VN News (Apr. 17, 1997)

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

April 17: Vietnam military set to be main organizer of mass labour scheme 
April 17: Vietnam, U. S. Take New Step with Accord 
April 17: HK presses on with return of Vietnam boatpeople 
April 17: Vietnam asks US for leniency on proprosed trade agreement
April 16: Vietnam steps up state surveillance powers 


Vietnam military set to be main organizer of mass labour
scheme 

Hanoi (dpa) - The Vietnamese army will be put in charge of mobilizing
up to a million ``volunteer'' labourers to work on major
infrastructure projects over the next few years, according to official
reports Thursday.

The country's national assembly is currently working on specific
regulations to govern the mandatory labour contribution from virtually
all working-age Vietnamese, including females.

Top Vietnamese leaders have identified a number of key infrastructure
projects that will make use of this forced labour scheme. Roughly one
million ``volunteers'' are expected to be involved in the first
project - a new north-south highway.

National Assembly chairman, Nong Duch Manh, said the government would
turn to the army to help organize the mammoth projects.

``I think the army will be able to manage it because it has a good
reputation among the people while its discipline will enable it to
both successfully manage the mass workforce and ensure the quality of
the construction,'' Manh was quoted saying in the army daily
newspaper.

``We have no experience in organizing such obligatory labour,'' said
Manh, even though he maintained that Vietnam had a long ``national
tradition'' of mobilizing the citizenry for public work projects.

The revived labour scheme is likely to demand 10 days free labour from
all males between 18 to 45 years of age and from all women between 18
and 40 years.

In addition to reducing the cost of major development projects the new
scheme is intended to make use of the legions of rural workforce left
idle during the off-seasons.

The measure will also act as a tax on urban dwellers who will have the
option of making an undertermined ``cash contribution'' instead of
having to work in malarial-plagued jungles, where the new highway is
to run along sections of the Ho Chi Minh Trail.
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Vietnam, U. S. Take New Step with Accord 

Hanoi (Reuter) - The United States and Vietnam, marking a new step in
their search to normalise economic relations, said on Thursday they
had agreed to the terms of a bilateral copyright treaty.

Once signed, the accord will give legal protection to U.S. copyright
owners in a country riddled with piracy, and provide similar security
for Vietnamese authors and producers in the United States.

``This historic agreement creates, for the first time, a legal
framework to protect the artistic, musical, literary, cinematic,
choreographic, computer software and other works of both countries
from copyright infringement,'' the United States Information Service
said in a statement.

It said the agreement would be signed shortly, after both sides had
approved authoritative Vietnamese and English texts, and would go into
effect not more than six months after signing.

Hammered out after three days of negotiations in Hanoi, the agreement
nudges the two former foes towards their elusive goal of normalising
economic relations.

Hanoi and Washington normalised diplomatic ties in 1995, but progress
on a full trade deal, which would lead to most-favoured nation (MFN)
trading status for Vietnam, has been slow.

Joseph Damond, chief negotiator from the U.S. trade mission in Hanoi,
said the copyright deal was ``a good start,'' but gave no date for
likely full economic normalisation.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Tran Quang Hoan announced the copyright
agreement without any ceremony at a news briefing and, when asked
about progress on a comprehensive trade deal, said Washington should
make less rigorous demands.

``...it is our opinion that the United States should take into
consideration Vietnam's specific conditions. Vietnam is a developing
country and is still a poor country,'' Hoan said.

His comment echoed those made by other Vietnamese officials when U.S.
Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin -- visiting Hanoi last week -- made
repeated calls for the communist country to speed up liberalisation of
its trade and investment regimes.

The International Intellectual Property Alliance (IIPA), a coalition
of associations representing U.S. industries, issued a statement
hailing the copyright agreement.

``This piracy problem must be tackled immediately if U.S.-Vietnam
trade relations are ever to grow,'' it said. ``The signing of this
treaty could be just the breakthrough that is needed.''

IIPA said piracy of copyright materials was inflicting over $50
million in trade losses a year and threatening the potential for U.S.
exports to one of the world's fastest growing markets.

Copies of foreign compact discs sell in stores for around $2 each and
the U.S. computer giant Microsoft Corp said last December an estimated
99 percent of software in Vietnam was pirated.

However, foreign business executives said there was no accurate way of
measuring the opportunity cost of piracy in Vietnam and other poor
countries because if unpirated CDs and software were sold at full
price, sales would plummet.

``It's not easy to tell how much you would sell at normal prices, but
I'm sure it would be pretty low,'' said one source.
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HK presses on with return of Vietnam boatpeople 

HONG KONG (Reuter) - Hong Kong and Vietnam are pressing ahead with
plans to screen and repatriate thousands of remaining boatpeople in
the territory before it reverts to Chinese rule, the Hong Kong
government said on Thursday.

``The Vietnamese government has recently stepped up clearances for the
return of Vietnamese migrants. We are making every effort to
repatriate the Vietnamese migrants as soon as possible,'' the
government said in a statement.

The statement followed a warning from a Vietnamese immigration
official in Hanoi on Wednesday that Hong Kong's repatriation programme
could be cancelled due to footdragging by Britain and Hong Kong over
signing an agreement on the issue.

But the Hong Kong government said it had not received any such word
from Vietnam and declined to comment on media reports.

Some 4,800 boatpeople are languishing in Hong Kong, most of them in
closed camps, and China has said it wants all of them out of the
territory before it takes over at midnight on June 30.

