[House Hearing, 106 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
UNITED STATES-VIETNAM TRADE RELATIONS
=======================================================================
HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TRADE
of the
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED SIXTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
JUNE 15, 2000
__________
Serial 106-106
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Ways and Means
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
71-553 DTP WASHINGTON : 2001
_______________________________________________________________________
For sale by the U.S. Government Printing Office
Superintendent of Documents, Congressional Sales Office, Washington, DC
20402
COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
BILL ARCHER, Texas, Chairman
PHILIP M. CRANE, Illinois CHARLES B. RANGEL, New York
BILL THOMAS, California FORTNEY PETE STARK, California
E. CLAY SHAW, Jr., Florida ROBERT T. MATSUI, California
NANCY L. JOHNSON, Connecticut WILLIAM J. COYNE, Pennsylvania
AMO HOUGHTON, New York SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan
WALLY HERGER, California BENJAMIN L. CARDIN, Maryland
JIM McCRERY, Louisiana JIM McDERMOTT, Washington
DAVE CAMP, Michigan GERALD D. KLECZKA, Wisconsin
JIM RAMSTAD, Minnesota JOHN LEWIS, Georgia
JIM NUSSLE, Iowa RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts
SAM JOHNSON, Texas MICHAEL R. McNULTY, New York
JENNIFER DUNN, Washington WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, Louisiana
MAC COLLINS, Georgia JOHN S. TANNER, Tennessee
ROB PORTMAN, Ohio XAVIER BECERRA, California
PHILIP S. ENGLISH, Pennsylvania KAREN L. THURMAN, Florida
WES WATKINS, Oklahoma LLOYD DOGGETT, Texas
J.D. HAYWORTH, Arizona
JERRY WELLER, Illinois
KENNY HULSHOF, Missouri
SCOTT McINNIS, Colorado
RON LEWIS, Kentucky
MARK FOLEY, Florida
A.L. Singleton, Chief of Staff
Janice Mays, Minority Chief Counsel
______
Subcommittee on Trade
PHILIP M. CRANE, Illinois, Chairman
BILL THOMAS, California SANDER M. LEVIN, Michigan
E. CLAY SHAW, Jr., Florida CHARLES B. RANGEL, New York
AMO HOUGHTON, New York RICHARD E. NEAL, Massachusetts
DAVE CAMP, Michigan MICHAEL R. McNULTY, New York
JIM RAMSTAD, Minnesota WILLIAM J. JEFFERSON, Louisiana
JENNIFER DUNN, Washington XAVIER BECERRA, California
WALLY HERGER, California
JIM NUSSLE, Iowa
Pursuant to clause 2(e)(4) of Rule XI of the Rules of the House, public
hearing records of the Committee on Ways and Means are also published
in electronic form. The printed hearing record remains the official
version. Because electronic submissions are used to prepare both
printed and electronic versions of the hearing record, the process of
converting between various electronic formats may introduce
unintentional errors or omissions. Such occurrences are inherent in the
current publication process and should diminish as the process is
further refined.
C O N T E N T S
__________
Page
Advisory of May 30, 2000, announcing the hearing................. 2
WITNESSES
Montagnard Advocacy, Y Hin Nie................................... 39
Pacific Ventures, Inc., Barry L. Clark........................... 54
Peterson, Hon. Douglas ``Pete'', U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam...... 16
Rohrabacher, Hon. Dana, a Representative in Congress from the
State of California............................................ 6
U.S.-ASEAN Business Council, and Cargill, Incorporated, Juels
Carlson........................................................ 45
U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council, Virginia B. Foote.................... 32
Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee, Falls Church,
Virginia, Dan Duy-Tu Hoang..................................... 50
SUBMISSIONS FOR THE RECORD
American Legion, John F. Sommer, Jr., letter..................... 57
Anheuser-Busch, St. Louis, MO, statement and attachment.......... 58
Boat People S.O.S., Merrifield, VA, Nguyen Dinh Thang, statement. 60
General Electric Company, Andre Sauvageot, statement............. 61
Khmer Kampuchea Krom Federation, Lakewood, CA, statement......... 64
McCain, Hon. John, a United States Senator from the State of
Arizona, statement............................................. 68
Montagnard Human Rights Organization, Greensboro, NC, Rong Nay,
statement...................................................... 70
National Alliance of Families, Bellevue, WA, Dolores Apodaca
Alfond, statement and attachments.............................. 71
New York Life Insurance, Inc., Sandra J. Kristoff, statement..... 72
Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States, Bruce R. Harder,
statement...................................................... 74
UNITED STATES-VIETNAM TRADE RELATIONS
---------- TR
ADE RELATIONS
THURSDAY, JUNE 15, 2000
Committee on Ways and Means,
House of Representatives,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:15 a.m., in
room 1100, Longworth House Office Building, Hon. Philip M.
Crane (Chairman of the Committee) presiding.
[The advisory announcing the hearing follows:]
ADVISORY
FROM THE COMMITTEE ON WAYS AND MEANS
SUBCOMMITTEE ON TRADE
Contact: (202) 225-1721
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 30, 2000
No. TR-21
Crane Announces Hearing on
United States-Vietnam Trade Relations
Congressman Philip M. Crane (R-IL), Chairman, Subcommittee on Trade
of the Committee on Ways and Means, today announced that the
Subcommittee will hold a hearing on United States-Vietnam Trade
Relations, including the renewal of Vietnam's waiver under the Jackson-
Vanik amendment to the Trade Act of 1974 (Trade Act). The hearing will
take place on Thursday, June 15 , 2000, in the main Committee hearing
room, 1100 Longworth House Office Building, beginning at 10:00 a.m.
Oral testimony at this hearing will be from both invited and public
witnesses. Invited witnesses will include the Honorable Douglas
``Pete'' Peterson, U.S. Ambassador to Vietnam . Also, any individual or
organization not scheduled for an oral appearance may submit a written
statement for consideration by the Committee or for inclusion in the
printed record of the hearing.
BACKGROUND:
Vietnam's trade status is subject to the Jackson-Vanik amendment to
Title IV of the Trade Act of 1974. This provision of law governs the
extension of normal trade relations (NTR), including normal tariff
treatment, as well as access to U.S. Government credits, or credit or
investment guarantees, to nonmarket economy countries ineligible for
NTR treatment as of the enactment of the Trade Act. A country subject
to the provision may gain NTR treatment and coverage by U.S. trade
financing programs only by complying with the freedom of emigration
provisions under the Trade Act. The extension of NTR tariff treatment
also requires the conclusion and approval by Congress of a bilateral
commercial agreement with the United States providing for reciprocal
nondiscriminatory treatment. The Trade Act authorizes the President to
waive the requirements for full compliance with respect to a particular
country if he determines that a waiver will substantially promote the
freedom of emigration provisions, and if he has received assurances
that the emigration practices of the country will lead substantially to
the achievement of those objectives.
Since the early 1990s, the United States has taken gradual steps to
improve relations with Vietnam. In February 1994, President Clinton
lifted the trade embargo on Vietnam in recognition of the progress made
in POW/MIA accounting. The United States opened a Liaison Office in
Hanoi later that year. On July 11, 1995, President Clinton announced
the establishment of diplomatic relations, which was followed by the
appointment of former Congressman Douglas ``Pete'' Peterson as U.S.
Ambassador to Vietnam. In 1997, the Office of the United States Trade
Representative began negotiations toward the conclusion of a bilateral
commercial agreement with Vietnam. An agreement in principle was
reached with Vietnam on July 25, 1999. The trade agreement, while not
yet signed, consists of four parts: market access, trade in services,
intellectual property rights protection, and investment.
Because the bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam has not yet
entered into force, Vietnam is ineligible to receive NTR tariff
treatment. However, if the President determines that a Jackson-Vanik
waiver would substantially promote the freedom of emigration objectives
under the Trade Act, U.S. exporters doing business in Vietnam are given
access to U.S. Government credits, or credit or investment guarantees,
such as those available from the Overseas Private Investment
Corporation, the Export-Import Bank, and the U.S. Department of
Agriculture, provided that Vietnam meets the relevant program criteria.
On March 9, 1998, the President first determined that a Jackson-
Vanik waiver for Vietnam would substantially promote the freedom of
emigration objectives under the Trade Act. On April 7, 1998, the
President issued Executive Order 13079, under which the waiver entered
into force. The renewal procedure under the Trade Act requires the
President to submit to Congress a recommendation for a 12-month
extension no later than 30 days prior to the waiver's expiration. On
June 3, 1998, the President renewed Vietnam's waiver for the next 12-
month period. On June 3, 1999, the President issued another 12-month
waiver. The President is expected to issue a waiver for the next 12-
month period by June 3, 2000. Once renewed, the new waiver authority
will continue in effect unless disapproved by Congress within 60
calendar days after the expiration of the existing waiver. Disapproval,
should it occur, would take the form of a joint resolution disapproving
of the President's waiver determination. In the first session of the
106th Congress, a resolution of disapproval, H.J. Res. 58 , was
considered and failed by a vote of 130 to 297.
In 1999, two-way trade between the United States and Vietnam was
valued at $900 million. U.S. exports to Vietnam last year totaled $291
million, and U.S. imports from Vietnam equaled $609 million. Top U.S.
exports included machinery and transportation equipment, and chemicals
and related products. Top U.S. imports from Vietnam in 1999 included
food and live animals, and miscellaneous manufactured articles.
In announcing the hearing, Chairman Crane stated: ``This hearing
will provide the Subcommittee with an opportunity to review Vietnam's
Jackson-Vanik waiver and emigration policies. It is also an occasion to
assess the progress that has been made on accounting for our soldiers
missing in action.
In addition, I look forward to this chance to review the status of
the pending bilateral trade agreement, which must be signed and
approved by Congress before NTR can be extended to Vietnam.''
FOCUS OF THE HEARING:
The focus of the hearing will be to evaluate U.S. trade relations
with Vietnam and to consider the renewal of Vietnam's waiver under the
Jackson-Vanik amendment to the Trade Act. The Subcommittee is
interested in receiving testimony about Vietnam's emigration policies
and practices and on the potential impact on Vietnam and the United
States of a termination of Vietnam's waiver. Witnesses are also
encouraged to address the nature and extent of U.S. trade and
investment ties with Vietnam, as well as issues related to the pending
bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam.
DETAILS FOR SUBMISSIONS OF REQUESTS TO BE HEARD:
Requests to be heard at the hearing must be made by telephone to
Traci Altman or Pete Davila at (202) 225-1721 no later than the close
of business, Thursday, June 8, 2000. The telephone request should be
followed by a formal written request to A.L. Singleton, Chief of Staff,
Committee on Ways and Means, U.S. House of Representatives, 1102
Longworth House Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20515. The staff of
the Subcommittee on Trade will notify by telephone those scheduled to
appear as soon as possible after the filing deadline. Any questions
concerning a scheduled appearance should be directed to the
Subcommittee on Trade staff at (202) 225-6649.
In view of the limited time available to hear witnesses, the
Subcommittee may not be able to accommodate all requests to be heard.
Those persons and organizations not scheduled for an oral appearance
are encouraged to submit written statements for the record of the
hearing. All persons requesting to be heard, whether they are scheduled
for oral testimony or not, will be notified as soon as possible after
the filing deadline.
Witnesses scheduled to present oral testimony are required to
summarize briefly their written statements in no more than five
minutes. THE FIVE-MINUTE RULE WILL BE STRICTLY ENFORCED. The full
written statement of each witness will be included in the printed
record, in accordance with House Rules.
In order to assure the most productive use of the limited amount of
time available to question witnesses, all witnesses scheduled to appear
before the Subcommittee are required to submit 200 copies, along with
an IBM compatible 3.5-inch diskette in WordPerfect or MS Word format,
of their prepared statement for review by Members prior to the hearing.
Testimony should arrive at the Subcommittee on Trade office, room 1104
Longworth House Office Building, no later than Tuesday, June 13, 2000.
Failure to do so may result in the witness being denied the opportunity
to testify in person.
WRITTEN STATEMENTS IN LIEU OF PERSONAL APPEARANCE:
Any person or organization wishing to submit a written statement
for the printed record of the hearing should submit six (6) single-
spaced copies of their statement, along with an IBM compatible 3.5-inch
diskette in WordPerfect or MS Word format, with their name, address,
and hearing date noted on a label, by the close of business, Friday,
June 23, 2000 to A.L. Singleton, Chief of Staff, Committee on Ways and
Means, U.S. House of Representatives, 1102 Longworth House Office
Building, Washington, D.C. 20515. If those filing written statements
wish to have their statements distributed to the press and interested
public at the hearing, they may deliver 200 additional copies for this
purpose to the Subcommittee on Trade office, room 1104 Longworth House
Office Building, by close of business the day before the hearing.
FORMATTING REQUIREMENTS:
Each statement presented for printing to the Committee by a
witness, any written statement or exhibit submitted for the printed
record or any written comments in response to a request for written
comments must conform to the guidelines listed below. Any statement or
exhibit not in compliance with these guidelines will not be printed,
but will be maintained in the Committee files for review and use by the
Committee.
1. All statements and any accompanying exhibits for printing must
be submitted on an IBM compatible 3.5-inch diskette in WordPerfect 5.1
format, typed in single space and may not exceed a total of 10 pages
including attachments. Witnesses are advised that the Committee will
rely on electronic submissions for printing the official hearing
record.
2. Copies of whole documents submitted as exhibit material will not
be accepted for printing. Instead, exhibit material should be
referenced and quoted or paraphrased. All exhibit material not meeting
these specifications will be maintained in the Committee files for
review and use by the Committee.
3. A witness appearing at a public hearing, or submitting a
statement for the record of a public hearing, or submitting written
comments in response to a published request for comments by the
Committee, must include on his statement or submission a list of all
clients, persons, or organizations on whose behalf the witness appears.
4. A supplemental sheet must accompany each statement listing the
name, company, address, telephone and fax numbers where the witness or
the designated representative may be reached. This supplemental sheet
will not be included in the printed record.
The above restrictions and limitations apply only to material being
submitted for printing. Statements and exhibits or supplementary
material submitted solely for distribution to the Members, the press,
and the public during the course of a public hearing may be submitted
in other forms.
