VN News (May 20, 1997)

[Vu Thanh Ca <vuca@envi.env.civil.saitama-u.ac.jp>]

Elbridge Durbrow, 93, Dies --  Fmr Ambassador to S. Vietnam 
Vietnamese Art Comes to America
Vietnam's Drug Problem 
84 Vietnamese Migrants in Hong Kong Return Home  



Elbridge Durbrow, 93, Dies --  Fmr Ambassador to S. Vietnam 


By Richard Pearson 
Washington Post Staff Writer


Elbridge Durbrow, 93, whose 38-year diplomatic career included tours in the
U.S. Embassy in Moscow in the 1930s and 1940s and an ambassadorship to South
Vietnam from 1957 to 1961, and who retired with the rank of career minister
in 1968, died May 16 at his home in Walnut Creek, Calif., after a stroke.<p>
His career included high posts in which he addressed two of the largest
diplomatic issues of our time. During his years in Moscow, there were
growing tensions as a wartime ally became the leading enemy in the Cold War.
While Mr. Durbrow was in Vietnam, that country was transformed in American
eyes from a sleepy, largely unknown corner of Asia to an immensely important
stage in a long struggle against communism.<p>
His tour as ambassador to South Vietnam began with Mr. Durbrow attacking
communism as the great menace of Southeast Asia and coordinating U.S.
military and humanitarian aide to a nation whose head was an increasingly
embattled President Ngo Dinh Diem. Mr. Durbrow became disenchanted with the
Diem regime and came to view the inefficient, isolated, undemocratic and
corrupt government as unable to defeat communism.<p>
In his history of Vietnam, historian and journalist Stanley Karnow described
Mr. Durbrow as "a chubby figure with a Rotarian manner" who was a "shrewd
diplomat." Karnow reported that in a 1960 message to Washington, the
ambassador floated a thought that was to become U.S. policy within three
years. He wrote that "we may well be forced, in the not too distant future,
to undertake the difficult task of identifying and supporting alternative
leadership."<p>
Mr. Durbrow's relations with the Diem regime continued to sour. When John F.
Kennedy took office as U.S. president in 1961, Southeast Asia drew the
interest of the White House. Operative theories included the belief that all
Diem needed to win his war were perhaps a few more troops, increased U.S.
aid and a more sympathetic U.S. ambassador. Mr. Durbrow was replaced by
Ambassador Frederick Nolting.<p>
Mr. Durbrow then held posts with the North Atlantic Council and as adviser
to the commander of the Air University at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama
before retiring from State in 1968.<p>
After that, he wrote and lectured on foreign affairs and was a director of
the Center for International Strategic Studies. He was elected chairman of
the American Foreign Policy Institute in 1976 and was active in other groups
involving foreign policy.<p>
Mr. Durbrow was a San Francisco native and a 1926 graduate of Yale
University. He did graduate work in economics and international relations at
Stanford University and the University of Chicago, as well as universities
in Europe.<p>
He joined the Foreign Service in 1930 and was named a vice consul in Warsaw.
He then served in Bucharest before being sent to Moscow, where he was
stationed from 1934 to 1937 as an economic expert.<p>
In contrast to some other American observers of the Soviet state and system,
Mr. Durbrow reported that it was "unprincipled, uncivilized and
undemocratic."<p>
After assignments in Rome and Naples, he returned to Washington in 1941 as
assistant chief of State's Eastern European affairs division. From 1944 to
1946, he was division chief.<p>
During World War II, while hoping for improved ties with the Soviets, he
warned that Soviets would use communist or popular front governments to
satisfy territorial and strategic aspirations in Eastern Europe. He opposed
American diplomatic recognition of new postwar governments in Hungary,
Romania and Bulgaria because of their undemocratic origins. Mr. Durbrow also
participated in the historic 1944 international monetary conference at
Bretton Woods.<p>
In 1946, Mr. Durbrow replaced George F. Kennan as counselor at the U.S.
Embassy in Moscow, where he warned of Soviet expansion and maintained that
the Soviets hoped to drive diplomatic wedges between the United States and
Britain.<p>
He was attached to the National War College from 1948 to 1950, then spent
two years as chief of the Foreign Service personnel division. From 1952 to
1957, he was stationed in Italy, where he became deputy chief of mission to
U.S. Ambassador Clare Boothe Luce. He was promoted to career minister in
1954.<p>
Mr. Durbrow was a member of DACOR (Diplomatic and Consular Officers Retired)
and the Metropolitan Club of Washington. He lived in Washington from 1968
until moving to Walnut Creek in 1985.<p>
His first wife, the former Emily M. Moore, whom he married in 1938, died in
1964.<p>
Survivors include his wife of 32 years, the former Bernice Balcom Helm, of
Walnut Creek; two sons from his first marriage, Chandler W. Durbrow II of
Arlington and Bruce C. Durbrow of High Point, N.C.; and a granddaughter.<p>

