and we have also built solid foundations for a future bilateral relationship. American companies, Vietnamese companies, our Congress, your National Assembly, our governments, veterans, many NGOs...WeÕve all had a wonderful period working on this relationship and I think we are all extremely optimistic about the future." Virginia Foote, Co-Founder and President of U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council, said in July 2007 when she was presented with the Friendship Medal in Hanoi.
In 1981 Bobby Muller, President of Veterans for America, formerly the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (VVAF), led the first delegation of American veterans to return to Vietnam since the end of the war. After the trip, Muller and VVAF became leading advocates of reconciliation with Vietnam.
As of 2007 nearly half of the 600 NGOs working across Vietnam came from the United States.
The funds of all international NGOs to be disbursed in 2008 are forecast to rise to more than $250 million, up from $235 million in 2007 and nearly tripling the amount in 2000. Fundings by U.S. NGOs alone account for half of the total assistance. American NGOs work in various areas, from education to health care to household economic development and social development.
Another U.S. veterans organisation, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund, launched a $500,000 programme (Renew Project) to remove landmines and unexploded bombs in the central region, one of the most heavily bombed areas during the war.
"VVMF will continue cooperating with the people of Quang Tri Province to carry out Renew project to help solve problems of bombs, land mines, which are threatening the lives of people in Quang Tri Province everyday," Chuck Searcy, Country Representative of the fund, said in an interview in April 2006.
In January 2006, the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Fund brought Danny Graves, the first-ever Vietnamese-born player in Major League Baseball (MLB), to Quang Tri as part of a plan to clear UXO and build the countryÕs first baseball field at a former battlefield.
Dubbed as Õbaseball diplomacyÕ, the event has not brought an American popular sport to Vietnam for the first time, but also bridged the friendship and understanding for the youth of the two countries.
A non-governmental organisation, the OXFAM U.S., granted $2.1 million for planting 2,000 hectares of cajeput in the southern province of Tien Giang.
ORBIS, a New York-based nonprofit, global development organization sponsored by FedEx Express, has collaborated with Vietnam in blindness prevention since 1996. The collaboration has been expanded over the years. ORBIS said it was supporting 14 long-term projects covering 26 out of 64 cities and provinces in Vietnam in 2008. In 2006 it began work to establish the countryÕs first eye bank and also funded the first wet laboratory in the country, where ophthalmologists can practice surgical procedures on animal eyes.
Atlantic Philanthropies Limited, which began operation in Vietnam in 1999, opened an office in the country last year. It has financial commitments to help develop health care infrastructure in the country with a total value of $220 million. It said it would disburse an average $25 million a year. Projects ranged from building and equipment hospitals and schools to upgrading laboratories to various training programmes.
Among the people-to-people activities, Home-Stay Programme jointly conducted by the Vietnam U.S. Society, an organisation formed by President Ho Chi Minh in 1945 to foster friendship with American people, and the Atlanta-based Friendship Force International is viewed as another way of promoting understanding, cooperation and development in peace between the two countries as the programme brings U.S. schoolchildren to live with Vietnamese families and also take Vietnamese people to stay in American homes.
It is hoped that with their wide network of U.S. and international contacts, American NGOs will continue to introduce Vietnam, presenting its people and its policies to the American people and other partners and mobilise additional resources to support Vietnam", PeopleÕs Aid Coordination Committee (PACCOM), a governmental body which connects the INGO network in the country, said in a report.
Vietnamese living in the United States
After the first film of the franchise "Star Wars" came out in May 1977, it became a worldwide pop culture phenomenon, winning the heart and soul of millions. One among them, Duy Nguyen from Everett who came from Vietnam in 1975, has now been shaping his favourite characters in the film using origami, or the Japanese art of folding paper, his childhood game that has made the civil engineer famous as the author of nearly 20 origami books. NguyenÕs career is only one of many success stories sung among the 1.6 million Americans of Vietnamese origin these days, the largest community of Vietnamese people living aboard.
