VN news (Apr 5-6) (2)

[Dam Son <son@fermi.phys.washington.edu>]

Many Vietnamese boat people face Hong Kong Deportation 
Two netted in growing Vietnam police drugs scandal 
Vietnamese spare cats, save crops 
China denies rig movement ahead of talks with Vietnam 
Vietnam must mobilize millions in compulsory labour: party chief
Three dissidents interrogated by Vietnamese police 
U.S., Vietnam ties approach milestone on long road 
China's Jiang Says Vietnam Friendship Should Be Strengthened 
Rights group warns of crackdown in Vietnam 


Two netted in growing Vietnam police drugs scandal 

Hanoi (Reuter) -- Two more policemen have been arrested in connection
with a widening drugs scandal involving members of the country's
powerful security apparatus, local authorities in northwest Vietnam
said on Friday.

An official in the mountainous Lai Chau province, which borders China
and Laos, told Reuters the two men had used official cars last year to
ferry five-and six-kg (11- and 13-pound) packages of heroin between
the area and Hanoi.

They were caught in a joint operation in late March involving local
security officers and police investigators from Hanoi, he said.

The arrests mark a further expansion of a scandal that surfaced last
year when a convicted Laotian drugs trafficker broke down in front of
a firing squad and begged for his life to be spared in return for
information.

Since then some 30 people have been arrested, including senior police
officials at Hanoi's Interior Ministry, border guards and others.

The case is expected to come to trial soon.

Vietnam's security apparatus may be the most powerful agency in the
communist country, with many of its officers having received training
in former Soviet-bloc countries prior to the collapse of East Europe's
communist governments.

The government says it is concerned that Vietnam is being targeted by
international drugs rings as a conduit and market for illegal
narcotics from Laos and China.

Two Hong Kong men and a Canadian woman have been sentenced to death in
recent weeks for trafficking heroin.
  ___________________________________

Vietnamese spare cats, save crops 

Hanoi (AP) -- Cats in northern Vietnam are off the menu and on the
prowl.

In Thai Binh province, where cats are a delicacy, authorities have
banned felines from restaurant menus to preserve them for rat-hunting
duty, official media reported today.

Millions of ravenous rats in Thai Binh have been devouring rice crops
by the acre. And farmers are turning to their dwindling cat population
for help.

``So many cats have been sold for food, few are left in the
villages,'' the state-controlled New Hanoi newspaper quoted local
officials as saying.

The newspaper said many cats are smuggled from Thai Binh to China
where restaurant-owners offer higher prices for the meat.

The Red River delta province of Thai Binh, about 70 miles southeast of
Hanoi, is the biggest rice-producing area in northern Vietnam.
  ___________________________________

China denies rig movement ahead of talks with Vietnam 

BEIJING (AFP) - China denied Friday that an offshore oil rig drilling
in waters claimed by Vietnam had moved out of the area ahead of a
meeting between Beijing and Hanoi on the dispute.

"The Kantan III oil rig is carrying out normal activities in Chinese
waters," said a high-level China National Offshore Oil Corp. official
directly involved with the controversial drilling project.

"I have nothing more to say on this issue," he said, speaking on the
condition of anonymity.

Foreign media reports earlier Friday said that China had withdrawn the
oil rig from the contested area in the South China Sea.

China and Vietnam will meet in Beijing on April 9 to discuss the
dispute, which flared on March 7 when the Chinese oil rig moved into
the contested area prompting Vietnam to demand that China move it.

In Hanoi, the head of the Vietnamese negotiating team, Nguyen Ba Son,
said Friday that he had not received any notification of the rig's
removal.

Son, who is deputy director of the International Law and Treaties
Department of the Foreign Ministry in Hanoi, said discussions would
still go ahead as planned.

Vietnam and China both claim the territory where the Kantan III rig is
operating which is a potentially gas rich area 64.5 nautical miles
(119 kilometres) from Vietnam's coast and 71 nautical miles (130
kilometres) from China's Hainan Island.
  ___________________________________

Vietnam must mobilize millions in compulsory labour: party
chief

Hanoi (AFP) - Vietnam needs to engage millions of people in a
compulsory labour scheme to help rebuild the country's tattered
infrastructure, Communist Party Chief Do Muoi was quoted as saying in
a report Friday.