BERNARD L. GLADIEUX
Management Consultant
Bernard L. Gladieux, 90, a management consultant who helped set up World War
II agencies and the Ford Foundation, died May 18 at a nursing home in
Oberlin, Ohio. He had a heart ailment.<p>
Mr. Gladieux lived in the Washington area off and on from 1939 to 1993, when
he moved to Oberlin from Alexandria.<p>
He retired in 1974 from the Knight, Gladieux and Smith management consulting
firm, where he was a founding partner in 1967. Earlier, he was a partner in
the Booz-Allen & Hamilton management consulting firm.<p>
Mr. Gladieux was a native of Toledo and a graduate of Oberlin College. He
received a master's degree in public administration from Syracuse University.<p>
He taught and was principal at the American School in Tokyo as a young man.
He worked for urban planning firms in Michigan and Chicago in the late 1930s
and then came to Washington to be a budget examiner in the Bureau of the
Budget. He was named chief of the war organization staff in the executive
office of the president in 1940, where he helped redirect government
operations to wartime. His operation established the Office of Strategic
Services, the War Production Board and the Office of Price Administration.<p>
In 1944, he became chief executive officer of the War Production Board.<p>
>From 1945 to 1950, he was executive assistant to three secretaries of
commerce, Henry Wallace, Averell Harriman and Charles Sawyer. In 1950, he
helped set up the Ford Foundation, where he was the first full-time employee
and administrative manager.<p>
He joined Booz-Allen in 1955, working in the Philippines to help establish a
national budget process for the country.<p>
Mr. Gladieux was later a consultant to 12 state governments and more than 30
local governments, as well as federal agencies, nonprofit organizations and
seven foreign governments. <p>
He was a founding member of the National Academy of Public Administration,
chairman of the National Civil Service League, a trustee of Oberlin College
and a member of the government panel of a business leadership organization,
the Committee for Economic Development. <p>
His wife, Persis Gladieux, died in 1991.
Survivors include four sons, Bernard L. Gladieux Jr. of Gilbertsville, Pa.,
Russell V. Gladieux of Berne, N.Y., Lawrence E. Gladieux of Alexandria and
Jay A. Gladieux of New Canaan, Conn.; a brother; seven grandchildren; and
five great-grandchildren.<p>
CATHERINE R. GREENWOOD
Moving Company Executive
Catherine R. Greenwood, 93, retired board president of Greenwood's Transfer
Moving Co., believed to be the oldest firm in Washington owned by African
Americans, died of congestive heart failure May 16 at Prince George's
Hospital Center. She lived at the Manor Care nursing facility in Largo.<p>
Until 1985, Mrs. Greenwood helped operate the Anacostia firm begun by her
husband, Benjamin O. Greenwood Sr., in 1922. They launched their business
with a horse and wagon, which they also used for a grocery business that
Mrs. Greenwood managed until the late 1920s. The Greenwoods bought their
first truck in 1927 and later prospered with a number of government,
restaurant and hotel delivery contracts.<p>
By 1975, the firm was one of the 100 top black-owned businesses in the
United States, grossing more than $1.5 million. At its height, Greenwood's
employed 200 and had 45 trucks. Mrs. Greenwood became president after her
husband died in 1965, and their daughter, Helen Greenwood Allen, directed
its operations.<p>
Mrs. Greenwood was a native of Washington and a member of McKendree, Simms
Brookland Methodist Church, where she was a trustee, steward and member of
the Pastor's Aid Society and Flower Circle. She also was a member of the
Anacostia Business and Professional Association and the Area Truckers
Association.<p>
She had seven children, five of whom have died.
Survivors include two children, Helen Greenwood Allen of Temple Hills and
Carl Raymond Greenwood of Washington; 19 grandchildren; 15
great-grandchildren; and five great-great-grandchildren.<p>
PAUL DAVID CARMI
Comptroller
Paul David Carmi, 75, who retired last year as Washington comptroller of