Note: All Committee advisories and news releases are available on
the World Wide Web at ``http://waysandmeans.house.gov''.
The Committee seeks to make its facilities accessible to persons
with disabilities. If you are in need of special accommodations, please
call 202-225-1721 or 202-226-3411 TTD/TTY in advance of the event (four
business days notice is requested). Questions with regard to special
accommodation needs in general (including availability of Committee
materials in alternative formats) may be directed to the Committee as
noted above.
Chairman Crane. The hearing will come to order.
Mr. Rohrabacher, we will reserve our opening statements
until later so that we can take your testimony and then go
vote.
With that, Dana, I ask you to try to keep it confined, your
oral testimony, to about 5 minutes; and any written testimony
will be a part of the permanent record.
[The opening statements of Chairman Crane and Mr. Ramstad
follow:]
Statement of Hon. Philip M. Crane, a Representative in Congress from
the State of Illinois
Good Morning. Welcome to this hearing of the Trade
Subcommittee on U.S.-Vietnam trade relations. Today we meet to
examine the 2000 Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam and pending
legislation by Rep. Rohrabacher--H.J. Res. 99--to disapprove
this waiver.
Since the early 1990's, the United States has taken gradual
steps to normalize our relationship with Vietnam. However, this
process has been contingent upon Vietnam's total cooperation
with the United States in making the fullest possible
accounting for our missing servicemen and women.
In 1998, the President issued the first waiver for Vietnam
from the freedom of emigration criteria in the Jackson-Vanik
amendment to the Trade Act of 1974. As many of you know, the
Jackson-Vanik amendment governs U.S. trade relations with
nonmarket economy countries, including the extension of normal
trade relations (NTR). Earlier this month, the President issued
the annual waiver for the next 12 months because he has
determined that such a waiver will substantially promote
freedom of emigration in Vietnam.
Vietnam is not yet eligible for NTR trade status because
Vietnam and the United States have not yet signed a bilateral
trade agreement, which would also have to be approved by
Congress. Thus, the practical effect of the Jackson-Vanik
waiver has been to enable U.S. government agencies such as the
Overseas Private Investment Corporation, the Export-Import
Bank, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture to provide
financing to Americans interested in doing business in
Vietnam--provided that Vietnam meet the relevant program
criteria. This is a necessary first step on the way to full
normal trade relations with Vietnam.
With respect to the bilateral trade agreement between the
United States and Vietnam, the United States Trade
Representative announced in July 1999 that it had reached an
``agreement in principle'' with Vietnam. The agreement is
reportedly comprehensive in scope and generally covers market
access, trade in services, intellectual property and
investment. I look forward to the formal signing of the
agreement and hope that it can be submitted to Congress for
consideration in the near future.
I believe this agreement would provide U.S. firms and
workers with access to the Vietnamese market, which is the 12th
most populous in the world. Such market access also would give
the United States the opportunity to be a positive force for
change in a country in transition and where over half of the
population is under the age of 25. If the agreement is signed
and approved by Congress, Vietnam would be eligible for NTR
treatment.
I look forward to our witnesses' testimony today on a broad
range of bilateral issues and policy objectives in U.S.
relations with Vietnam. I now recognize Mr. Levin, the Ranking
Member of the Subcommittee, for his opening statement.
[statement]
We have a full schedule today and in the interest of time,
I ask our witnesses to limit their oral testimony to five
minutes each. We will include your longer written statements in
the hearing record. Our first witness is our colleague,
Congressman Dana Rohrabacher of California.
Statement of Hon. Jim Ramstad, a Reprensentative in Congress from the
State of Minnesota
Mr. Chairman, thank you for calling today's hearing to
discuss U.S.-Vietnam Trade Relations.
I am pleased that we are once again reviewing the progress
being made in Vietnam on reform of the country's economy as it
moves toward a more market-oriented approach. These policies of
political and economic reintegration in the world must be
encouraged.
Hopefully, as the Vietnamese Communist Party continues to
relinquish some of its control over the economy to spur its
growth, they will also see the benefits of political freedoms
for the citizens. While there are signs of personal freedoms
and considerable power at the local levels, there is
significant need for greater democracy in Vietnam.
Two-way trade between the U.S. and Vietnam has greatly
increased since 1994, reaching $900 million in 1999. I am very
pleased that Amb. Peterson, our former colleague and a true
American hero as a former POW, is here today to update us on
the status of our bilateral trade negotiations and the general
economic and political situation in Vietnam today.
Knowing the crucial value of an engaged relationship
between the US and Vietnam, I want to thank you again, Mr.
Chairman, for calling this hearing. I look forward to hearing
from all of today's witnesses about the importance and
implication of U.S.-Vietnam trade relations.
STATEMENT OF HON. DANA ROHRABACHER, A REPRESENTATIVE IN
CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA
Mr. Rohrabacher. Mr. Chairman, it has been 2 years since
President Clinton issued the first Jackson-Vanik waiver for
Vietnam, allowing for taxpayer-funded subsidies and insurance
for investment in that dictatorship. Each year we have been
assured by the administration and by our ambassador to Hanoi
that this action would lead to greater political openness and
prosperity for the Vietnamese people and a better economic
climate for American investors. Unfortunately, the exact
opposite has happened.
As the Washington Post stated on May 3rd, ``Vietnam remains
a one-party state. Rampant corruption retards foreign
investment, and the Communist party fears more openness to the
outside world could bring in more political heterodoxy for
which the party shows zero tolerance..''
Human Rights Watch recently linked the ongoing persecution
of dissidents and religious believers in Vietnam to pervasive
economic and political corruption. There is no free press; all
information is controlled by the state. Radio Free Asia
broadcasts are routinely jammed.
A recent poll of international businessmen by Political and
Economic Risk Consultancy Group, which is a respected Hong
Kong-based research firm, rated Vietnam among the three worst
legal systems in Asia; and that is saying a lot when you
consider that includes Burma, China, Communist China, North
Korea, and so forth. Official Vietnamese data shows that
foreign investment has dropped by 75 percent during the past
year, and the country's annual growth rate of around 4 percent
has fallen to half of what it was when President Clinton
normalized political and economic relations with Hanoi.
I fully agree with the Wall Street Journal's assessment
that, ``The biggest barrier to growth in Vietnam is, as it
always has been, the Communist party itself. Until the party
sees its way to limiting its own power, Vietnam will be saddled
with widespread corruption and slow economic growth.'' .
Another troubling development, based on numerous reports by
western diplomats, is that Hanoi has sent large numbers of
troops into Laos to defend the corrupt and repressive Pathet
Lao regime from its internal opponents. Thus, we continue to
subsidize investment in this dictatorship while they are
engaged in military action in their neighbor's country. This
military intervention to prop up a neighboring Communist regime
will further deplete Vietnam's economy. But, also, it should
say to the world, we should not be guaranteeing American
investments in that country with taxpayers' dollars.
The repeated promises by Hanoi of economic reform have been
no more credible than any past pledges. There is still not even
the slightest hint of free and fair elections, and that
repressive government is basically still looking to the United
States and foreign investment through businesses to bail them
out, and that is what we do when we grant this status. When we
give them a Jackson-Vanik waiver, we permit American
businessmen to go in with American dollars backed up by the
U.S. taxpayers--to make investments in this dictatorship and
bail them out of their bad policies.
As this panel is aware, the Jackson-Vanik provision
primarily addresses the issue of freedom of emigration for
people who have fear of prosecution and persecution in Vietnam.
The Vietnamese Exit Permit system for immigration, including
for long-time reeducation camp survivors, Amer-Asians,
Montagnards and other people of interest to America, remains
rife with corruption. Many Vietnamese on the U.S. migration
list have not been able to come to the United States because
they could not afford to pay the bribes that are necessary to
get those papers, that paperwork done.
My joint resolution, disapproving the President's waiver
for the corrupt Vietnamese dictatorship, does not intend to
isolate Vietnam nor to stop U.S. companies from doing business
there. It simply prevents Communist Vietnamese from enjoying a
trade status that enables American businessmen to make
increasingly risky investments with loan guarantees subsidized
by the American taxpayer.
If private banks or insurance companies will not back up or
ensure private business ventures in Vietnam, why should the
American taxpayers be asked to guarantee those loans? Rampant
corruption, mismanagement, as well as abuses in the emigration
program, the lack of free trade unions, the suppression of free
expression, and the persecution of dissidents and religious
believers are valid reasons to oppose the Jackson-Vanik waiver
for Vietnam.
Mr. Chairman, we do no favors to the Vietnamese people nor
to American investors by once again reflexively supporting the
President's unjust Jackson-Vanik waiver. I propose that we give
the Communist dictators of Vietnam a strong message from the
U.S. Congress that their corruption, mismanagement and
repression will no longer be, at the very least, subsidized by
the American taxpayers. By supporting my legislation, we can
put the Vietnamese leaders on probation for a period of 1 year.
If they then enact reforms, which they have promised to do,
and begin developing a truly credible judicial system, and they
begin ending their corruption in the migration program and take
their jack-boots, or you might say Ho Chi Minh sandals, off the
face of the Vietnamese people, I personally will reconsider my
support for this waiver next year. I am not holding my breath
on that one.
The Vietnamese Communists have manipulated American
generosity to further impoverish and repress their people.
There is no reason in the world for us to provide taxpayer
guarantees for the people who are investing in this
increasingly risky venture, when there are democracies like the
Philippines who would love to have those investments of those
American companies go to their country instead of this
dictatorship.
Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I would ask, for the
record, to submit several of the articles that I have quoted
about the situation in Vietnam.
Chairman Crane. Without objection, so ordered. Thank you
for your testimony.
[The prepared statement and an attachment follow:]
Statement of Hon. Dana Rohrabacher, a Representative in Congress from
the State of California
Mr. Chairman:
It has been two years since President Clinton issued the
first Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam, allowing for taxpayer-
funded subsidies and insurance for investments there. Each year
we have been assured by the Administration and by our
ambassador to Hanoi that this action would lead to greater
political openness and prosperity for the Vietnamese people,
and a better economic climate for American investors.
Unfortunately, the exact opposite has happened.
As the Washington Post stated on May 3, ``Vietnam remains a
one party state... rampant corruption retards foreign
investment and... the Communist Party fears more openness to
the outside world could bring in more political heterodoxy--for
which the party shows ZERO tolerance.'' And Human Rights Watch
recently linked the ongoing persecution of dissidents and
religious believers in Vietnam to pervasive economic and
political corruption. There is no free press--all information
is controlled by the state. Radio Free Asia broadcasts are
routinely jammed.
A recent poll of international businessmen by Political and
Economic Risk Consultancy Group, a respected Hong Kong-based
research firm, rated Vietnam among the three worst legal
systems in Asia. Official Vietnamese data shows that foreign
investment dropped by 75% during the past year and the
country's annual growth rate of around 4 percent has fallen to
half of what is was when President Clinton normalized political
and economic relations with Hanoi. I fully agree with the Wall
Street Journal's assessment that, ``The biggest barrier to
growth in Vietnam is--as it always has been--the Communist
Party itself. Until the party sees its way to limiting its own
power, Vietnam will be saddled with widespread corruption and
slow economic growth.''
Another troubling development, based on numerous reports by
Western diplomats, is that Hanoi has sent large numbers of
troops into Laos to defend the corrupt and oppressive Pathet
Lao regime from its internal opponents. This military
intervention to prop up a neighboring communist regime will
further deplete Vietnam's economy.
The repeated promises by Hanoi of economic reform, have
been no more credible than any past pledges. There is still not
even the slightest hint that free and fair elections will be
conducted in Vietnam. In that repressive environment, it is
hardly surprising that foreign investors and businesses are
bailing out.
As this panel is aware, the Jackson-Vanik provision
primarily addresses the issue of freedom of emigration for
people who fear or have experienced persecution. The Vietnamese
Exit Permit system for immigration--including for long time
reeducation camp survivors, Amer-Asians, montagnards and other
people of interest to America--remains rife with corruption.
Many Vietnamese on the U.S. emigration list have not been able
to come to the United States because they could not afford to
pay the bribe price.
My joint resolution, disapproving the President's waiver
for the corrupt Vietnamese dictatorship, does not intend to
isolate Vietnam nor to stop U.S. companies from doing business
there. It simply prevents Communist Vietnam from enjoying a
trade status that enables American businessmen to make
increasingly risky investments with loan guarantees and
subsidies provided by U.S. taxpayers.
If private banks or insurance companies will not back-up or
insure private business ventures in Vietnam, the American
taxpayers should not be asked to do so. Rampant corruption,
mismanagement, as well as abuses in the emigration program, the
lack of free trade unions, the suppression of free expression
and the persecution of dissidents and religious believers, are
valid reasons to oppose the Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam.
Mr. Chairman, we do no favors to the Vietnamese people or
American investors by once again reflexively supporting the
President's unjustified Jackson-Vanik waiver. I propose that we
give the Communist dictators of Vietnam a strong message from
the U.S. Congress that corruption, mismanagement and repression
will no longer be, at the very least, subsidized by American
taxpayers. By supporting my legislation, we can put the
Vietnamese leaders on probation for the period of one year.
If they enact the reforms that they have promised, and
begin developing a truly credible judicial system, end the
corruption in the migration program and take their jack-boots--
or Ho Chi Minh sandals--off of the faces of the Vietnamese
people, I will then consider support for the waiver next year.
But I won't hold my breath.
The Vietnamese Communists have manipulated American
generosity to further impoverish and repress their people. I
ask my colleagues to support my resolution.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1553.001
[Additional attachments are being retained in the Committee
files.]
Chairman Crane. How can the United States most effectively
influence the pace and direction of economic and political
reforms in Vietnam?
Mr. Rohrabacher. We should, number one, as Ronald Reagan
did with the Soviet Union, the number one goal should be not to
help them grow economically. Because Ronald Reagan said about
the Soviet Union, every week he would say, what have we done to
undermine the Soviet Union economy, which eventually led to
freedom in Russia.