Speaking to reporters on April 2, Do Muoi said compulsory labour was
obligatory for young people and rejected allegations that such a plan
violated human rights, the official Communist Party organ Nhan Dan
said.

"At the moment the obligation of youth is to voluntarily participate
in the building of the country," Muoi was quoted as saying.

Sources in Hanoi said that the National Assembly is expected to
approve this month a programme requiring men, aged 18 to 45, and
women, aged 18 to 40, to contribute 10 days of free labour a year.

The office of the National Assembly was unable to confirm that the
programme will be ratified.

Those wishing to be exempt from the programme will have to option to
pay compensation, for an undisclosed amount.

"We want to mobilize all our human resources to escape poverty and
develop the country," Muoi said.

The 80-year-old party chief echoed sentiments expressed by Prime
Minister Vo Van Kiet in a speech on Wednesday to National Assembly
deputies.

"We need to increase the contribution of people as we did during the
two wars," he said, referring to the war against the French, which
ended in 1954, and the Vietnam War against the Americans and South
Vietnam which ended in 1975.

"There are a large number of youth of military age who are unemployed.
It is their duty to do something," Kiet said.

Compulsory labour was used extensively during both wars, particularly
to help build the famous Ho Chi Minh Trail supply route for then North
Vietnamese armed forces fighting in the south of the country.

The law making body is expected to approve a nationwide scheme that
will engage millions of Vietnamese, especially youth, to help rebuild
the country's tattered infrastructure and possibly turn the former Ho
Chi Minh Trail into the country's second north-south highway.

Rebuilding the historical 1,800 kilometre (1,116 mile) supply route is
a pet project of Prime Minister Kiet, and is expected to require
200,000 workers annually until 2002 if approved.

Speaking during a recess at the National Assembly on April 2, Do Muoi
said that compulsory labour would be used for reforestation projects
and to build infrastructure projects.

Vietnamese capital Hanoi has already introduced regulations requiring
city dwellers to contribute annually 10 days of labour, or pay a cash
equivalent of between 3.60 and 5.5O dollars for the period, to the
city.
  ___________________________________

Three dissidents interrogated by Vietnamese police 

HANOI (AFP) - Three Vietnamese dissidents were interrogated by police
last week and have been told to refrain from having contact with
foreigners, one of the three, scientist Ha Si Phu, said Friday.

Phu told AFP by telephone he had been interrogated on March 28 by
police together with writer Bao Cu and poet Bui Minh Quoc in the
southern mountain resort town of Dalat.

After a two and a half hour interview, the police asked the three men
to not grant interviews to foreign journalists and to end all contacts
with Vietnamese living abroad.

Phu, a 56-year-old writer and scientist known for calling for greater
democratization within the government and party, was released in
December 1996 after spending a year in prison.

He had been accused of "revealing state secrets" after having been
discovered in the possession of a letter in which Prime Minister Vo
Van Kiet asked the politburo of the communist party to move ahead with
economic and political reforms. The letter had been circulated widely.

Phu told police on March 28 that he "wasn't violating the law" by
speaking to foreign journalists. He had given only two interviews to
foreign radio stations immediately after his release from prison which
focused primarily on the condition of his health, he said.

When asked about his willingness to respect the injunction by the
police, Phu said he had explained that he had to "readjust his
contacts with foreigners and exiles."

"The democratization of the country should be established with
prudence and by appropriate means so that the leaders don't worry," he
said.

For his part, Bao Cu had written several open letters to authorities
requesting the release of his friend Phu and had already been in
trouble with authorities because of his calls for democratization.

Poet Quoc had also taken positions at odds with the official line in
Hanoi.
  ___________________________________

U.S., Vietnam ties approach milestone on long road 

Hanoi (Reuter) - The United States and Vietnam will settle debts
racked up by the Saigon war-time regime when U.S. Treasury Secretary
Robert Rubin visits next week, but progress on economic ties between
the two former foes may be more tricky.

The most senior U.S. economic policy-maker to visit post-war Vietnam,
Rubin will sign a deal on Monday to reschedule some $145 million of
debt run up by the former government of South Vietnam.

Responsibility for the humanitarian and development loans debt was
transferred to Hanoi after the U.S.-backed South Vietnam government
fell to the forces of the communist North in 1975.

The deal, which implements a 1993 decision by the Paris Club of
creditor nations to reschedule Hanoi's government-to- government
debts, was little more than a milestone on a long and stony road to
normal economic relations.

