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VN News 30/07/97




Vietnamese FM regrets Cambodia kept out of ASEAN: report 
Vietnamese Workers Compensated for Layoffs Caused by Gulf War 
Cuba's Castro gives crocodiles to Vietnam 
Vietnamese Newspaper Highlights - July 29, 1997 
Hong Kong-Refugees: a Problem that Refuses to Go Away 
Coal Mining Misery Darkens Romantic Vietnam Bay 
Vietnam still `attractive' for business 
Remains of two Vietnam-era servicemen returned to families 
Vietnamese Army Delegation Visits France 

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Vietnamese FM regrets Cambodia kept out of ASEAN: report 

Hanoi, July 30 (AFP) - Foreign Minister Nguyen Manh Cam has voiced
Vietnam's regrets that Cambodia was barred from entering the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), a report said
Wenesday.

"We regret the fact that Cambodia was not admitted this time to
ASEAN," Cam said.

"We still support the admission of Cambodia and hope that Cambodia
will be admitted as soon as possible," he aded.

In an interview which appeared in the official Communist Party organ
Nhan Dan and the army daily Quan Doi Nhan Dan, Cam said Vietnam was
"deeply preoccupied" with the situation in neighbouring Cambodia.

However Cam, who returned to Vietnam from the ASEAN ministers meeting
in Kuala Lumpur earlier this week, repeated his country's official
position on the crisis in Cambodia.

"We respect the independence and sovereignty and non-interference in
the interior matters of Cambodia which can only be resolved by the
Cambodians," he said.

Hanoi's non-interference policy is in stark contrast to its position
in late 1978 when Vietnamese troops invaded Cambodia to topple Khmer
Rouge leader Pol Pot and end his four-year reign of terror.

ASEAN groups Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore
Thailand, Vietnam as well as Burma and Laos who were officially
admitted to the association on Wednesday, July 23.

The decision to postpone Cambodia's entry, which had originally been
set to join alongside Burma and Laos, was prompted by unrest in the
country when Second Prime Minister Hun Sen ousted his rival First
Prime Minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh.

fb/jkb

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Vietnamese Workers Compensated for Layoffs Caused by Gulf War 

HANOI, Vietnam (AP) The first of nearly 16,000 Vietnamese who lost
their jobs in Iraq because of the Persian Gulf War have received
compensation from the United Nation.

About 380 workers who were laid off by Iraqi factories in the early
1990s were given $2,500 each as payment for their unfinished labor
contracts, the state-run Vietnam News reported today.

The money was transferred last month from a U.N. fund into Vietnam's
Bank for Investment and Development, which in turn disbursed the money
to the former workers, Vietnam News reported.

A total of 15,992 Vietnamese workers were forced to leave Iraq between
August 1990, when Iraq invaded neighboring Kuwait, and March 1991,
when allied forces under the U.N. banner forced Iraq to withdraw.

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Cuba's Castro gives crocodiles to Vietnam 

Hanoi, July 30 (Reuter) - Socialist solidarity between Vietnam and
Cuba appeared alive and snapping on Wednesday as Hanoi took delivery
of 150 infant crocodiles from Havana.

Agriculture Ministry officials told Reuters all 150 had arrived in
Vietnam in good health. They were sent as an official gift, and would
be used for breeding purposes.

"We've got to keep them here for a while to see that they adapt to
Vietnamese living conditions," one official said by phone.

Cuba and Vietnam are two of the world's remaining communist states and
continue to maintain close relations.

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Vietnamese Newspaper Highlights - July 29, 1997 

Hanoi, July 29 (VNA) - Highlights of Vietnam's daily newspapers today:

NHAN DAN:

- A press conference was held in Hanoi yesterday by the National
Assembly Office to make public a list of 450 newly-elected deputies to
the 10th National Assembly. At the press conference, chairman of the
National Assembly Office and general secretary of the Electroal
Organisation Board, Vu Mao, said that up to 99.95pct of the more than
43 million voters went to the polls, 0.47pct higher than the previous
general election in 1992.

HANOI MOI:

- Germany has agreed to provide $US2 million to a wide-ranging project
to support the development of small-to-medium sized enterprises in
Vietnam.

- In the first six months of this year, the Hanoi industrial sector
mapped out a feasibility study for 20 projects to develop its
production with an estimated capital of VND103.6 billion ($US10
million).

VIETNAM NEWS:

- Vietnam will attempt to procure $US485 million in foreign investment
in an attempt to implement plans for afforestation and forestry
products processing during the 1998-2000 period.

- The Song Hau farm of Can Tho province in the Mekong river delta,
Vietnam's first-ever private rice exporter, has made a modest debut on
the international market. Of the 2.3 million tonnes of rice exported
in the first half by 15 exporting companies, 14 of them state-owned
enterprises, the private Song Hau farm has packed off 65,000 tonnes.

(VNA)

29-07 1544

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Hong Kong-Refugees: a Problem that Refuses to Go Away 

HONG KONG, (Jul. 29) IPS - Months before Hong Kong's handover to
Chinese rule, lawyers and refugee officials were counselling
Vietnamese boat people in camps here to return home, warning that they
may not get a very sympathetic ear from the new Chinese rulers.