What we must do instead is what Reagan did, support those
people in Vietnam and in that region who seek democracy and
support communications with the people of Vietnam themselves
who are for a more free and open democratic society. We have
lots of avenues open to us. We should have major efforts
through our national Endowment for Democracy and bolstering
Radio Free Asia, and so forth. That is the way to bring a
better, more peaceful and freer Vietnam.
Chairman Crane. And will that contribute in a positive way
to the fullest possible accounting of POW-MIA cases and
progress on remaining emigration cases?
Mr. Rohrabacher. I think the most important thing that
could bring an accounting for MIA-POWs is the elimination of
the Communist dictatorship in Vietnam, instead of continuing
support for the Communist dictatorship of Vietnam. They have
not given us a full accounting, and I know that there are some
people who have testified to that before this Committee.
Again, let me state for the record, this Congressman has
asked over and over again for the Vietnamese government to
simply provide the records of all the prisons in which
Americans were held during the Vietnam War. They have
steadfastly refused to do that. If we had those records, we
could find out exactly how many men they were holding. They
claim to me and to others who were at the negotiations that all
of those records were destroyed during the war. They have not
given us a full accounting, not by a long shot. The way to get
a full accounting of our men is to try to put pressure on them,
rather than trying to curry favors with these dictators in
Vietnam.
Chairman Crane. Thank you.
Mr. Levin.
Mr. Levin. I think there is much shared concern about the
government of Vietnam. I am not sure there is anything close to
total disagreement. I think it is closer to total agreement
about the problems there. The issue becomes how you begin to
impact conditions within Vietnam.
We have an ambassador there, a former colleague, and I am
not saying ambassadors are always right, but I think our
present ambassador has some special credibility and also a
relationship with us that I think underlines his credibility. I
just urge that you take a look at his testimony--I think you
were here last year perhaps when he testified--and to see his
perspective on how we try to bring about change with Vietnam,
within Vietnam. Because, as you know, his perspective is very
different in terms of how we respond to the problems there,
whether it is the POW-MIA issue that you just commented on or
whether it is emigration issues or whether it is commercial and
related issues. So I just urge that we try to have a serious
dialog on that.
When you talk about taxpayer subsidization, I just hope
that that does not become kind of the rallying cry. I am not
sure how much it really costs, if anything. As I understand it,
there is one OPIC project now under way, just begun with
Caterpillar, and Ex-Im has just signed an agreement, I think it
may be the initial one, where there hasn't been any funding. So
I don't want taxpayers to think that the ambassador or anybody
is suggesting that we provide taxpayer moneys to prop up the
government of Vietnam. It is really, in a sense, the opposite.
It is how to impact change within that country.
Mr. Rohrabacher. Well, number one, I have the utmost
respect for Pete Peterson. I consider him a friend, and he is a
former colleague, but I have some disagreements with him,
obviously. But, again, I hold him in high esteem, and I think
of him as a personal friend as well.
With that said, let me say that I do disagree with him. I
think that you could only judge someone's opinion as how right
it is by how it plays out in reality, and we have had this
Jackson-Vanik waiver now for several years and has Vietnam
become more democratic? No.
There is a definition of insanity, and that is doing the
same thing over and over again but expecting to have different
results. Things are not getting better in Vietnam. I have
quoted many sources here from the Wall Street Journal and other
economic analyses, as well as politically. It shows that things
are not getting better. I hope when Pete comes to testify here
today that he will be asked again whether or not the
Vietnamese--here is a very easy thing the Vietnamese can do to
show good faith on an accounting of MIA/POWs come up with the
records for all of the prisons that Americans were held in
during the war. Please ask him, why, after that has been
requested, have not the Vietnamese complied with that. If they
are dealing with us in good faith, they could do that with a
snap of their fingers.
Mr. Levin. We will ask him about that and your other
comments. I would simply urge, a few years is not a true test
of where a country is going.
Mr. Rohrabacher. I agree, but we have been doing this with
China for 10 years, and it is becoming more repressive. We have
the same pattern.
One last thought in terms of the subsidy that you are
talking about. That is the essence of the argument. If you take
away the portion of what we are dealing with here and we say
you could have everything else but you are not going to get any
more taxpayer guarantees through the Export-Import Bank and any
other internationally financed, subsidized--taxpayer-subsidized
financial institution, saying we are just going to eliminate
that from the mix here, you will find that that is what this
debate is really all about.
That is why the business community is pushing this. They
want a subsidy so that they can close up here and open up in
this dictatorship where they have no unions, they can pay dirt
wages, and they think they are going to have this tremendous
profit by doing it that way.
Mr. Levin. My time is up, but I think Caterpillar might say
to you that the purpose of their project is not to close up
here, it is to help to shape relationships so that what is
produced here by Caterpillar can be sold and used in Vietnam.
My time is up. Thank you.
Chairman Crane. Thank you.
Thank you, Dana, for your testimony. We have no further
questions.
We will now stand in recess subject to the call of the
Chair.
[Recess.]
Chairman Crane. The Committee will come to order.
I want to welcome you all to the Subcommittee hearing on
U.S.-Vietnam trade relations. Today we meet to examine the 2000
Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam and pending legislation by
Representative Rohrabacher, H.J.Res. 99, to disapprove this
waiver.
Since is early nineties, the United States has taken
gradual stops to normalize our relationship with Vietnam.
However, this process has been contingent upon Vietnam's total
cooperation with the United States in making the fullest
possible accounting for our missing servicemen and women.
In 1998, the President issued the first waiver for Vietnam
from the freedom of emigration criteria in the Jackson-Vanik
amendment to the Trade Act of 1974. As many of you know, the
Jackson-Vanik amendment governs U.S. trade relations with
nonmarket economy countries, including the extension of normal
trade relations, or NTR. Earlier this month, the President
issued the annual waiver for the next 12 months because he has
determined that such a waiver will substantially promote
freedom of emigration in Vietnam.
Vietnam is not yet eligible for NTR trade status because
Vietnam and the United States have not yet signed a bilateral
trade agreement, which would also have to be approved by
Congress. Thus, the practical effect of the Jackson-Vanik
waiver has been to enable U.S. Government agencies such as the
Overseas Private Investment Corp., the Export-Import Bank, and
the U.S. Department of Agriculture to provide financing to
Americans interested in doing business in Vietnam, provided
that Vietnam meet the relevant program criteria. This is a
necessary first step on the way to full normal trade relations
with Vietnam.
With respect to the bilateral trade agreement between the
United States and Vietnam, the U.S. Trade Representative
announced in July, 1999, that it had reached an agreement in
principle with Vietnam. The agreement is reportedly
comprehensive in scope and generally covers market access,
trade in services, intellectual property and investment. I look
forward to the formal signing of the agreement and hope that it
can be submitted to Congress for consideration in the near
future.
I believe this agreement would provide U.S. firms and
workers with access to the Vietnamese market, which is the
twelfth most populous in the world. Such market access also
would give the United States the opportunity to be a positive
force for change in a country in transition and where over half
of the population is under the age of 25. If the agreement is
signed and approved by Congress, Vietnam would be eligible for
NTR treatment.
I look forward to our witness' testimony today on a broad
range of bilateral issues and policy objectives in U.S.
relations with Vietnam.
I now recognize Mr. Levin, the Ranking Member of the
Subcommittee, for his opening statement.
Mr. Levin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome to everybody
who is here for this hearing, and thank you for calling this
hearing.
As you indicate, the immediate question before the
Subcommittee and then before the Congress as a whole is whether
to approve or disapprove of the President's recent decision to
waive the Jackson-Vanik prohibitions with respect to Vietnam
for an additional year. I support that decision. It should be a
small, but hopefully, significant step in stimulating forward
momentum in our relationship with Vietnam and reforms within
Vietnam. It will not confer normal trade relations status nor
GSP status for Vietnam. It will enable U.S. producers exporting
to and investing in Vietnam to continue to receive the benefits
of trade financing provided by the Department of Agriculture,
Ex-Im, OPEC and other Federal agencies. Gradually, this should
help to strengthen U.S.-Vietnam commercial relations.
In addition to the immediate question of a Jackson-Vanik
waiver for Vietnam, we must begin to focus more sharply on
longer term questions relating to the future of U.S.-Vietnam
relationships.
Last July, our trade negotiators concluded an agreement in
principle with the government of Vietnam. This agreement
reportedly would be far-reaching in its scope. Vietnam has made
significant market access commitments, agreeing to extend MFN
and national treatment to U.S. goods. It also would agree to
cut tariffs on key U.S. exports and to eliminate quotas on most
imports.
In the area of intellectual property rights protection,
Vietnam would agree to bring its laws into compliance with
standards that, in some cases, go beyond the obligation of the
WTO Agreement, TRIPS.
In the services sectors, Vietnam has agreed to phase in
over relatively short periods of time the right for foreign
firms to establish businesses in areas including law,
accountancy, information technology, banking and insurance.
While the commitments that Vietnam would make in its agreement
in principle with the U.S., while those commitments are
significant, much work, in my judgment, remains to be done.
There are areas of concern that must be addressed as we
consider taking further steps toward normalization of trade and
economic relations with Vietnam.
First, we must insist on improved compliance with
internationally recognized labor standards in Vietnam, and we
must find ways to implement that compliance. The Human Rights
Report of the State Department issued earlier this year states
that ``Vietnam's record in this area is poor.'' in particular,
the State Department observes that, and I quote, ``There were
reports that thousands of children work in exploitative child
labor.'' this must change.
A second area of concern is the pace of economic reform in
Vietnam. Our approval of a bilateral trade agreement would
require reassurance that Vietnam is taking steps to reform its
economy, including steps to root out corruption, enforce
intellectual property rights, and improve the reliability of
government-published data.
I am looking forward to hearing what our witnesses today
have to say on these and other issues, because there are,
indeed, problems in our relationship. In particular, I am
pleased that our ambassador to Vietnam and former colleague,
Pete Peterson, is once again appearing before this
Subcommittee. His perspectives on Vietnam have been valuable to
us in the past, as I am sure they will be today.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, our work is cut out for us. We
may be on the threshold of taking important new steps in our
trade and economic relationship with Vietnam. In the short
term, it is important that we not take steps backward. For that
reason, I support renewal of the waiver for Vietnam. In the
longer term, it is critical that we address these many issues--
these many outstanding issues affecting our trade and economic
relationship with Vietnam.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Crane. Thank you.
Now I would like to yield 1 minute to our distinguished
colleague from the State of Washington, Ms. Dunn.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
I would like to thank the Chairman for his willingness to
hold hearings on this issue, and I support the policy of
engagement with Vietnam that began earlier this decade. I have
long thought that Vietnam should be doing more to help answer
the many questions that families of American POWs and MIAs have
had to endure for well over two decades. This issue continues
to trouble me deeply.
At this time, however, I continue to believe that it is in
the best interests of the United States to move forward with
our relationship with Vietnam. My conversation with many
experts on our Nation's policy toward Vietnam, including
Ambassador Peterson who traveled a great distance to be at our
hearing today, have led me to this conclusion. If we are to
work with the Vietnamese to win further concessions on the POW-
MIA issue and help them move toward a market-based economy,
continuing our engagement with them will only increase our
leverage in the future.
The United States has entered into bilateral trade
negotiations with Vietnam, and it is well on the way to
finalizing a historic agreement. At the same time, I will
insist that we use every tool at our disposal to extract
further concessions on the issue of POW/MIAs, and I look
forward to hearing from Ambassador Peterson on this issue
today.
If Vietnam wants to enjoy the benefits of open trade with
the United States, it must live up to its obligations to
provide access to all POW/MIA records and to make substantial
progress in reforming its economic structure and ensure human
rights and religious freedom.
Mr. Chairman, thank you once again for bringing attention
to this very important matter, and I look forward to working
with you in the future as we continue a new era in our
relations with Vietnam.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Ms. Dunn.
We have a full schedule today, and in the interest of time
I ask our witnesses to limit their oral testimony to 5 minutes,
and we will include any longer written statements in the
hearing record.
Chairman Crane. Our next witness is Ambassador Pete
Peterson, our U.S. ambassador to Vietnam, former colleague of
ours here in the Congress, resident of the Hanoi Hilton for 6-
1/2 years, is that not correct, Pete?
Mr. Peterson. That is correct.
Chairman Crane. And a man who has, I think, special
insights on our relations with Vietnam and who has
inconvenienced himself to make that long trip to get over here
to participate in our hearings.
We welcome you, Pete; and we are glad to have you here
today to testify.
STATEMENT OF HON. DOUGLAS ``PETE'' PETERSON, U.S. AMBASSADOR TO
VIETNAM (FORMER MEMBER OF CONGRESS)
Ambassador Peterson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. It
is an honor to be back with you and your colleagues.
I see on the dais three of my classmates, which would
suggest some success here with the elevation of the Ways and
Means Committee. I also see high-tech coming up with the new
timing devices, which I am impressed with, instead of the old
bulbs, which is rather significant.
This morning, I would like to consult with you once again
on the President's decision to waive Jackson-Vanik for this
year. Since the waiver was first granted in March 1998, it has
been an essential component of our policy of engagement with
Vietnam, and I am confident that this extension of the waiver
will continue to advance U.S. national interest as we deal with
Vietnam.
The one common point here that I think that you will hear
throughout my testimony is that engagement works. We are now at
our fifth anniversary of our recognition of normalization of
our diplomatic relations with Vietnam; and, of course, another
anniversary that we have all just witnessed was the 25th
anniversary of the fall of Saigon. That is the past, and now we
are looking to the future. Getting to where we are, relations
between our two countries have been difficult over the last 25
years, but we are now stepping out into a new millennium with
great aspiration and anticipation.
The engagement progress since 1995 has been much smoother,
quicker, and more sustainable. An example of that is just the
very fact that 500,000 Vietnamese have resettled permanently in
the United States since we have engaged in that program.
It is also significant that we continue to look at the
executive and legislative cooperative process in the
establishment of Vietnamese policy, and this Committee and
other Committees here have been very helpful, and I want to
give you my personal thanks for that. I want to also thank you
for your outstanding support staff. They have been just
remarkable in helping me out and my staff out in establishing
our positions here.