French Broadcasting Antenne 2, the overseas operation of the French national
broadcasting system, died of a liver ailment May 18 at Arlington Hospital.<p>
Mr. Carmi worked for French Broadcasting for 25 years. Earlier, he did
public relations work for U.S. drug companies in the Middle East.<p>
He was born in Jerusalem. He was a graduate of the French Faculty of
Medicine in Lebanon. He settled in the Washington area in 1976. He moved
from Kensington to McLean last year.<p>
Mr. Carmi was a member of St. Luke's Catholic Church in McLean.<p>
Survivors include his wife, Mary Carmi of McLean; two children, Aida Yamine
of Vienna and David Carmi of Westminster, Md.; a brother, Marcel Carmi of
McLean; a sister, Laurys Assily of Jerusalem; and four grandchildren.<p>
LOUIS LAVAL HAMBY JR.
CIA Officer
Louis Laval Hamby Jr., 83, a retired senior administrative officer of the
Central Intelligence Agency, died May 17 at Sibley Memorial Hospital after a
stroke.<p>
Mr. Hamby, a resident of Washington and Pawley's Island, S.C., was born in
Columbia, S.C. He had maintained residences in Washington and South Carolina
all his life.<p>
He graduated from Western High School and George Washington University law
school. During World War II, he was a Navy intelligence officer in Honolulu.<p>
He practiced law until 1951, when he joined the CIA. At retirement, in 1974,
he received a certificate of merit. He then worked 20 years as a security
consultant to the Department of Defense.<p>
He was a member of All Saints Episcopal Church in Chevy Chase.<p>
Survivors include his wife of 48 years, Frances Scott Page Hamby of
Washington and Pawley's Island; three children, Sarah Allan Hamby of
Florence, Italy, and Washington, Louis Laval Hamby III of Palm Beach, Fla.,
and Suzanne Veirs Hamby of Southborough, Mass.; and two grandchildren.<p>
ALBERT M. DuGOFF
Oil Company President
Albert M. DuGoff, 68, the former president of Homes Oil Co. in Washington,
died of cancer May 13 in a hospice at Fort Myers, Fla.<p>
Mr. DuGoff was born in Washington and graduated from Roosevelt High School
and George Washington University. In high school and college, he was a
standout football player.<p>
He spent his working career with Homes Oil, an independent wholesale and
retail petroleum products operation. He retired as president in 1995 when
the business was sold.<p>
On retirement, Mr. DuGoff moved to Fort Myers, where he had maintained a
winter residence.<p>
Survivors include his wife, Edith DuGoff of Fort Myers; two children, David
A. DuGoff of Chevy Chase and Sharen Egana of Cape Coral, Fla.; a sister,
Ruth Kaplan of Silver Spring; a brother, Leon DuGoff of Rockledge, Fla.; and
five grandchildren.<p>
GEORGE EDWARD MUTH
Businessman
George Edward Muth, 90, a Washington businessman who operated a family art,
engineering and drafting supply business, died May 17 at Sunnyside
Presbyterian Retirement Community in Harrisonburg, Va., after a stroke.<p>
Mr. Muth was born in Washington. He graduated from Central High School and
received a law degree from George Washington University.<p>
He was a patent lawyer in Washington until 1936, when he became president
and treasurer of George F. Muth Co., and he continued to manage the business
until 1972, when it was sold to Ginn's. After the sale, he was
secretary-treasurer of the new operation for 10 years.<p>
In 1972, Mr. Muth moved to Rappahannock County, Va., and in 1990, he
relocated to Harrisonburg.<p>
He was a former chairman of the board of trustees of Gallaudet College; an
elder of the Sixth Presbyterian Church in Washington; president of the
Washington Boys Club, Washington Rotary and the National Art Materials Trade
Association; and vice president of the National Travelers Aid Society and
the National Capital Area Boy Scout Council. He had been a trustee of George
Washington University.<p>
In Rappahannock, he was a past president of the Hunt Club, a member of the
board of zoning appeals, planning commission and electoral board and a
trustee of the Rappahannock County Library.<p>
Survivors include his wife of 67 years, Lydagene Black Muth of Harrisonburg;
and a sister, Flora Lee Muth of Washington.