However, a new influx of boat people since the June 30 handover had
belied the belief among many in the refugee assistance community that
fear of China would stop the Vietnamese from putting out in their
rickety, barely seaworthy boats for the haven of Hong Kong.

So far this year, 1,218 Vietnamese asylum seekers have entered Hong
Kong, more than the 1,038 recorded for the whole of last year and four
times 1995 levels. In the last two days alone, 34 arrived in Hong
Kong.

Most of the boat people who have arrived here in recent years were
economic migrants, not people fleeing political persecution at home.

According to the Hong Kong government's Security Branch, which handles
the situation, almost a quarter of the 1,700 in Hong Kong's camps have
returned after being repatriated to Vietnam at least once. Of the 34
who arrived in the last two days, 25 have been already been
repatriated at least once, a possible indication of persecution in
Vietnam on their arrival. Some claimed they were heading to Taiwan.

Some have reapplied for refugee status in Hong Kong even though they
were refused the first time round. "Some of them have stronger cases
when they return because of the persecution they faced when they
returned," says refugee lawyer Pam Baker.

Earlier this year, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
(UNHCR) launched a massive effort to try to empty the camps by
repatriating boat people and resettling those granted refugee status.
Several hundred of them returned voluntarily to Vietnam in late May,
in keeping with an earlier agreement forged among British, Vietnamese,
and UNHCR officials.

Most of the 1,000 or so left in the camps at the time of the handover
were rejected for resettlement because of drug problems or criminal
records.

And it became clear over the weekend that those still here would not
leave without a fight. Five boat people climbed onto the roof of Hong
Kong's Victoria Prison to stage a protest against their impending
repatriation.

They remained for several hours shouting slogans, including "We would
rather die than be repatriated!" said a government spokesperson.

China had demanded that Britain clear Hong Kong of Vietnamese boat
people before the handover date, and Vietnam had made it clear that it
did not want to negotiate with China over the issue, insisting it was
Britain's problem.

China and Vietnam are rebuilding their ties after years of hostility
sparked by a brief border war in 1979.

A Hong Kong immigration official based at the British embassy in Hanoi
was withdrawn just before the handover, and diplomats say talks will
have to be conducted long distance between the two sides.

But without any apparent deadline such as the handover date, diplomats
say the heat has gone out of the issue.

However the latest arrivals have succeeded in bringing the problem to
the fore again and has led directly to calls by legislators to abandon
Hong Kong's port of asylum policy.

A government official said Hong Kong's port of first asylum policy
exists "in name only" because Vietnamese immigrants who have been
coming to Hong Kong recently will not be screened and will be treated
as illegal immigrants.

He said boat people have come to work as illegal labor.

"We must send a clear signal to boat people that we are not accepting
them any more," said Hong Kong legislator Selina Chow who has
introduced a motion to scrap the port of asylum policy. It is likely
to be debated next month.

Chow says boats carrying Vietnamese should be "chased away" from Hong
Kong waters.

Legislators argue that this is the only realistic course to stop the
flow of boat people to Hong Kong. But even if the message gets back to
Vietnam, voluntary relief groups say it does not resolve the problem
of what will happen to the boat people already here. Their status is
likely to continue to a thorny problem for both China and Vietnam.

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Coal Mining Misery Darkens Romantic Vietnam Bay 

By John Chalmers 

CAM PHA, Vietnam (Reuter) - With its multitude of tiny islands rising
sharply from emerald waters, romantic boat rides and spectacular
sunsets, Vietnam's Halong Bay gets a "must not miss" rating from
travel guide writers, and the United Nations cultural agency UNESCO
has this giant arena of natural beauty on its list of World Heritage
sites.

Yet this is what a government-run weekly had to say recently about
northern Vietnam's most popular tourist attraction: "Mountains of
dirt and rocks from ... coal mines, some reaching over 200 metres
(yards) in height, are casting clouds of dirt over residential areas
in the region."

That is no exaggeration, as the general director of the state-owned
coal monopoly, Vinacoal, is ready to admit. "We have to think about
how to protect Halong Bay," Doan Van Kien told Reuters in an
interview from the company's head office in Hanoi. "The damage done
there is a consequence of many years of exploitation, to which the
government paid no attention."

Indeed, forest cover in this coal-rich province of Quang Ninh has
tumbled to around 15 percent from 42 percent in 1969, rivers are
heavily polluted and 300,000 tons of coal slurry spews into the sea
every year. The Mine Science and Technology Institute says the
concentration of dust in the atmosphere at coal faces is 10 times
higher than international standards, causing respiratory diseases
among 80 percent of the province's ragtag army of miners.

WORKERS SCRABBLE FOR COAL BY HAND At the Coc Sau open-cast mine in the
town of Cam Pha, where a crater measuring 1.4 miles across has been
gouged out of the lunar landscape, workers scrabble with their hands
for coal as mechanical diggers grind deafeningly beside them. Most
cover their face with cloth masks, which are black around the mouth
and nose.