But we are now building a spirit of cooperation between our
two peoples, and we are producing results in the areas of POW-
MIAs, which Ms. Dunn has talked about, emigration, human
rights, and economic reform. On the emigration issue, the
cooperation between the United States and Vietnam has been
excellent. We have completed nearly all of our emigration
processing under the Orderly Departure Program, resettlement
opportunities of the returnees, the ROVR program, the
subprograms of the former reeducation camps, the HO program,
and the Montagnard program.
Since I last spoke to you a year ago, 3,786 persons have
departed Vietnam and resettled in the United States. That is an
example of what is happening in the emigration policy and the
levels of cooperation to be measured between the United States
and Vietnam. I am confident that renewal of the Jackson-Vanik
waiver this year will continue to sustain the excellent
cooperation that we have had with the Vietnamese.
Now, on MIA and POW. This is a very, very significant
program. It remains the number one foreign policy issue with
our engagement with Vietnam, and I am only here to tell you
that we are making significant progress. The fact is that we
have gone into the field, we have discovered remains, and the
Vietnamese, because of their unilateral actions, have enhanced
significantly the works that we are doing in Vietnam. Because
of time, I cannot give you all the details, but in my testimony
you will find where we have been and where we are going.
The human rights area is another area of major concern
between our two countries, and in the last 3 years, the times
that I have been posted to Vietnam, I have seen myself
significant improvements in the human rights process in
Vietnam. No, it is not a perfect situation, and it will not be
for a long time. Much work needs to be done. But I share with
Congress and the American people the deep concern for the human
rights situation in Vietnam, and we continue to keep it as the
cornerstone of our dialog.
In fact, just last week we held our human rights dialog,
our annual dialog with Vietnam with significant results, and I
am confident that that will continue.
The labor issue comes up often. The International Labor
Organization, ILO, is involved in Vietnam. We are hooking up,
hopefully, the AFL-CIO with them for training and to help move
the Vietnamese along in that area as well.
Now, very quickly, trade and economic reform. It has slowed
down, and clearly the reform has stagnated because of a lot of
reasons, but it looks like there is light at the end of the
tunnel. I have been told informally that the Vietnamese would
like to come to the United States to finalize the clarification
of the BTA, the Bilateral Trade Agreement, and it is likely
that we should see them back to the United States within the
next month. Should that occur, it is conceivable that that
agreement could be signed and, therefore, then submitted to
your Committee for consideration later this year.
In conclusion, I would remind you that this is a 1-year
extension. This is not something that you do not get another
look at in the next year. In fact, if you will, it is
significant in the sense that it is a probationary process, and
you will have the opportunity to look at Vietnam's conduct in
all of these areas of which I have touched.
Congressional approval of this waiver sends a vital message
to the Vietnamese that we are committed to the rule of our
policy of engagement and that we do want to have a
constructive, cooperative relationship with Vietnam and that we
want to stimulate U.S. exports to Vietnam, thereby increasing
the job potentials here in the United States. I am confident
that the extension of the Jackson-Vanik waiver this year once
again will further our sense of engagement and further our
national interests as we deal with the Vietnamese in the next
year.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of the Hon. Douglas ``Pete'' Peterson, U.S. Ambassador to
Vietnam (former Member of Congress)
Mr. Chairman, I would like to thank you for once again
inviting me to consult with you about the President's decision
to waive Jackson-Vanik again this year. Since the waiver was
first granted in March 1998, it has been an essential component
of our policy of engagement with Vietnam. I am confident this
extension of the waiver will continue to advance U.S. national
interests in Vietnam.
Before opening our discussion of the current state of U.S.-
Vietnam relations, I thought I might take a brief retrospective
look at the history of our relationship. In three weeks we will
celebrate the fifth anniversary of the normalization of United
States--Vietnam diplomatic relations. This year also marks the
twenty-fifth anniversary of the fall of Saigon. Anniversaries
provide a useful opportunity to put relationships into some
perspective.
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.
Much of what has been accomplished over these five years
can be directly attributed to the vigorous and productive
executive/legislative cooperation that has been developed
relative to Vietnam policy. I would like to take this
opportunity to thank the members of this subcommittee and the
members of the House for their continuing interest in U.S.-
Vietnam relations. Your visits to Vietnam, meetings with
Vietnamese leaders visiting Washington, and other congressional
interventions on a wide range of issues have reinforced our
policy of engagement. The House and its members have made
clear, both privately and publicly, to Vietnam's leaders and
its people that the United States remains committed to enhanced
U.S.-Vietnam relations. Progress on some bilateral issues would
not have occurred without direct assistance rendered by members
of Congress. In that regard, I would like specifically to thank
Chairman Archer, Chairman Crane and the members of this
committee for your direct support and counsel.
Looking back at the last five years, there is one common
theme to everything involved in the development of the
relationship; one factor that should be evident from our
experience in Vietnam--engagement works. On every issue in
which we have been able to demonstrate mutual interests and in
which both sides have been convinced of each other's commitment
to build a relationship, we have made progress. Each side has
made gestures to advance this process--the United States lifted
its trade embargo and Vietnam agreed to assume long-term debt
and settle property claims. Vietnam, by joining the ASEAN
Regional Forum and the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Forum,
signaled its desire to play a constructive role on regional
security, trade issues, and economic development. Vietnam will
take over chairmanship of the ASEAN Standing Committee (ASC)
and the ASEAN Regional Forum (ARF) after the July ASEAN
Ministerial Meeting. This change marks the first opportunity
for Hanoi to assume leadership positions within ASEAN.
Bilaterally, engagement at all levels is building a spirit
of cooperation between our two peoples and producing results in
those areas that are most important to us--POW/MIAs,
emigration, human rights, and economic reform. Vietnam's
cooperation on emigration policy, the test issue for the
Jackson-Vanik waiver, is exemplary. In the past five years, we
have completed nearly all immigration processing under the
Orderly Departure Program, Resettlement Opportunities for
Vietnamese Returnees (ROVR) sub-program, the Former Re-
education Camp Detainees (``;HO'') program, and the Montagnard
programs. Since I last spoke to you, a total of 3786 persons
have departed Vietnam and resettled in the United States under
all of our various refugee programs.
This year we relocated refugee and resettlement processing
from our Embassy in Bangkok to our full-service Consulate
General in Ho Chi Minh City. This move has enhanced our ability
to provide essential services. While this move was accomplished
relatively smoothly, there have been some start-up pains. We
still hope to finish processing of eligible applicants under
the ODP and ROVR programs by the end of this calendar year. I
want to emphasize that we will not consider our refugee
programs to be completed until the last eligible applicant has
had the opportunity to be interviewed, or we have an acceptable
accounting of each case. Vietnamese officials have continued
their excellent cooperation over this past year and we will
continue to build on this strong foundation to gain
authorization to interview all those who wish to be interviewed
for resettlement in the United States under all refugee and
related programs. I am confident that the renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver this year will further enhance the
excellent cooperation and coordination we now receive from
Vietnamese officials.
Like emigration, we have established an impressive spirit
of cooperation with the Vietnamese in the search for our
servicemen and women still missing in action from the war. In
March Secretary Cohen's visit provided an enormous boost to our
progress in building the people-to-people relationships that
are slowly replacing suspicion with trust and understanding.
This is vitally important at this juncture because we have
finished the easy work; the tasks ahead are becoming
progressively more difficult. We are now searching in some of
the most difficult and dangerous terrain in the world--in thick
primeval jungle and on top of rugged mountain peaks. We face
unpredictable weather conditions from torrential rains and high
winds, along with increasingly treacherous situations involving
the clearing of unexploded ordinance. Nonetheless, young
volunteer American servicemen and women and their Vietnamese
counterparts continue to brave these severe and highly
dangerous conditions to locate the remains of our MIAs. I am
never more proud than when I meet these young people, most of
whom were born well after any of the loss incidents they are
investigating.
Vietnam continues to support the President's Four Measures
of Cooperation on the POW/MIA issue. Since 1993, thirty-nine
(39) joint field activities have been conducted in Vietnam, 288
possible American remains have been repatriated, and the
remains of 135 formerly unaccounted for American servicemen
have been identified, including 26 since January 1999. This
would not have been possible without bilateral cooperation
between the U.S. and Vietnam. Of the 196 Americans that were on
the Last Known Alive list, fate has been determined for all but
41 men. Many of the American losses occurred in Laos and
Cambodia. To date, Vietnam has provided 39 witnesses for
investigation of possible loss sites along the border and
within Laos and Cambodia. The Vietnamese continue to provide
documents and films to investigation teams. Since 1993,
approximately 28,000 items have been reviewed for possible
information that would lead to an accounting for our fallen
comrades. As presented here, Vietnam's cooperation in our
efforts to account for missing Americans from the Vietnam War
remains excellent and in good faith; without such cooperation,
closure for the many families of our missing warriors would not
occur. Let me assure you, the quest for fullest possible
accounting of POW/MIAs remains our number one foreign policy
priority with Vietnam.
Since my posting to Hanoi, I have seen significant human
rights improvements in Vietnam. It is not a perfect situation
and we have additional work to do in encouraging Vietnam to
make further improvements in this critical area. I share with
the Congress and the people of the United States a deep concern
for the human rights situation in Vietnam. We have established
a serious dialogue with the Vietnamese on human rights issues,
and, just last week, we held annual high-level human rights
discussions with Vietnam's representatives here in Washington.
Secretary Albright raised human rights issues with Vietnamese
senior leadership during her visit last year. In addition, my
staff and I constantly work with Vietnamese officials to keep
this issue a cornerstone of the bilateral relationship. I am
pleased to report that our policy of engagement and dialogue
has produced encouraging results.
This year, Vietnam liberalized its policy toward tolerating
public dissent, and the Vietnamese Communist Party continued
its efforts to reform procedures on internal debate and to
allow a mechanism for citizens to petition the Government with
complaints. We have seen evidence of this in various
publications, but one of the clearest demonstrations can be
seen on the streets outside the National Assembly Hall, where
delegates are currently in session. Ordinary Vietnamese
citizens are carrying placards demanding change on political
and economic issues. Some placards I personally witnessed
complained about corrupt local officials in their home
districts.
Additionally, the Vietnamese released nearly 20 religious
or political prisoners and thousands of others from jail this
year. Among those released were 12 Hmong Protestants and three
Catholic priests. Participation in religious activities
throughout the country continued to grow significantly.
Churches are generally full on days of worship and on special
days of remembrance large numbers of followers celebrate. An
estimated 500,000 Hoa Hao gathered in An Giang province for a
religious festival and an estimated 200,000 Roman Catholics
attended the annual La Vang pilgrimage. The Vatican and Vietnam
have regular dialogue. We are also encouraging Vietnam to
recognize more than one group of Hoa Hao adherents. Ambassador
for Religious Freedom Robert Seiple visited Vietnam last year
and witnessed many of the improvements and issues first hand.
Still, much remains to be done, but there has been progress and
we want to encourage further progress in the future.
Conditions for workers have also improved. The
International Labor Organization has opened an office in Hanoi
and has moved quickly to assist Vietnam to implement its new
labor law. The ILO is also providing technical assistance to
help establish a workers' compensation and social security
program, to improve occupational health and safety standards
and inspectors, to train union members for negotiation of
collective bargaining agreements, and to review overtime
procedures. The ILO also conducted a two-day seminar in Vietnam
to educate Vietnamese officials on the importance of ILO
Conventions 138 and 182 on Child Labor. We anticipate that the
AFL-CIO, working with the ILO, will bring to Vietnam in the
near future its tremendous experience and dedication to the
cause of Workers' rights.
You should also know that there were numerous
(approximately 60) private and public strikes during the year,
primarily against foreign-owned or joint venture companies, but
a number also involved state-owned and private firms. The
Government tolerated these strikes, even though most were
spontaneous and supported by organized labor after the fact. In
some cases, the Government disciplined employers for illegal
practices that led to strikes. In October 1999 the Government
reduced the length of the workweek for government employees and
employees of companies in the state sector from 48 hours to 40
hours.
Organizing this year's annual Human Rights Dialogue was the
easiest I have yet experienced, and for the first time
Vietnam's delegation met with U.S.-based human rights NGOs. In
last week's human rights dialogue, Assistant Secretary for
Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor Harold Koh raised freedom of
speech, association and religion, Vietnam's administrative
detention decree, prison conditions, labor rights, information
on former prisoners of conscience, as well as specific
detention cases of concern to us. Vietnam's delegation also met
with the Council on International Religious Freedom. The tone
of the meetings was the best ever. I believe that we have
finally established in-depth mutual understanding on this issue
that will encourage a spirit of cooperation on human rights.
Expanding economic linkages between the U.S. and Vietnam
has been another challenging mission. Although we have made
excellent progress over the past five years in expanding U.S.
exports to and investment in Vietnam, this past year has been
particularly frustrating. Perhaps the relationship is just
experiencing growing pains. When I spoke with you last year, we
were in the middle of the 8th round of trade negotiations with
Vietnam. One month later in July, we reached agreement in
principle on the bilateral trade agreement. Following technical
discussions in August, we had high hopes of signing the
Bilateral Trade Agreement during the APEC Summit in September,
but Vietnam balked at the last minute. I know all of us were
disappointed by this outcome, because concluding the BTA will
bring real benefits to both sides. Not only would the BTA open
markets to American companies, but implementation of its terms
would mean that, over time, Vietnamese citizens would gain
significant freedom to determine their own economic destinies.
Nonetheless, I still hope we can complete the agreement
before the end of this administration. We are currently
awaiting Vietnam's answer to the United States Trade
Representative's May 17 invitation to Vietnam's Trade Minister
for discussions in the U.S. to finalize the BTA. Ambassador
Barshefsky's invitation responded to Vietnam's March letter
indicating issues on which Vietnam desired further
clarification. Without access to the U.S. market on competitive
terms, Vietnam cannot attract the foreign direct investment and
expertise to be able to compete in international markets with
its neighbors in ASEAN and China.