Vietnamese Art Comes to America 
PR Newswire
(Copyright (c) 1997, PR Newswire)


WASHINGTON, May 20 /PRNewswire/ -- A new exhibition of art from  Vietnam,
organized and circulated by Meridian International Center in Washington, D.C.,
will tour the United States beginning in November, 1997, it was announced
today by Meridian president Ambassador Walter L. Cutler.  A Winding River: The
Journey of Contemporary Art in  Vietnam is the first major cultural exchange
between the U.S. and  Vietnam since the recent establishment of full diplomatic
relations.  The exhibition is part of a larger cultural exchange project,
which according to present plans also calls for sending an exhibition of
American art to  Vietnam and other Southeast Asian countries.   

Organized under major grants from Mobil Oil Corporation and The Coca-Cola
Company with additional assistance from Caterpillar Inc., the project has the
strong support of official circles in both countries, including that of the
first American ambassador in Hanoi since the war, Pete Peterson, and  Vietnam's
new ambassador in Washington, Le Van Bang.  A number of important
organizations with an interest in the area will cooperate in presentation of
accompanying cultural and educational programming.  This is an important
moment in history, when a new relationship focusing on the future rather than
on the past is being forged by the two countries.  The exhibition and its
ancillary programs will offer a new perspective on the cultural heritage of a
country which has heretofore been viewed primarily in the context of the
conflict which so affected nearly every American family.


A Winding River includes approximately 80 works by 45 artists, men and women
from both the northern and southern parts of  Vietnam.  On loan from museums,
collectors and individual artists, the works have been created in a variety of
mediums, ranging from traditional lacquers to oils, gouaches, Chinese inks and
steel engravings.  Meridian has worked with both  Vietnamese and American guest
curators in organizing the exhibition, which is accompanied by a full color
catalogue.   

In making the formal announcement of the exhibition tour, Meridian president
Cutler said, "Meridian is very pleased to be the vehicle for this important
cultural exchange, which underscores our mission to promote international
understanding.  The cultural bridge which can be built by this high quality
exhibition of the work of many of  Vietnam's outstanding artists can help to
provide for many Americans a new meaning for the word,  Vietnam."   

A Winding River will open to the public at Meridian's elegant galleries in
Washington, D.C. on November 9, 1997.  The nationwide tour will take the
exhibition to six to eight other locations over a two-year period beginning in
April, 1998.  For further information please contact Meridian's Arts Office,
202-939-5518, 5568/9.



Vietnam adopts tougher punishment for child sex abusers 
 
Hanoi (dpa)-  Vietnam has adopted tougher punishments for those who
sexually abuse minors, a move hailed Tuesday by international experts as
an important step in controling an alarming upsurge in child sexual
exploitation in the country.   

Under recent amendments to the criminal code men raping children from
13 to 16 years of age will now face imprisonment of between seven and 15
years.

Another amendent calls for 15 to 20 years prison terms for anyone
seducing children into prostitution, which has become a major problem in
recent years.   

An estimated 20,000  Vietnamese girls are ``victims of prostitution''
nowadays, representing roughly 15 per cent of all prostitutes in the
country, according to the United Nations.   

Rape of children is also on the rise although no official nationwide
figures have been made available.   

``By adopting this month new and more severe sanctions for those who
sexually abuse children, the  Vietnamese National Assembly has shown its
determination to end this unberable plight,'' said Rima Salah, the chief
representative of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in  Hanoi. 

UNICEF has been working with the  Vietnamese government to develop a
National Plan of Action to protect children from sexual abuse,
exploitative labour and drug abuse, and this is expected to be adopted
sometime next month.   

Despite strong central government committment to do more to protect
vulnerable children, actual implmemtation has been rather weak to date,
UNICEF officials noted, and there is strong public prejudice to over
come.   

Child rape, for instance, is beleived to be vastly underreported
because families are ashamed and want to preserve their reputation.   

``Child victims of prostitution are still considered by the public
opinion as guilty and depraved adolescents instead of victims,'' it
added.   

UNICEF is also supporting the training of police and judges dealing

Vietnamese Prime Minister Visiting E. Europe, Italy 

HANOI (AP)--Looking to strengthen post-Cold War ties with former communist
allies, Vietnamese Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet Tuesday began a state visit to
three Eastern European countries.</p>
Kiet will also visit Italy during his week-long trip, the Communist Party
newspaper, The People, reported.</p>
The prime minister's visit will focus on rebuilding ties with Poland, the
Czech Republic and Hungary.</p>
Kiet's visit marks the first presidential exchange between Vietnam - one of
the world's few remaining socialist countries - and its former allies since
the collapse of communism in Europe in the early 1990s.</p>
Vietnam was heavily dependent on military and development aid from the
Soviet Union and its Eastern European allies in the 1970s and '80s. That
financial support was halted with the collapse of the Soviet Union.</p>
In 1994, the Czech Republic - formerly Czechoslovakia before a split between
the Czech Republic and Slovakia - became the only Eastern European country
to resume financial aid to Vietnam.</p>
Kiet hopes to push for the implementation of several agreements on trade and
investment, The People reported.</p>
Accompanying the prime minister on the trip were about two dozen ministers,
government officials and business executives, the report said.