"I am totally exhausted at the end of every day," said 31-year-old
Thanh, who has toiled at Coc Sau for the past five years. "Sometimes
I just say to myself that I won't go back the next day."

But he always does -- to earn his $60 a month. Women, who account for
about a third of Coc Sau's 5,300 workers, take home as little as $30 a
month because they lack the strength to carry as much from the coal
face. In an unusually frank article last month, the official
English-language daily Vietnam News asked whether authorities really
cared about the lives of women working in the mines.

"Career diseases are not uncommon to them, especially respiratory
diseases, tuberculosis and rheumatism," it said. "Many workers die
before they become eligible for a pension."

But Kien says Vinacoal does care about its 70,000 employees, all but
10,000 of whom live in Quang Ninh. He said huge efforts were being
made to protect the environment with the gradual introduction of
modern mining equipment and technology. This is increasingly possible
because revenues are riding high on the back of ballooning output and
exports.

Annual production has risen almost 50 percent to 9.3 million tons
since 1994 and sales abroad have grown even faster -- to 3.6 million
tons in 1996 -- making Vietnam the world's top exporter of anthracite.

A KEEN SENSE OF DUTY The company's revenue last year was around $300
million, but because of cheap domestic prices and a policy of keeping
mines that are not economically viable open to protect jobs, its
profit was just $4 million.

Kien says the company has a keen sense of duty to provide the people
of Quang Ninh with a living as creeping mechanization threatens to
make manual labor redundant. "If we lay off 10,000 or 20,000 workers
this would have a very bad impact on society," he said, reeling off a
list of other industries to which Vinacoal has turned its hand.

The company is setting up a cement factory and has invested in the
textiles trade, brewing, soft drinks, hotels and tourism including
even pleasure boats in Halong Bay. Today, these new areas account for
22 percent of Vinacoal's revenue, but by 2000 it hopes that figure
will have risen to at least 30 percent.

The promise of cleaner and easier jobs may have come too late for tens
of thousands in Quang Ninh. But at least there is hope for their
children.

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Vietnam still `attractive' for business 

The New Straits Times
07/29/97

Vietnam still offers attractive business opportunities for investors
despite its bureaucracy and red tape, said Sungeiway Group president
and chief executive officer Tan Sri Jeffrey Cheah.

"Bureaucracy is everywhere. The country has lots of business potential
for Malaysian companies, if they have the patience and vision. That is
my personal view," Cheah said.

Speaking to reporters at the 3rd Langkawi International Dialogue
yesterday, he said Malaysian investors must anticipate problems
whenever they ventured overseas.

"If one thinks it is easy to invest in another country with the hope
of making it (profits) quickly, without being patient and hardworking,
he is mistaken," he said.

" Vietnam is now part of Asean and they would want to work with the
other members like Malaysia, Thailand and Singapore to enable the
country to grow.

"How will they grow if they close their doors (to foreign investors)?
They know that to develop, their doors should be open to foreign
investors."

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Remains of two Vietnam-era servicemen returned to families 

Armed Forces Newswire Service
07/29/97
(c) 1997 Phillips Business Information, Inc.

The Pentagon announced yesterday that the remains of two American
servicement previously unacounted for from Southeast Asia have been
identified and are being returned to their families for burial in the
U.S.

They are identified as Maj. James B. East, USAF of Oklahoma City, Ok,
and Lt. Col. Thomas R. Morgan, USAF, of Akron, Ohio.

On April 26, 1969, East was attacking an enemy mortar position in Laos
when his A-1J Skyraider was struck by enemy ground fire. The aircraft
crashed and exploded.

On January 26, 1967, Morgan was conducting a strike mission over a
target in South Vietnam. As the attack began, pilots in other aircraft
observed smoke trailing from Morgan's F100D Super Sabre. His plane
burst into flames and broke in half prior to impact.

With the identification of these two servicemen, there remains 2,116
unaccounted for Americans from the Vietnam War.

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Vietnamese Army Delegation Visits France 

Xinhua English Newswire
07/29/97

A high-ranking Vietnamese army delegation today began a three-day
visit to France to promote military cooperation.

During the visit, Vietnamese Defense Minister Doan Khue, who is
heading the delegation, will sign an agreement with his French
counterpart, Alain Richard, on "administrative arrangement" in the
field of defense," AFP quoted French officials as saying.

Meanwhile, French President Jacques Chirac, in his 50-minute meeting
with Khue, described French- Vietnamese relations as "friendly and
trustful," according to French presidential spokeswoman Catherine
Colonna.

Chirac confirmed that he will pay a state visit to Vietnam on November
14, before attending a summit of French-speaking countries in Hanoi on
November 15-16.

The Vietnamese army is seeking cooperation with Western countries,
including France, Japan and the United States, in technology and
personnel training, the AFP reported.

Khue, who is on a four-nation European tour including Poland, the
Czech Republic and Bulgaria, will also visit French navy and air force
bases in the southern cities of Toulon, Hyeres and Orange.

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