Over the last six months, selected macroeconomic indicators
have given the leadership of Vietnam a sense of comfort that
has led to a slowdown in economic reform. Although foreign
direct investment flows have plummeted as economic reform has
stalled, higher oil revenues, improving exports to recovering
regional trading partners, increasing remittances from overseas
Vietnamese, and rising levels of official development
assistance have stimulated Vietnam's economy. Growth has risen
from less than 4% one year ago to an estimated 5.6% in the
first quarter of this year, seemingly validating arguments for
slowing the pace of change.
We have seen some progress on economic reform,
nevertheless. Vietnam's State Bank issued important new
prudential regulations and took the first steps in
restructuring Joint Stock Banks and State Owned Commercial
Banks. The National Assembly approved an important new foreign
investment law and the new Enterprise law, which streamlined
domestic business formation. The government moved to simplify
equitization, divestiture, transfer, sale, or lease of small
State Owned Enterprises (SOEs) and allowed foreigners to own
equity in SOEs. Minor steps were also taken toward trade
reform; the government reduced tariffs, liberalized import/
export rights, removed some import licensing requirements, and
improved foreign exchange regulations. The National Assembly
has also extended, on a temporary basis, normal trading
relations status to United States goods pending completion of
the Bilateral Trade Agreement.
The reform agenda remains long and the next steps--
expanding competition in the financial sector, removing further
protections for SOEs, and opening to the global economy--can
free Vietnam's people to stimulate more rapid economic growth.
With approximately 1.3 million annual entrants into the job
market, Vietnam's annual growth rate needs to approach 10% to
absorb new job seekers and to keep pace with its neighbors.
This past year, Ex-Im, OPIC, TDA, and USDA programs made
available by the Jackson-Vanik waiver began to have the
positive impact on U.S.-Vietnam commercial relations we all
expected. USDA's Cooperator Program is improving dietary
sensitivities that can lead to greater demand for U.S.
agricultural products. A 25,000 MT wheat donation authorized
under Section 416(b) of the Agriculture Act of 1949, generated
considerable positive publicity and good will among the
Vietnamese people. The grain's timely arrival in Vietnam's
Central Provinces just before major flooding augmented a
considerable United States humanitarian effort to provide
relief to thousands left homeless. Local currency earned from
the commercial sale of the wheat will be applied to disaster
mitigation and rural development projects in Vietnam. These
projects build Vietnamese goodwill for the U.S. More
specifically, OPIC lent Caterpillar's local distributor $2.3
million for an expansion of the company's facilities and OPIC
has approved an $8 million loan for a new pharmaceutical
factory. A few more project finance applications are in the
pipeline. The Trade and Development Agency continued to support
U.S. businesses through funding of feasibility studies and
technical training. Finally, Ex-Im Bank signed two agreements
making its insurance and loan programs available for the first
time to U.S. exporters.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver remains a prime example of
executive/legislative cooperation on foreign policy and an
essential element of our engagement with Vietnam. It has
promoted greater Vietnamese cooperation on the total range of
bilateral issues. Congressional approval of the waiver sends a
vital message to Vietnam's leadership and people that the
United States wants a cooperative, constructive relationship
with Vietnam. The policy tools the Jackson-Vanik waiver makes
available build the people-to-people relationships that will
strengthen trust between our societies. I am confident that
this extension of Jackson-Vanik will further advance the
national interests of the United States in Vietnam. I urge
members of the House to support the President's waiver.
Chairman Crane. Could you elaborate any further on why the
agreement has not been signed?
Ambassador Peterson. Yes. I think, by and large, the
Vietnamese became very, very frightened at the complexity of
this trade agreement. The trade agreement is patterned and
created under the auspices and principles of the WTO. When we
first began speaking to the Vietnamese about these principles,
frankly, they did not understand them at all. And even if we do
not get the agreement signed, the very fact that we have
educated the Vietnamese on these very complex issues will be a
benefit to future relationships on trade. But they became very
frightened. I think there was an internal debate that took
place within the halls of the Politburo and the National
Assembly and others, and they just came to the point where they
said, you know, we are not ready.
It has been nearly a year since we initialled the Principle
Agreement. I think now that there is much greater understanding
in the country as to the benefits associated with this, and now
I think, too, that the concern that they had of losing control
of the economic situation in Vietnam is becoming a lesser
matter, and that has been, I think, stimulated again by the
very fact of the passage of permanent NTR for China here in
this hall just last month. I think all of those factors have
given the Vietnam a comfort factor in moving ahead to the
future.
Chairman Crane. Could you describe a little bit the scope
of the agreement in principle that was reached last year in the
bilateral commercial agreement?
Ambassador Peterson. I can't tell or relate all of the
details because they are not--I am not a trade expert, for one,
and I don't understand some of these complex issues.
Nevertheless, I can assure you that they do take the Vietnamese
to the next step.
The agreement is largely designed with the evaluation of
the Vietnamese market and the potentials for implementation,
but it addresses very concretely the intellectual property
issues that are very important to any kind of commercial
engagement. It has the opening up of sectors of the market that
we are concerned about. It addresses tariff issues that are
always of concern; and, just in general, it has a small chapter
on investment that is critical to any kind of engagement we
might have.
Chairman Crane. Our previous witness talked about
government subsidies of businesses going over there and implied
they are just losing taxpayer dollars. Those businesses that
have had assistance to do business in Vietnam through such
things as the Ex-Im Bank loans or OPIC or the Department of
Agriculture providing assistance, have there been significant
American businesses going in there that have failed?
Ambassador Peterson. No, I don't think any would come out
and just say they have failed, but there have been businesses
that lost patience with the process, and that is clear. Because
some of the reforms that were necessary for some to be
successful in various sectors, the energy sector is a case in
point, that just did not materialize as was expected, and so
some of those companies obviously saw opportunities in other
countries, so they pulled their investments out and went to
another country. That is how business works.
But the programs of OPIC and the Ex-Im are infant, and only
a very few have been used. Because we just haven't had that
much interest on the American side to invest in these last
couple of years because of the downturn of the FDI interest in
Vietnam in general. But I don't think that you are looking at--
certainly you are not looking at a subsidy program, if you
will, with the enticement of American companies to come to
Vietnam.
Chairman Crane. Finally, what impact would denying the
Jackson-Vanik waiver have on our relationship with Vietnam and
any future progress on the POW-MIA accounting and immigration
issues?
Ambassador Peterson. I think failure of the renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver between the two countries would be very,
very damaging to our overall relationship. While it wasn't
meant to be, it has become the symbol of American commitment of
engagement and of cooperation into the future. I don't think
that the Vietnamese would negatively in any way impact--allow a
negative impact to our MIA search efforts. They have long
stated that as a humanitarian issue; and, in fact, we have now
established, I believe, a partnership in that regard in that we
are helping them locate the lost persons from the war, which
number 300,000, by the way.
So we are working this back and forth in a very
humanitarian way. So I don't think there is any threat there of
withdrawal should this not pass. Nevertheless, there is a whole
host of other things that we are working with the Vietnamese
on, be it counternarcotics, be it health programs, be it
environmental programs and things like that that would likely
suffer greatly if we were not able to pursue.
Now, again, I don't think it would have a negative impact,
a severe negative impact on the emigration policy, because the
Vietnamese have indeed moved forward to embrace international
standards of emigration policy, which, of course, is the basis
for the Jackson-Vanik waiver.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Ambassador.
Mr. Levin.
Mr. Levin. Thank you. Welcome.
Ambassador Peterson. Thank you.
Mr. Levin. Nice to see you again, Pete.
Would you like to comment--and it is not necessary,
perhaps, but you heard Mr. Rohrabacher's comments about POW-MIA
issues. Would you like to say a word about that?
Ambassador Peterson. I only would cite the fact that I have
personally seen, if you will, the master list of POWs held in
Vietnam. We have had that in our possession since at least
1992, which was a very ragged, very wide--on very bad paper, I
might add--list of everybody that the Vietnamese claim to have.
Now, it wasn't by prison. It was just the master list. It
was almost like checking in at a hotel, the registrar's
listing. And we have that in our possession, and my name is on
it, a number of other names that you would be familiar with are
on it. I have forgotten the exact number of names on that, but
even some that did not come out of prison on--who lost their
lives there after having been captured are on that list.
And so, I don't know that there is a prison-by-prison list,
and I doubt it seriously. There were at least 11 prisons in
Vietnam, and we moved around in those prisons frequently. So at
any 1 day, you would get a snapshot list but you would not get
a list, if you will a definitive list, of persons who had been
in that one prison for the entire time that we were
incarcerated.
Mr. Levin. Thank you. In your testimony, and you referred
to it briefly in our oral presentation, you mentioned in terms
of conditions for workers, we anticipate that the AFL-CIO,
working with the ILO, will bring to Vietnam in the near future
its tremendous experience and dedication to the cause of
workers' rights. And maybe this is too preliminary for further
comment, but is there anything further that you could tell us
about that?
Ambassador Peterson. Well, for the last 3 years we have had
a dialog with AFL-CIO and they have had at least three
delegations visit Vietnam to evaluate the possibility of
engaging in, perhaps through the good offices of the ILO, a
dialog with the Vietnamese on the establishment of labor law
and the implementation of the labor law. The labor law in
Vietnam actually is pretty good.
Mr. Levin. On paper.
Ambassador Peterson. On paper. The problem of course is
implementation. And in a general sense, the ILO is working with
the Vietnamese very diligently to pursue greater implementation
nationwide on that document and to further expand that into the
areas that it does not quite meet the test.
And the AFL-CIO have, without commitment yet, but have
signaled an interest in coming in and marrying up with the ILO
to conduct technical assistance.
Mr. Levin. And that is being pursued by the embassy? By
your staff?
Ambassador Peterson. Yes, I personally have been involved
with this myself since actually before I ever even was posted
to Hanoi.
Mr. Levin. By the way, and I perhaps should know this, it
indicates why we should have a better idea of the real dynamics
within Vietnam, the state-owned enterprises, are they still the
majority of the economy within Vietnam?
Ambassador Peterson. Yes.
Mr. Levin. They are?
Ambassador Peterson. Yes, and there is a move, of course,
for the equitization--that is their word for privatization--of
the SOEs, the state-owned enterprises. They are moving not as
fast as we would like to see them move, but there is enormous
problems with valuation in those SOEs. Those are ancient
companies whose inventories and accounting practices have been
pretty bad, and so they are having the difficulty of
establishing valuation.
They have gone so far, however, to say in the process of
equitization that foreign entities can, in fact, purchase up to
I believe 30 percent of the SOEs in that process. And that is a
breakthrough, and a further breakthrough is that on July 1st,
the Vietnamese will open its very first stock market in Ho Chi
Minh City, and that will open up the opportunity for a greater
SOE equitization, so that they can build capital from the stock
market.
Mr. Levin. Thank you.
Chairman Crane. Mr. Ramstad.
Mr. Ramstad. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And Ambassador
Peterson, it is good to see you again. As one of your three
classmates on the panel, I just want to say that you made all
of us very, very proud and I certainly appreciate all the hard
work that you have done to improve relations with Vietnam and
the work you have done with the Vietnamese government to
improve economic conditions there and your work on economic
reforms as well.
I certainly agree with you, Pete, that opening Vietnam's
economy and markets will make Vietnam stronger and improve the
lives of the Vietnamese people, and of course it is music to my
ears whenever we have an opportunity for more export markets.
My farmers appreciate it. Our businesspeople appreciate it and
need it, and so it is obviously good for our economy as well.
While I firmly believe that trade and economic development
are vital to the development of democracy in Vietnam, I am
concerned about the benefits of trade and economic development
reaching down to the oppressed ethnic minorities. I have read
the accompanying statement from the State Department
accompanying the waiver request. I am concerned about what the
government of Vietnam is doing, if anything, Mr. Ambassador, to
promote economic development among minority groups, especially
our former allies, the Hmong, the Khmer Rouge and the
Montagnards.
Two questions: What is the government of Vietnam doing to
promote economic development among these minority groups,
particularly the three I referenced? And second, what is your
country team doing to encourage and monitor the situation?
Ambassador Peterson. The Vietnamese, it is really quite a
mixed process as to the minority groups. There are 54 minority
groups in Vietnam. In some provinces, it is totally merging and
you really cannot see any differentiation between one to the
other. But once you get out into the very, very serious rural
areas, mountainous areas where the Hmong and some of the Thai
and others locate, it is very, very distinguished that there is
a separation. And some of it is self-imposed. It is not
necessarily something that the government can do much about.
Those are extremely poor areas which we are talking about,
and the Vietnamese have, and through the good offices the World
Bank, ADB and through the donor programs that other nations
have, have worked very hard to move the investment out into
those rural areas because they see that that is a major need.
In fact, they have identified 1,600 communes that have special
needs for the alleviation of poverty and hunger.
Now, you can say how do you fix that? Clearly, it is not by
just going into that commune and dropping off bags of rice.
What you have to do is create sustainable jobs. And so those
programs are focused on that. And to a very minor, minor
extent, the American programs that we have are assisting in
that regard. We have very little USAID money, as you know, and
so we are not so much involved with economic development in
that program but more humanitarian and in a sense some of those
hunger and poverty issues become humanitarian.
But the overall is positive, and our country team watches
very closely. I have traveled to--personally, to well over 50
of the 61 provinces and my staff is out in those areas
virtually weekly. And we report that rather frequently back to
the U.S. through the State Department and I am sure those
reports would be made available to you if you would like.
Mr. Ramstad. And I appreciate that. And that certainly
corroborated what my friends from Cargill tell me. You have
traveled throughout the country to the hinterlands and you have
helped American companies as well in the process. Let me just
conclude, if your team could get to me, because of my concern
before this goes to the floor, if possible, the economic
condition of each of the three groups I pointed out, and then
any planned actions either by the government or NGOs to help
ensure that the benefits of U.S. trade do reach the minorities.
Ambassador Peterson. OK. We will work on that. I would
ask--the term ``Montagnards'' is a very generic term and it
means all of those groups essentially and I would need, if you
would, to just jot down now we are talking two groups, and I
will get that back to you.
[The following was subsequently received:]
What are the economic conditions of the Hmong, Khmer, and
``Montagnard'' minority groups and what are actions planned by
the Vietnamese government and non-governmental organizations to
help ensure that the benefits of U.S. trade do reach the
minorities?