In June 2007, just before President Nguyen Minh Triet left Vietnam for a historic visit to the United States, he said most of the Vietnamese now live a stable life in the United States and "successfully integrate into the local community while maintaining close ties with their homeland." The Vietnamese community in the U.S. soil accounts for half of all Vietnamese people living overseas.
As migrants, Vietnamese Americans have some of the highest rates of naturalisation. The 2006 American Community Survey found 72 percent of foreign-born Vietnamese are naturalised U.S. citizens, up from 44 percent in 2000. Adding the 36 percent who are born in the United States, it makes 82 percent of them United States citizen in total. About 40 percent of the Vietnamese Americans live in California, half of them in Orange Country alone. Vietnamese populations grow fast in other states such as New York, Louisiana, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Illinois, Minnesota, Washington, Florida and Virginia and recently, the Vietnamese immigration pattern has shifted to states like Oklahoma and Oregon.
"I would like to praise those experts and academics who have made intellectual contributions to national construction, and cooperated with their colleagues inside the country in scientific research, training and experience exchange. Charity activities by overseas Vietnamese have been promoted, thus helping resolve social and humanitarian matters,"
Ñ President Nguyen Minh Triet said in an interview with Vietnam News Agency, June 2007 Ñ
Regarded as an upwardly mobile group, Vietnamese Americans have improved their economic status dramatically and lifted themselves above the poverty line.
Unlike Duy Nguyen who has found a way to continue his childhood game, now using computer to diversify the paper folding and could one day fly back his paper crane - symbol of peace - to Vietnam, another American of Vietnamese origin has come back to his home country since 1989 after a self-sponsored trip to realise a dream to return and represent an American corporation in the country.
Nguyen Duy Binh (or Binh Nguyen) arrived in the United States in 1975 and attended colleges in Virginia and Texas. He joined FedEx, now the worldÕs largest express transportation company, back in 1976 when the company was into its third year since its establishment. After the return to Vietnam, in 1989, Binh Nguyen wrote a letter to FedEx President Frederick W. Smith about business chance and proposed FedEx to extend operation in Vietnam. The president, himself a Vietnam veteran who served during 1966-1967, replied in a letter, granting his agreement and at the same time expressed his support to the normalisation process of Vietnam-U.S. relationship.
"I am still keeping the two letters forever," Nguyen said of the letters as evidence for the common desire for national reconciliation.
Nguyen then bridged a contract to form a business alliance between FedEx and HCMC Post and Telecommunications, which are under state-run VNPT in 1993 and soon returned to run FedEx Vietnam operation after embargo lifted in February 1994.
He also helped arrange for the first air carrier collaboration between FedEx, VASCO, and Corporate Air to begin direct service five times a week between FedExÕs Asia-Pacific hub in Subic Bay, the Philippines and HCM City in 2001.
FedEx is running its Vietnam operation now with 247 staff ensuring right delivery time to any customers across the country and links them with the world. But itÕs here not only for business. With Nguyen at FedEx, three schools have been built, books for children and 70 tonnes of medicines and medical aid delivered via free-on-charge FedEx flights, and hundreds of Vietnamese have undergone eye surgery as Õthe flying hospitalÕ ORBIS came to Danang and HCMC several times.
Over the past decades after the war, thousands of the Vietnamese Americans with their great potential in terms of economy and knowledge, have returned to run their own business in their home country. President Triet noted, however, that a fraction of the Vietnamese community there had yet to have the chance to revisit their homeland so they, with a shortage of knowledge, have still been engaged in actions "that are contrary to the nationÕs interest and unfavourable for community solidarity."
Binh Nguyen now is Chief Representative of FedEx Vietnam and has been an active member of AmCham Board since 1994, then Chairman of the Board of Governors in 2004. He also spends time to give lectures for entrepreneurs and for RMITÕs MBA programmes in HCMC.
"I am deeply grateful for FedEx that helped with my career and made me a chance to return home to represent the worldÕs largest express transportation company. I would like also to thank my motherland who has given opportunity and a good business environment to world corporations, small and major, to come to Vietnam and contribute to the cause of developing the countryÕs economy", Nguyen said.
(Source: VN-US Society & Vietnam-US Magazine)
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