``Rubin and Vietnam will sign a debt agreement, but the visit is
really a signal of a deeper commitment to economic engagement,'' said
Desaix Anderson, the U.S. charge d'affaires in Hanoi.

However, a foreign affairs analyst in Hanoi said he expected no
breakthrough to emerge from Rubin's visit.

``It comes down to political will, and I don't think the political
background is good for full normalisation right now,'' he said.

He pointed to Hanoi's outrage over broadcasts to Asia by a new
U.S.-backed radio station, Radio Free Asia, which the ruling Communist
Party has branded as an ``assault tool of hostile forces'' against its
political system.

U.S. President Bill Clinton lifted a long-standing embargo on trade
with Vietnam in 1994 and the two countries normalised diplomatic
relations the following year.

But since the fanfare of August 1995, when the then-Secretary of State
Warren Christopher raised the flag at Washington's new embassy in
Hanoi, progress on a commercial trade agreement has been
unspectacular.

A trade deal is one condition needed for Vietnam to earn the Most
Favoured Nation (MFN) trading status it so anxiously wants. MFN, which
guarantees non-discriminatory tariff rates on exports would give
Vietnam access to the largest market in the world.

``The U.S. is demanding that Vietnam open its markets. But I don't
believe that Vietnam will be ready to meet those demands, because
right now it's still deciding what kind of protectionist policies it
should have,'' the foreign affairs analyst said.

American companies have flocked to Vietnam since the embargo was
lifted, encouraged by a reform-led economic boom, a market of more
than 70 million people and a cheap workforce.

The United States now ranks eighth among foreign investors in Vietnam,
with about 1.0 billion committed.

But Bradley LaLonde, general manager of Citibank in Hanoi and head of
the local American Chamber of Commerce, said U.S. firms still find
Vietnam a tough place to do business.

``We would like to see access to the market, to sell goods, distribute
our own goods and essentially be treated as national companies. That
means a level playing field,'' he said.

Conditions like that are on a long list of U.S. criteria for a trade
deal, but so far Hanoi has not come up with a timeframe for
implementing more liberal trade and investment regimes.

``They haven't outlined what the overall problems are or decided when
they will do what,'' Charge d'Affaires Anderson said. ``The U.S. is
being very specific. The pace depends on them for the next stage of
the talks.''
  ___________________________________

China's Jiang Says Vietnam Friendship Should Be Strengthened

BEIJING (AP) -- Chinese President Jiang Zemin told a Vietnamese
official Friday that friendship between their countries contributes to
peace and stability in Southeast Asia and should be strengthened, a
news report said.

Jiang told visiting Interior Minister Le Minh Huong that their leaders
will make efforts to push toward greater cooperation, the state-run
Xinhua News Agency said.

The meeting comes weeks after China moved an oil rig into South China
Sea waters claimed by Vietnam, rekindling a longstanding territorial
dispute between the two countries. Talks on the row could come next
week.

Vietnam has demanded that China withdraw the rig it claims has been
operating since early March in the northwest corner of the South China
Sea between Vietnam and China's Hainan Island.

China and Vietnam have clashed repeatedly over disputed territory and
they battled in 1988 over the Spratly Islands, also in the South China
Sea. The two sides also had a brief but bloody border war in 1979.

Huong told Jiang that cooperation between state security departments
of the two countries will contribute to safeguarding their safety and
interests, the report said.
  ___________________________________

Rights group warns of crackdown in Vietnam 

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Human Rights Watch/Asia voiced alarm Thursday at
what it described as a new crackdown on Vietnamese dissidents, citing
the questioning of prominent writer Ha Si Phu and others.

"The interrogations are taking place after a series of highly
publicized corruption trials in which four top officials were
convicted," the New York-based human rights group said in a statement.

Hanoi officials, apparently worried about their government's image,
warned the local media against printing anything that might damage
Vietnam's image abroad, it said.

"There's little doubt that a fresh crackdown is brewing," said Human
Rights Watch/Asia executive director Sidney Jones.

Among dissident intellectuals recently taken in for questioning were
Ha Si Phu, a well-known nuclear scientist and writer; Bao Cu, also a
prominent writer; and Hoang Tien, a writer and pro-democracy advocate.

  ___________________________________