The ``Montagnard'' people, some 6.5 percent of the total
population of 78 million, comprise more than 30 ethnic groups
in the Central Highlands. The Hmong number approximately one
percent of the population and live in the highland regions of
the northwest border provinces. Both groups have a lower
standard of living than the majority Vietnamese population and
many of their communities suffer from severe poverty. This is
due to a variety of factors, including high population growth,
environmental degradation, isolation, and social and cultural
marginalization. The Khmer constitute one and a quarter percent
of the total population with the majority residing in the
eastern coastal provinces of the southern Mekong River delta
where they engage in wet rice cultivation and are relatively
prosperous. On the other hand, the Khmer of the western Mekong
delta near Cambodia live in relatively isolated pockets and
their overall standard of living is much lower than their
eastern brethren.
In general, increased economic development and expanded
trade and tourism have helped ethnic minority communities in
Vietnam, though progress in developing these communities has
been uneven. Many of these groups have long been isolated, and
expanding trade and increasing investment clearly help to
improve living standards and economic and educational
opportunities for members of ethnic minority groups, especially
those in areas located near larger cities and in the delta.
Over the past ten years, Vietnamese government and NGO programs
have made gains in increasing educational opportunities and
health conditions for persons in ethnic minority communities.
Mr. Ramstad. I will break that down and be more specific.
Great to see you. Thanks for the wonderful job you are doing
and God bless.
And I yield back.
Chairman Crane. Ms. Dunn.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Ambassador, it
is great to welcome you here. We were disappointed last
December, when Congressman Crane was going to lead a delegation
to Vietnam, that we were not able to secure the airplane we
needed and so we couldn't visit you. I would like to see
firsthand how things are doing there. But just for the benefit
of somebody like me, who comes from a state that is very
reliant on trade, one out of four, almost one out of three jobs
almost are now related to trade, I am curious for your feel
about what is going on in Vietnam with regard to the level of
activity by American firms in Vietnam. How does it compare to
other countries that are doing business? Are you in a position
to help out our American firms?
Boeing is an example. Microsoft. What do you see as the
future of trade from the United States with Vietnam?
Ambassador Peterson. I think the opportunities and the
potential are enormous. But, in fact, the economy has stagnated
because the government has, in fact, stagnated their reform
process. And as a result, with the increase, if you will, of
the recovery of the Asian financial crisis, the neighbors of
Vietnam become more attractive as to attracting that investment
that would otherwise come to Vietnam. So we are not seeing a
lot of new companies come to Vietnam but those who are already
there--and Boeing is there. Vietnam Air flies three 767s right
now, and they are looking at the potential purchase of
additional Boeing aircraft in the next year or two.
But the others, like Microsoft certainly is there in a very
big way. We just had a dinner celebrating the--what is it--the
new program that Microsoft has just come out with, the 2000
program, and that was a big hit in Vietnam and virtually
everyone knows those two companies there.
Some companies though, I have to tell you, are not doing so
well. Some companies are doing very well. And it has a lot to
do with sector opportunity, and it also has to do with
management of those companies because some companies have not
really patterned their opportunities or actions against what
the realities are yet in country.
But the potential is there for American export. We have
your apples in Vietnam. We have a whole host of Washington-
based companies that are involving themselves there, and I see
nothing but a bright future for the export market into Vietnam
as it adheres to greater reforms.
Ms. Dunn. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Crane. Mr. Nussle--Mr. Camp.
Mr. Camp. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome, Ambassador. It
is good to see you. Your testimony always has great weight
before this Committee and partly because we all know you and
have great respect for the job that you did as a Member of
Congress and the job that you are doing now as Ambassador to
Vietnam and also your experiences. Thank you for being here and
for your testimony.
My question, I just wanted to go into a little more detail,
if you could, about some of the concrete steps the Vietnamese
have taken to help us resolve the remaining POW/MIA cases and
what you see as the greatest obstacle to resolving those cases
that remain.
Ambassador Peterson. You know, Dave, I think the biggest
obstacle is just the logistics now. We have, from the
Vietnamese side, had enormous unilateral efforts on their part
to help us discover locations, establish identities of
witnesses that will give us information concerning the cases
that remain unresolved. All the things that give us access to
their archives, all of those things are there.
But just the pure logistics is enormous. I wish I could
take you out and show you, and you might have seen, in fact,
when Secretary of Defense Cohen visited. He visited one of the
most difficult sites that we had had for some time, and people
are working in water up to their chest and mud up to their
knees at least or beyond in effecting the kinds of search
efforts. And now we are going into circumstances where the
sites are so remote that people are having to walk for hours
into the jungle to get to those sites and then camp out in some
of the most dangerous places in the world and on mountain tops
and on sides of mountains as well.
So the logistics are becoming our major obstacle for making
faster progress, because now when we get out to one of those
sites what might have taken you 3 weeks to do is now taking 6
or 8 weeks when we have to go back. And then there is another
factor and that is the danger. We put so many of our cases sort
of back off to the side because the site itself was too
dangerous because of unexploded ordnance that was associated
with the crash site. And now we are having to go into those
places, and I am very concerned about that because I don't want
to lose any life or have anyone injured associated with that.
But I think the bottom line is the biggest problem is the
logistical issue, access is not a problem. Unilateral action is
not a problem, and cooperation is not a problem.
Mr. Camp. Thank you very much for that summary. On some
economic issues, obviously some of the trade statistics are not
as good in recent years as they were beginning to be in sort of
the mid-nineties, and the foreign direct investment figure has
begun slipping, and I understand some new commitments are
expected. To what extent do you believe that the lack of
implementing structural reforms to revitalize the economy has
affected foreign investment?
Ambassador Peterson. It has had a devastating impact on
attracting foreign direct investment. Their lack of moving
forward with the kind of reforms they needed to do in the
financial sector and the re-equitization of the state-owned
enterprises and the trade issues has severely restricted the
importation of foreign direct investment.
They could turn that around virtually overnight by signing
the bilateral trade agreement, because that has in all of it a
reform package essentially that they would buy in. And it also
in a sense allows time, because there are time lines associated
with it, for them to build the infrastructure, the institution
infrastructure that has to be in place for them to implement.
And it is a good agreement in that respect.
But the fact that the Vietnamese stalled on their reform
efforts has directly impacted negatively their opportunities to
attract investment. But I would say that there is an
encouraging sign on the American side. In the last quarter,
American exports to Vietnam were $110 million. That is quite a
step above last year and might be an indicator for the future.
Mr. Camp. Thank you very much for your insight and your
comments, and it is great to see you, Pete, and congratulations
on all of your successes. Thank you. I yield back.
Chairman Crane. Mr. Neal.
Mr. Neal. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Great to see you, Pete. I
read where the Chinese often describe their new approach to
economics as being a mixture of socialism and capitalism. How
would you describe the Vietnamese framework for their economic
system?
Ambassador Peterson. It is very close. Very close to that.
Their idea is they still are saying that they want the state-
owned enterprises to have a majority piece of the economic
well-being of the country, which means that they want to
maintain a significant portion of control.
On the other hand, it becomes unrealistic because of the
state-owned enterprises. They are so badly managed, many of
them are in serious debt, and over 50 percent of them are not
profitable. And so they might make a statement like that but it
is not sustainable. But in a general sense, they would probably
say and describe their new marketplace as that same combination
as the Chinese.
Mr. Neal. As we recently concluded the debate on permanent
normal trading relations with China, much of the discontent
that surrounded that debate dealt with the issue of human
rights. Could you just quickly give us your sense of whether or
not American values introduced into a free market advance our
interests or whether or not a tight economic system precludes
that?
Ambassador Peterson. I am convinced that through
engagement, through dialog and through the creation of a strong
economic engine, that we are at our apex of having the greatest
amount of influence on the improvement of human rights in any
country.
In the process of building the economic engine, you empower
people, and through that empowerment they then determine their
own destinies. And you can see it happening, in the urban areas
particularly, in Vietnam right now. You will see even greater
adherence to that once the economic engine kicks in and the
economic engine reaches even somewhere close to the potentials
that exist in Vietnam. Those citizens will be enriched. The
government will be more comfortable because there will not be
so many pressures, financial pressures, and they then in the
process will have a new role for individuals.
In the process the quality of life for everyone, in this
case 80 million people, improves, and I think that in itself is
a human rights issue. If you have that many people having a
greater lifestyle and more comfortable life, a healthier life
and one in which individual potential is realized, I think that
is a significant improvement.
Mr. Neal. Do you have a time line? Do you have any sense of
where we are in history and where we are going with that?
Ambassador Peterson. Well, I think it is really hinged on
the Vietnamese courage in signing the BTA, because the BTA is
the one thing that is going to really kick the economy in
Vietnam.
Now, it is not all American. The bilateral trade agreement
will be a very significant psychological lift to not only
American investors but investors all over the world, because if
in the process of implementation of that agreement the
Vietnamese reform their financial sector, and of course reform
their state-owned enterprise sector and reform their trade
sector, the entire world trade organizations will benefit and
you are going to see probably, if this trade agreement was to
be signed and implemented, that the first major influx of
foreign direct investment is likely to be not American but is
likely to be in some of those industries that are already
there, like from Korea or Taiwan or Singapore. But then
Americans are sitting there at the doorstep to take advantage
of that as well.
Mr. Neal. You are always most welcomed here and great to
see you, Pete.
Ambassador Peterson. Thank you.
Chairman Crane. Mr. Watkins.
Mr. Watkins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Ambassador,
welcome again. Always delighted to see you here, and appreciate
the job and the professionalism that you go about doing that
job in Vietnam.
I am proud of Oklahoma. We were the first state to step
forward to put in a trade office in Vietnam. As you well know,
States have limited dollars and it is one of those decisions
that was made to try to be there early and to try to be of
assistance. There is always a little debate on where that money
should go. And especially without the bilateral trade
agreement, there is a lot of people who say we should not have
been there. Some of us think it is always good to be a leader
in areas.
I know that debate will continue as we try to position
ourselves in trying to help our business and industries and
others in the area.
The question is, you know, do you have other States there
full-time now? Or is Oklahoma still basically the only one?
Ambassador Peterson. It turns out that Oklahoma has the
record for staying power.
Mr. Watkins. We have always been a hardy bunch.
Ambassador Peterson. And I think it has been very
beneficial to you. Florida had an office there and it actually
was withdrawn because of funding issues in January, I believe
is when that office closed.
But Oklahoma has for not so much cost actually been there
over these years and has established a very strong relationship
with their counterparts in Vietnam, which is going to serve
Oklahoma issues or interests a great deal once the opportunity
breaks through for the BTA. For instance, if the BTA was to be
signed this year and implemented next year early or something
like that, your office would be in first place to reap the
benefits from that, particularly as it might apply to the
energy sector or the agricultural sector, of which you have
great interest.
So I think it is a good investment, and I think that to
stay there now would be wise and to carry this out, and I think
it is really minimal costs.
Mr. Watkins. How close do you think we are, Pete, in
getting to that agreement? I mean, do you see any--what is the
problem, do you think? What can we do to help break the ice and
get that?
Ambassador Peterson. Well, we really have been working on
this very hard. USTR--and Joe Devane is with me, our chief
negotiator--have done yeoman's work in pursuing this, as has
our State Department and my mission in Vietnam, to encourage
the Vietnamese to move forward with the signing of this
agreement. It is very key to their economic recovery and their
road toward WTO. As I said earlier, I have been told
unofficially that the Vietnamese intend to come back to the
United States to work out the final details on this trade
agreement as early as the end of this month and perhaps into
July. But if that were to occur, then I think we are very, very
close to signing that agreement.
Mr. Watkins. Pete, let me ask you along this line, and I am
kind of just thinking out loud with the chairman, as you know,
Congresswoman Dunn indicated that--I forgot when it was, Mr.
Chairman, but I know you invited me to go along, we were
looking at going to Vietnam. Do you think it is timely? I mean,
maybe this is a timely--would that possibly help focus a little
bit if a congressional delegation came?
Ambassador Peterson. It is always helpful for a
congressional delegation to visit Vietnam. Every delegation has
been received very warmly. I encourage strongly as I can for
you all to come. I know Chairman Crane attempted to come out
last December and for reasons beyond his control was not able
to with a good delegation. I hope that we can renew that. But a
delegation right now would be a useful issue, I think.
Mr. Watkins. We have a contest coming November that may
have to take precedence. But let me say, Mr. Ambassador, again,
I appreciate what you are doing there. In Oklahoma, I have
tried to lift the vision of a lot of our people about the
importance of international trade and it is a constant battle
to try to convince a lot of people that investments have to be
made. At my alma mater at Oklahoma state we have established an
international trade area. Also, I have the honor of a
lectureship that is in my name and I would like to visit with
you sometimes about coming maybe to Oklahoma and those hardy
people there that have got that stick-to-it-ness and maybe
share and lift the vision of our people concerning Vietnam and
the potential and all there. We have been making investments in
that country, time, energy, and money, and I know Mr. Clark is
going to be on the next panel, but I think I could always use
some great help in trying to be more positive about what we are
trying to do in that area of the world. So I would like to
visit with you afterward.
Ambassador Peterson. I would be happy to help in any way
that I can. I have to tell you that your trade missions--trade
delegations from Oklahoma have been probably the most
successful of any that we have had visit Vietnam, very
professional, very focused, and have really given a boost to
the process.
Mr. Watkins. Well, as a daddy, I am just trying to catch
up. My son has already been there, and when the opening--so I
hate for him to always say, daddy, I have already been there.
So I need to catch up, Mr. Chairman.
Thank you, Mr. Ambassador, for what you are doing.
Chairman Crane. I did not realize, Wes, that your son
served in Vietnam.
Mr. Watkins. No, he is a world traveler. He majored in
international trade. He did not serve in Vietnam. He got his
degree in international trade, and I think he figured out a way
to travel around the world, Mr. Chairman, and he has been
there.