Vietnam's Drug Problem 

Wall Street Journal 

Hanoi is busy patting itself on the back for what it calls Vietnam's
tough stance against drugs. Yet last week's drug-trafficking trial at which
eight people, including several government officials, were sentenced to
death, looks more like a cover-up than a crackdown.

A court handed down guilty verdicts for a total of 22 defendants, half
of them police or border officials. All were accused of crimes relating to
a drug ring that used Interior Ministry vehicles to ferry an estimated 660
pounds of heroin to Vietnam from Laos. A Laotian who had been caught with
drugs in Vietnam and faced execution revealed the ring to authorities,
winning himself a death sentence reprieve from President Le Duc Anh.


With Mr. Sieng Pheng singing like a canary, the government's case must
have looked like an easy win before an applauding international audience.
But then Vu Xuan Truong, a police captain facing a firing squad sentence
for his involvement in the drug ring, threatened to implicate "extremely
important people." In response skittish Vietnamese authorities suddenly
closed the trial to the public. Passages of testimony that were released
later had whole sections blacked out. Mr. Truong's accusations may die with
him, but their thrust is not difficult to guess. "I will go to hell before
you, but I'll reserve places there for you," he told the police officers
escorting him at his sentencing.

ever mind that it is precisely the secretive and authoritarian ways of communist
rule that cause cynicism about efforts to combat crimes of the type that
were revealed last week.

Shielding the trial and Mr. Truong's accusations from scrutiny makes it
impossible to know what really went on. Not surprisingly, the sudden
secrecy after all the original fanfare has fueled suspicions of a cover-up
of official wrongdoing at higher levels. One of the less sinister of these
theories is that the trial was a token gesture to earn points with the U.S.
and other sources of aid and trade who are looking for results on the war
against drugs. If so, Hanoi should know that tokens will not do. As
traditional routes through Thailand and elsewhere are more closely policed,
Vietnam has become a prime transit route for the Golden Triangle's harvests
en route to the world's addicts.

Nor is this a case where the government can shift the blame to foreign
consumers. Local traffickers are leaving a trail of Vietnamese addicts. The
government's conservative estimate puts the number of addicts at 200,000.
Meanwhile, there are reports that heroin is so inexpensive that dealers are
giving it away to children in order to get them hooked. In Lang Son
province on the Chinese border, urine tests showed traces of heroin in 10%
of school children.


These accounts contradict the tired old Communist Party claim that drug
use is concentrated in the south of the country, where foreign influences
and a more open business environment have attracted "corrupting forces."
Old guard conservatives have used such arguments to support their campaign
to slow economic reforms and keep the reins of power firmly in party
hands.


Never mind that it is precisely the secretive and authoritarian ways of
communist rule that cause cynicism about efforts to combat crimes of the
type that were revealed last week. Only effective law enforcement, not
politically expedient excuses, can defuse Vietnam's heroin problem.


It may be too much to hope for a thorough investigation that would the
extent to which drug smuggling is an official enterprise in
Vietnam--although such an inquiry would surely win Hanoi credibility and
respect internationally. More likely, the best way to fight drugs is to
restart Vietnam's stalled reforms; reforms that are bound eventually to
bring a more accountable government and a higher standard of living that
will leave the population less vulnerable to crime and drug use.


84 Vietnamese Migrants in Hong Kong Return Home  


HONG KONG (Xinhua News) - A group of 84 Vietnamese migrants (VMs)
returned by air to Hanoi, Vietnam, today on the 103rd flight under the
Orderly Repatriation Program (ORP).

According to the Hong Kong government, the majority of the returnees,
comprising 73 men, 10 women and one girl, are from the northern part of
Vietnam. Only three of the returnees are from Central and South
Vietnam.

The spokesman said that many of the returnees arrived in Hong Kong this
year. Some of them came here in 1988, 1989, 1991, 1995 and 1996.

He said that the group brought to 10,367 the total number repatriated
on ORP flights since November 1991.

There are 4,598 Vietnamese boat people in Hong Kong now, he said.

with these issues and the establishment of drop-in centers for street
children, who are particularly at risk of sexual abuse.