Some 1,300, listed as refugees, are awaiting resettlement in a third
country. Up to 2,000 have been told by Hanoi that they would be
accepted back and are awaiting repatriation.

The remaining 1,500 are being screened for Hanoi's acceptance, said
Preeta Law, a spokeswoman with the United Nations High Commissioner
for Refugees (UNHCR).

During a meeting involving officials from Hong Kong, Vietnam and the
UNHCR in Hanoi in March, all parties agreed to try to clear Hong
Kong's camps by May 31, Law said.

``There's a Vietnamese delegation here interviewing people who are not
yet cleared with the view to clearing them as soon as possible...in
time for them to be able to return by May 31,'' Law said.

Vietnam on Thursday called for Hong Kong and the United Nations to
quicken the return of boatpeople in Hong Kong.

``Vietnam has urged the British/Hong Kong side and the United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to accelerate efforts to
repatriate to Vietnam all the refugees it had agreed to take
back...,'' the official Vietnam News Agency said.

In a reference to the March meeting, however, the agency said Hanoi
proposed April 15 as a target date for the roughly 2,500 detainees now
cleared for repatriation.

However, a source who attended the meeting said Vietnam had already
accepted that date was unrealistic.

``I don't know why they are putting the date up again,'' said the
source, who declined to be identified. ``Perhaps it's a question of
tactics.''
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Vietnam asks US for leniency on proprosed trade agreement

By Frederik Balfour

Hanoi (AFP) - The United States should consider Vietnam's "special
circumstances" and show flexibility in talks on a proposed trade
accord, a foreign ministry spokesman said here Thursday.

"Vietnam is still developing and is still a poor country," the
spokesman said, adding there were still differences "in the level of
development and existence of laws," between the two countries.

US trade officials, led by chief-negotiator Joseph Damond, wrapped up
three days of talks here Wednesday saying the two sides still had a
long way to go before reaching an agreement.

He said there were certain issues on which the US had no intention of
showing leniency.

Nevertheless, the talks ended on an upbeat note with the announcement
that a deal had been reached on copyright protection.

But despite the goodwill generated, the two sides still have a long
way to go on a full trade deal, negotiators said.

"We insist that imports be accorded national treatment. There is no
room for flexibility on that," a US representative told AFP.

Vietnam is increasingly optimistic about the prospects for a full
normalisation of trade ties a week after the agreement to schedule 145
million dollars of debt incurred by the former Saigon regime.

Ties were also boosted when the US Senate finally confirmed former war
prisoner, Douglas "Pete" Peterson as the first US ambassador to
Vietnam since the Vietnam war.

The next round of talks is expected to take place in Washington as
early as this summer, when the Vietnamese will respond to the draft
agreement presented to them in Hanoi this week, US officials said.

The most ticklish issue, says one official familiar with the draft, is
the question of national treatment for US businesses.

"Maybe the sound of it bothers them. The idea of treating US companies
like they were Vietnamese is really tough for them," he said before
negotiations began.

A Hanoi-based US lawyer familiar with the accord said the two sides
were still "miles apart.".

He said provisions that would open the Vietnamese market to foreign
investors would be particularly difficult for Hanoi to swallow.

Analysts say the US will meet stiff resistance from government
ministries which control state-owned enterprises (SOEs) that have the
most to lose from foreign competition.

"They have deep vested interests (in preserving the status quo). The
same guys who own the SOEs are the ones negotiating," said a US source
close to the talks.

Vietnam has a thicket of tariffs and non-tariff trade barriers which
must be harmonized to conform with the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations (ASEAN) free trade area by 2006.

The most protected industries include steelmaking, telecommunications
and transport.

Negotiators say Vietnam has far more to gain than the US in the short
run in the event of an agreement.

With a ballooning trade deficit --more than 4 billion last year, worth
about 17 percent of GDP-- Hanoi is desperate to boost exports.

A trade accord would pave the way for Vietnam to receive Most Favoured
Nation status (MFN), opening the US market to a flood of cheap, labour
intensive Vietnamese goods.

Approved US investment in Vietnam is currently about 600 million
dollars, but the figure is expected to fall by around a third over a
reported decision by Chrysler Corp. to pull out of a 192 million
dollar car assembly project.

In comparison, the total approved investment of the Korean Daewoo
Corp. tops one billion dollars.

Two-way trade between Vietnam and the US last year was worth about one
billion dollars.
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Vietnam steps up state surveillance powers 

Hanoi (Reuters) - Vietnam said Wednesday it was arming its powerful
Interior Ministry with new extra-judicial powers to place citizens
suspected of endangering national security under police surveillance.

An official with the central Government Office told Reuters a decree
signed this week gave the state police agency the power to monitor
people ``who cause social disorder,'' but whose offenses were not
sufficient to warrant a criminal trial.

He said the aim was to control offenders involved in petty crime.
However, another official said later the decree targeted people seen
as a threat to state security.

``The objective of this decree is narrow. It's aimed at people whose
activities might impact national security,'' said the official, who
declined to be identified.

Vietnam's existing criminal code allows for police surveillance
following conviction by a court.

However, the U.S. State Department noted in its annual report on human
rights earlier this year that the government continued ``to operate a
nationwide system of surveillance and control'' through block wardens
and informants.

It said anecdotal evidence suggested monitoring was more heavy-handed
in Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon.

Officials said the decree would come into effect at the end of April.
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