Chairman Crane. I want to thank you very much, Pete. It is
a delight always to have the opportunity to share time with you
and to get your insights, especially from the perspective that
you bring to this debate, and we look forward to ongoing
contacts with you and hopefully we can get our Trade
Subcommittee on a trip over there. We will continue working on
that and look forward to visiting with you over there, too. And
in the interim any way we can be of assistance you let us know.
Ambassador Peterson. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Crane. Thank you.
Now our next panel: Virginia Foote, President of the U.S.
Vietnam Trade Council; Y Hin Nie, President, Montagnard Dega
Association, Inc.; Juels Carlson, Associate, Cargill, on behalf
of the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council; Dan Hoang, Vice President,
Public Relations, Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee;
and Barry Clark, the Director, Oklahoma Vietnam Office,
Oklahoma Department of Commerce, and President and Director,
Pacific Ventures, Inc., in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
And if our witnesses will please all take their seats. I
would remind you again we will have your presentations in the
order that I presented you. If you can keep your oral testimony
to 5 minutes, let me assure you that any printed testimony will
be made a part of the permanent record.
With that, we shall proceed first with Virginia Foote.
STATEMENT OF VIRGINIA B. FOOTE, PRESIDENT, U.S.-VIETNAM TRADE
COUNCIL
Ms. Foote. Thank you, Chairman Crane and members of the
subcommittee. I am pleased to be here today representing the
U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council to testify in strong support of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver renewal for Vietnam. As you suggested, I
will submit my full statement into the record and we have fact
sheets on Jackson-Vanik and NTR plus a chronology of the
normalization process which I would like to submit into the
record as well.
The Vietnam Trade Council was founded in 1989 as a trade
association. We have strong membership within the American
business community. We have offices in Washington and Hanoi,
and have worked through our educational affiliate, the U.S.-
Vietnam Forum, to help improve relations between the United
States and Vietnam with educational exchange programs, annual
conferences, congressional delegations, and programs designed
to provide assistance on international trade norms and
standards.
Today I would like to address why the renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam is so important for both the
United States and Vietnam. As we discussed earlier, beginning
in the late eighties Vietnam's government committed to end its
isolation and began working to normalize relations worldwide.
The Reagan, Bush and Clinton administrations recognized
Vietnam's goal of ending its international isolation and
responded with a policy of normalizing relations with Vietnam
through a step-by-step process pegged to cooperation on the
U.S.'s principal goal of seeking the fullest possible
accounting for our missing in action from the Vietnam War.
Since the normalization process betweem the U.S. and
Vietnam has moved far more slowly than other nations did,
American business involvement in Vietnam has lagged behind
other nations and still operates with severe handicaps. Without
NTR status, a trade agreement and initially without trade
support programs, American companies nonetheless began
traveling, investing, and trading with Vietnam. Today the
United States is the ninth largest investor, with slightly over
$1 billion committed to foreign investment projects and a
billion in two-way trade. Two-way trade is up 30 percent the
first quarter of the year 2000.
But Vietnam's impressive foreign direct investment growth
peaked in 1996. It has dropped substantially since then. For
Vietnam the easy parts of economic reform have been
accomplished. Harder issues loom large and important steps
toward reform have been postponed or avoided. But important
economic reform continues to be made in Vietnam, albeit slowly.
One of the most significant recent reforms for the domestic
private sector in Vietnam is the enterprise law, which came
into effect in January this year. Since that time, 5,000 new
private enterprises have been started in Vietnam. The number of
enterprises founded since the law went into effect in January
equals the numbers founded in the previous 9 years put
together.
Vietnamese businesses and foreign investors will not be
successful until additional reforms are made, and Vietnam knows
this. Toward this end, additional commercial reform is under
way in the banking-insurance sector, customs law, and
competition policy; they are working to eliminate the
burdensome registration and licensing procedures; intellectual
property rights are being protected and administrative
procedures are being streamlined.
The international community is involved in these reforms.
Specifically through AID projects, the U.S.-Vietnam Trade
Council is working on the bilateral trade agreement and legal
reform in general. It is in this complex and changing economic
environment that the U.S. and Vietnam are hoping to finalize a
bilateral trade agreement, and once again Congress is
discussing the annual waiver of Jackson-Vanik.
On the merits of the progress in the ROVR program alone,
Jackson-Vanik ought to be renewed. In assessing orderly
departure programs, Jackson-Vanik ought to be renewed. But on
the economic front the renewal of Jackson-Vanik is equally
important for achieving U.S. Goals. American involvement in the
economic integration process is welcomed in Vietnam and is
extremely important to our mutual development and relations
there overall.
Americans set a high standard for trade investment, labor
and business practices. The Jackson-Vanik waiver plus a
bilateral trade agreement pave the way for normal trade
relations, which is the crucial goal for both sides. While
Vietnam has extended NTR status to goods entering the United
States, the U.S. has not done the same for Vietnam, making it
one of only six countries that do not have NTR status.
Yes, Vietnam has a corruption problem. Yes, Vietnam is
bogged down in its bureaucracy and constituency driven
decisionmaking process. But are these problems unique to
Vietnam? They are not.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver is a crucial building block of
bilateral trade relations, allowing Ex-Im and OPIC programs to
continue for American companies in Vietnam.
Vietnam's strategic and economic role in the region will be
greatly affected by U.S. policy, and this bilateral policy of a
step-by-step process of normalizing relations with Vietnam,
while slow, has produced positive results for American
interests. The Jackson-Vanik waiver has produced important
results since the initial waiver was issued by the President in
1998, and on behalf of my membership I urge to you renew the
waiver again this year.
Thank you.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Virginia B. Foote, President, U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council
Chairman Crane, members of the Committee, I am pleased to
be here today representing as the U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council to
testify in strong support of the Jackson-Vanik waiver renewal
for Vietnam. If there are no objections, I would like to submit
for the record two fact sheets we have put together on the
importance of this waiver and NTR status, and a chronology of
the overall normalization process between the United States and
Vietnam, which began in the Reagan Administration.
The U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council, founded in 1989, is a trade
association with strong membership from the American business
community. With offices in Washington D.C. and Hanoi we have
worked along with our educational affiliate, the U.S.-Vietnam
Forum, to help improve relations between the United States and
Vietnam with educational exchange programs, annual conferences,
Congressional delegations and programs designed to provide
assistance on international trade norms and standards.
Today I would like to address why the renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam is so important to both the
United States and to Vietnam. Beginning in the late 1980's
Vietnam embarked on a bold economic reform program, which
showed impressive results almost immediately. Vietnam went from
near famine to become the third largest rice exporter behind
Thailand and the United States in a matter of a few years.
Growth rates climbed to 8 and 9%. Foreign investors flocked to
Vietnam. From 1988 -1999 over $36.6 billion in foreign
investment was committed. Vietnam had a very low per capita
income of approximately $250 per year in the early 1990s and
the international donor community began generous overseas
development assistance programs, reaching pledges of $2.8
billion for 1999. Total ODA committed since 1993, when Vietnam
became eligible, to the end of 1999 equals $16 billion. (UNDP
Hanoi).
Also beginning in the late 1980's, the Vietnamese
government committed to end its isolation and began working to
normalize relations worldwide. In this area, Vietnam has had
tremendous success in establishing relations in Europe, within
Asia and with the United States. Vietnam joined ASEAN in 1995,
APEC in 1998, and now belongs to over a dozen international
organizations. Vietnam has observer status in the WTO and is
committed to joining.
The Reagan, Bush and Clinton administrations recognized
Vietnam's goal of ending its international isolation and
responded with a policy of normalizing relations with Vietnam
through a step-by-step process pegged to cooperation on the
U.S.'s principal goal of seeking the fullest possible
accounting for our missing in action from the Vietnam War.
As the attached timeline shows, this process has proceeded
slowly through three administrations but has led to the lifting
of the trade embargo, the establishment of diplomatic relations
and the beginnings of economic normalization including the
initial waiving of the Jackson-Vanik amendment in 1998. On its
part, Vietnam has greatly enhanced its efforts on issues of
high priority to the U.S. including the MIA efforts,
immigration goals, and now economic integration. Just the
latest in a long line of normalization steps, in March of this
year Secretary of Defense William Cohen became the first US
Defense Secretary to visit Vietnam since the end of the War.
Since the U.S. normalized relations far more slowly than
other nations did, American business involvement in Vietnam has
lagged behind other nations and still operates with severe
handicaps. Without NTR status*, a trade agreement, and
initially without trade support programs, American companies
and individuals nonetheless began traveling, investing and
trading with Vietnam. Today the U.S. is ninth largest investor
with slightly over $1.0 billion commitment to foreign
investment projects, and $899 million in two-way trade. And
two-way trade is up 30% in the first quarter of 2000.
And Americans are traveling to Vietnam in great numbers. In
1997 Vietnam issued 98,000 visas for Americans wishing to
travel to Vietnam, over 66,000 for Vietnamese Americans wanting
to visit their homeland. In 1998, Vietnam issue 180,000 for all
Americans. In 1999 the Embassy of Vietnam in DC alone issued
64,386 visas to Americans traveling to Vietnam, 46,113 of those
were to Vietnamese Americans.
By 1996, Vietnam's impressive FDI growth had peaked at $8.6
billion. Foreign investment dropped by 40% in 1997 to $4.6
billion and has continued to decline since. In 1998, FDI
commitments totaled approximately $3.8 billion and in 1999
dropped to $1.5 billion. Official GDP growth rates were
calculated at around 5% in 1998 and 4.7% in 1999, a ten-year
low. Independent observer estimates are even lower. The IMF
estimates that growth rates may have actually been as low as 3-
3.5 percent in 1999. In 1999 unemployment climbed to 7.4
percent from a low of 5.9 percent in 1996. And although Vietnam
was in a sense one step removed from the Asian financial crisis
with a non-convertible currency and plans for a stock market
still in the works, 70% of its foreign investment nearly and
70% of its international trade had been coming from Asian
countries, and therefore saw a dramatic decrease.
For Vietnam, the easy parts of economic reform have been
accomplished. Harder issues loom large and important steps
towards reform are often postponed or avoided. But important
economic reforms continue to be made in Vietnam, albeit slowly.
One of the most significant recent reforms for a domestic
private sector is the Enterprise Law, which came into effect
this January 2000. Since that time the 5,000 new enterprises
have been founded in Vietnam with a total registered capital of
US$285.7 million. These figures are very significant given the
small size of Vietnam's fledging private sector. The number of
enterprises founded since the law went into effect in January
equals the number founded in the previous nine years. This
figure does not include the 2,647 enterprises in Ho Chi Minh
City alone who have switched to new business fields or expanded
their operations, investing a combined $67.7 million.
But Vietnamese businesses and indeed foreign investors will
not be successful unless additional reforms are made. Towards
this end, additional commercial law reform is underway in the
banking and insurance sector, customs law, competition policy,
the elimination of burdensome registration and licensing
procedures, intellectual property protection, and
administrative procedures. With the support of USAID, the Trade
Council's educational affiliate is actively involved in
supporting these efforts with expert technical assistance. The
United States should do more in this area--and could do more in
this area.
How? As a step towards fully normalized relations, the U.S.
required the current government of Vietnam in Hanoi to repay
the $145 million debt the former South Vietnamese government
owed to the U.S. While it was an extremely bitter pill for
Vietnam to assume this debt, since 1997, Vietnam has been
making multi-million dollar payments to the U.S. Treasury. This
year Vietnam will make payments totaling around $8.0 million
and payments range from $6-12 million annually until the year
2019. This debt money could be put to tremendous use through a
fund focused on educational programs, technical assistance
work, and business and legal training.
During the cold war period, it is estimated nearly two
hundred thousand Vietnamese students spent their college, post-
graduate, and additional training years in universities and
institutes in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. In
this post-cold war period when an educated and trained
population is key to a country's success, a comparatively small
tens of hundreds students are coming to the U.S. each year, due
to the lack of funds. This year some 1800 Vietnamese students
are studying in the U.S. The Vietnamese government just
recently has committed to funding 400 students abroad annually.
Would it not serve both Vietnamese and American interest to see
these numbers grow dramatically? A debt settlement fund could
be used to help address this problem as well.
It is in this complex and changing economic environment
that the U.S. and Vietnam are hoping to finalize a bi-lateral
trade agreement and once again the Congress is discussing the
annual waiver of the Jackson-Vanik amendment.
Initially U.S. policy pegged the Jackson-Vanik waiver to
progress on the ROVR program specifically and immigration in
general. While difficult to reach agreement on, the
implementation of the program has been fairly smooth and rapid.
The State Department reports that the government of Vietnam has
cleared over 96% of the ROVR cases. On the merits of progress
on the ROVR alone, Jackson-Vanik ought to be renewed again this
year. And in assessing the Orderly Departure immigration
program overall, Jackson-Vanik ought to be renewed.
Approximately half a million Vietnamese have come to the United
States under ODP. Only a small number of ODP cases remain to be
processed. Since the initial waiver of Jackson-Vanik, the
Vietnamese have allowed all remaining ODP cases--including the
Montagnard cases which are of particular concern to the U.S.-to
be processed under the new and far quicker system developed by
the Vietnamese initially just for ROVR cases.
The ODP office in Bangkok has been closed and
responsibility for handling the few remaining cases
successfully transferred to the Refugee Resettlement Section
(RRS) at the Consulate General of Ho Chi Minh City, which
opened in August 1999. Interviews of remaining ODP and ROVR
applicants, of which a few hundred remain, are expected to be
completed by the end of 2000.
On the economic front, the renewal of a Jackson-Vanik
waiver is equally important for achieving U.S. goals. American
involvement in the economic integration process is welcome in
Vietnam and could be extremely important to overall development
in the long run. American companies and government negotiators
set a high standard for trade, investment, labor and business
practices. American management and technology is greatly
admired in Vietnam. American companies are actively involved in
training programs through the Trade Council and individually.
American products are popular. With a population of 77 million
with over half under the age of 25 and well educated, Vietnam
has great potential as a significant trading partner.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver, plus a bi-lateral trade agreement
will lead the way for normal trade relations, a crucial goal
for both sides. While Vietnam has extended NTR status to goods
entering from the United States, the U.S. has not done the same
for Vietnam and it remains one of only 6 countries that do not
have NTR status from the U.S, including Afghanistan, Cuba,
Laos, North Korea, Serbia, and Vietnam.
Vietnam has signed an agreement in principle with the U.S.
on a bilateral trade agreement in July last year and finally
appears now to be in the final stages of its internal decision
making process on the signing a final document. The issues in
the agreement, such as liberalizing the trade and investment
regimes and the strengthening of intellectual property rights,
are of great importance to anyone doing business in Vietnam,
now or in the future, or anyone hoping to see Vietnam's
standard of living increase.
The United States should stay involved in this process. It
is in our interest to see an economically healthy Vietnam in
the Southeast Asian region. The Economist Intelligence Unit
estimates that although GDP growth will continue to fall in
2000 to 4.2% but the completion of a bilateral trade agreement
with the US this year could boost Vietnam's GDP growth to 5.9 %
in 2001. With fully normalized economic relations, the United
States could well join the top ranks of investors in Vietnam.
Yes, Vietnam has a corruption problem. Yes, Vietnam is
bogged down by its bureaucracy and conscientious driven
decision making process. Yes, the vested interests are fighting
reform. Yes, there is fear of massive unemployment if their
companies can't compete. Yes, they worry about what lessons are
to be learned from the economic crisis in the region and the
role of foreign interests. But are these problems unique to
Vietnam? They are not.
Vietnam was slow to set out on an economic reform path that
other countries in the region began years earlier. And it has
been a slower process in Vietnam than many hoped and therefore
it has not been easy for our companies to operate there. But
the Jackson-Vanik waiver is a crucial building block of bi-
lateral trade relations allowing Ex-Im Bank and OPIC to open
programs for American companies doing business in Vietnam. In
1999 the framework agreements, which allow Exim to begin
operations in Vietnam were completed, and OPIC made its first
loan to an American company operating in Vietnam. Operations of
both Exim and OPIC programs are dependent on a renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver.
Vietnam's strategic and economic role in the region will be
greatly affected by U.S. policy overall and by the course of
bilateral relations in the short run. The bi-partisan policy of
a step-by-step process of normalizing relations with Vietnam,
while very slow, has produced positive results for American
interests. The Jackson-Vanik waiver has produced important
results since the initial waiver by President Clinton in March
of 1998 year and it is crucial that the waiver be renewed again
this year at this important time in our relationship. On behalf
of our membership, I urge your favorable consideration.
Thank you.
VIETNAM NTR STATUS AND THE BILATERAL TRADE AGREEMENT
Why does the U.S. need a bilateral trade agreement
with Vietnam?
A bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam is important to
the U.S. because, together with the Jackson-Vanik waiver, it
allows for Normal Trade Relations (NTR) status to be extended
to U.S. goods entering Vietnam, and reciprocally to Vietnamese
goods entering the U.S. The bilateral trade agreement, which
addresses issues relating to trade in goods, trade in services,
intellectual property rights and foreign investment, not only
guarantees NTR but creates more open market access, and greater
transparency for U.S. exporters and investors in Vietnam.
Through this trade agreement and provision of NTR status, the
U.S. will receive the same status that Vietnam affords its
other trading partners such as the EU, Australia and Canada.
How does Vietnam receive NTR status under U.S.
Law?
In order to receive NTR status from the U.S., the following
criteria must first be met under Title IV of the Trade Act of
1974, as amended: 1) A waiver of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment
must be renewed annually by the President; and 2) the U.S. and
Vietnam must conclude a bilateral trade agreement. Once the two
governments sign a bilateral trade agreement, it will be
submitted to Congress with a request for the granting of NTR
for Vietnam. Non-discriminatory treatment can only be extended
through a joint ``approval resolution'' passed by both the
House and the Senate. NTR status for Vietnam would then be
subject to annual renewal each summer through the continuation
of the Jackson-Vanik waiver. Currently, countries that do not
have NTR status are Afghanistan, Cuba, Laos, North Korea,
Serbia & Montenegro, and Vietnam.
What are the Congressional procedures?
Pursuant to Section 152 (b) of the Trade Act of 1974, as
amended, an approval resolution for NTR status is first
introduced (by request) to the House and the Senate and then is
referred to the House Ways and Means Committee and the Senate
Finance Committee. Both the House and the Senate must vote in
favor of NTR for it to be granted. Because Vietnam is a
Jackson-Vanik country, the NTR request has built-in procedures
for Congressional consideration--the agreement cannot be
amended and the request must be voted on by the House and the
Senate within 60 session days from when the President's request
is submitted to Congress, with a maximum of 45 legislative days
in committee and 15 days on the floor within which time a vote
must be taken. Debate on the floor is limited to 20 hours each
for both Houses. Upon Congressional approval and a Presidential
signature, diplomatic notes are exchanged between the two
sides, formally extending reciprocal NTR status.
THE JACKSON-VANIK AMENDMENT FOR VIETNAM
What is the Jackson-Vanik Amendment?
It is an amendment to the U.S. Trade Act of 1974, that
precludes the participation of 30 some non-market economy
countries in any U.S. Government program that extends credits
or credit and investment guarantees if the country restricts
emigration. Before the waiver was issued, American projects in
Vietnam were not eligible for assistance from the Export-Import
Bank (Ex-Im) or the Overseas Private Investment Corporation
(OPIC). To remove this restriction on a country such as
Vietnam, the President must either certify that the country
permits free emigration, or the President can waive the
emigration requirement on the grounds that the waiver will
promote U.S. emigration objectives.
On March 11, 1998, President Clinton issued a Jackson-Vanik
waiver for Vietnam based on improvements of emigration
procedures, particularly its cooperation on the Resettlement
Opportunity for Vietnamese Returnees (ROVR). The waiver must be
renewed annually. On July 30, 1998, the U.S. House of
Representatives voted 260-163 in favor of extending the waiver
for Vietnam. When the waiver was first issued in March 1998,
American projects in Vietnam became potentially eligible for
trade and investment support programs such as the Export-Import
Bank of the U.S. (Ex-Im) and the Overseas Private Investment
Corporation (OPIC). In June, 1999 President Clinton extended
the waiver to Vietnam again, and on August 3, 1999 the House of
Representatives renewed the waiver by a vote of 297 in favor
and 130 opposed. The President has requested a renewal for the
year 2000.
Why the Jackson-Vanik waiver is important?
The availability of export promotion programs is a critical
factor in a number of major procurement decisions being made
now in Vietnam. The Jackson-Vanik waiver also allows the U.S.
Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Maritime Administration
to make their trade support programs available for projects in
Vietnam. The ability of U.S. companies to utilize these
programs now places them on a more level playing field with
their foreign competitors who have enjoyed a high level of
government support for their projects in Vietnam. Though the
U.S. currently is the ninth largest investor in Vietnam, the
investment and trade opportunities for U.S. companies could
expand significantly with continued availability of Ex-Im and
OPIC financing.
What role does Congress play now?
On an annual basis, the President must submit to Congress
by June 3rd a request to renew his authority to issue waivers
of the Jackson-Vanik amendment in principle, and a decision to
continue waivers for individual countries where he determines
this will substantially promote freedom of immigration from
that country. Congress then has the opportunity to reject the
overall authority, or to withhold it for an individual country
through a joint resolution of disapproval, which must pass both
the House and Senate before September 1st. If Congress does not
act the authority is automatically renewed.
What the 2000 Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam
does not do:
The waiver does not grant Normal Trading Relations (NTR,
formerly MFN) status to Vietnam as the Jackson-Vanik waiver is
only one step in the NTR process. A bilateral trade agreement
must first be negotiated and signed and then Congress must vote
whether or not to approve the granting of NTR status to
Vietnam. Vietnam and the U.S. signed an agreement in principle
on July 25, 1999 on a trade agreement. It is hoped that the
agreement will be concluded in the year 2000.
Chronology of U.S.-Vietnam Relations
April 30, 1975--North Vietnamese forces take over the
southern part of Vietnam, ended the war and unified the
country. Washington extends embargo to all of Vietnam and
breaks diplomatic relations.
1978--Secret talks between Hanoi and Washington on
normalizing relations break down
1988--Under the Reagan Administration, Vietnam begins
cooperation with United States to resolve fate of American
servicemen missing in action (MIA)
September 1989--Vietnam completes Cambodia withdrawal.
April 1991--Under the Bush Administration, Washington
presents Hanoi with ``roadmap'' plan for phased normalization
of ties. The two sides agree to open U.S. government office in
Hanoi to help settle MIA issues.
April 1991--U.S. begins humanitarian aid projects for war
victims to be administered by U.S. Agency for International
Development (USAID).
October 1991--Vietnam supports U.N. peace plan for
Cambodia. Secretary of State James Baker announces Washington
is ready to take steps toward normalizing relations with Hanoi.
December 1991--Washington lifts ban on organized U.S.
travel to Vietnam.
1991--U.S. Congress authorizes the United States
Information Agency (USIA) to begin exchange programs with
Vietnam.
April 1992--Washington eases trade embargo by allowing
commercial sales to Vietnam for basic human needs, lifts curbs
on projects by U.S. non-governmental and non-profit groups and
allows establishment of telecommunications links with Vietnam.
July 2, 1993--President Clinton clears way for resumption
of international lending to Vietnam.
September 13, 1993--Clinton eases economic sanctions to let
U.S firms join in development projects.
January 27, 1994--Senate in favor of a resolution urging
the Administration to lift embargo, saying this would help get
a full account of MIAs.
February 3, 1994--President Clinton lifts trade embargo.
January 28, 1995--United States and Vietnam sign agreements
settling old property claims and establishing liaison offices
in each other's capitals.
May 15, 1995--Vietnam gives U.S. presidential delegation
batch of documents on missing Americans, later hailed by
Pentagon as most detailed and informative of their kind.
June 1995--Veterans of Foreign Wars announces support of
U.S. normalization of diplomatic relations with Vietnam.
July 11, 1995--President Clinton announces ``normalization
of relations'' with Vietnam.
August 6, 1995--Secretary of State Warren Christopher
visits Hanoi and officially opens U.S. embassy.
May 1996--U.S. presents Vietnam with trade agreement
blueprint.
July 12, 1996--U.S. National Security Adviser Anthony Lake
visits Hanoi to mark first anniversary of normalization and
press forward on slow-moving economic and strategic ties,
stressing that MIA issue tops Washington's agenda.
April 7, 1997--U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin and
Finance Minister Nguyen Sinh Hung sign accord in Hanoi for
Vietnam to repay debts of approximately $145 million, which
Vietnam assumed from former government of South Vietnam.
April 10, 1997--Senate confirms Douglas ``Pete'' Peterson,
Vietnam War veteran and former prisoner of war, as Ambassador.
April 16, 1997--United States and Vietnam reach agreement
on providing legal protection for copyright owners.
May 9, 1997--Peterson takes up post as U.S. Ambassador in
Hanoi.
May 9, 1997--Vietnam's Ambassador to the United States, Le
Van Bang, arrives to take up post in Washington, DC June 1997--
Secretary of State Madeleine Albright attends ceremony to lay
cornerstone for U.S. consulate in Ho Chi Minh City.
August 1997--U.S. government under the U.S. Agency for
International Development (USAID) begins a commercial law
program.
October 1997--Vietnam institutes new processing procedure
in ROVR program significantly improving progress.
November 1997--Vietnam opens consulate in San Francisco, CA
March 1998--U.S. opens talks on a Civil Aviation Agreement
held.
March 10, 1998--President Clinton issues waiver of Jackson-
Vanik Amendment for Vietnam, paving the way for OPIC, EXIM,
USDA and MARAD operations.
March 19, 1998--OPIC and the Government of Vietnam signed a
new Investment Incentive Agreement, allowing OPIC to offers
services in Vietnam.
March 26, 1998--Minister of Planning & Investment Tran Xuan
Gia and Ambassador Pete Peterson finalize signing of the OPIC
bilateral for Vietnam.
July 23,1998--The U.S. Senate votes 66-34 to continue
funding for the U.S. Embassy in Vietnam based on ongoing
cooperation on the POW/MIA issue.
July 30, 1998--The U.S. House of Representatives passes the
Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam by a 260 to 163-vote margin.
October 1998--Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister
Nguyen Manh Cam make Vietnam's highest--level visit to
Washington since normalization.
October 1998--Deputy Prime Minister Hanh visits U.S. for
planning meeting on military-to-military activities.
October 1998--U.S. and Vietnam agree to negotiate a Science
& Technology Agreement.
December 28, 1998--Bilateral Copyright Agreement enters
into force.
January 1999--EXIM team visits Vietnam to negotiate an EXIM
bilateral agreement.
January 29, 1999--The U.S. receives a proposal from the
Vietnamese indicating substantial progress on the U.S.-Vietnam
bilateral trade negotiations.
March 1999--The most recent round of trade talks are held
in Hanoi.
June 1999--Trade talks held in Washington, DC--Ambassador
Barshefsky cites progress, noting that the number of remaining
issues had been significantly narrowed in this negotiation.
June 30, 1999--President Clinton re-extends the Jackson-
Vanik waiver for Vietnam
July 25, 1999--Negotiators from the U.S. and Vietnam agree
to a bilateral trade agreement in principle in Hanoi, Vietnam
August 3, 1999--The Jackson--Vanik waiver passes the House
by a vote of 297 to 130.
August 16, 1999--The U.S. opens a consulate in Ho Chi Minh
City
September 1999--President Clinton and Prime Minister Phan
Van Khai speak informally at the APEC summit in New Zealand.
September 5-7--Secretary Albright visits Vietnam
November 30, 1999--The first OPIC investment in Vietnam is
announced-a $2.3 million loan to Caterpillar Inc.'s authorized
dealership in Vietnam.
December 9, 1999--Ex-Im and the State Bank of Vietnam
complete the framework agreements, which allow Ex-Im to begin
operations in Vietnam.
March 13, 2000--Secretary of Defense William Cohen became
the first US Defense secretary to visit Vietnam since the end
of the War.
Chairman Crane. Thank you.
Mr. Nie.
STATEMENT OF Y HIN NIE, PRESIDENT, MONTAGNARD ADVOCACY, INC.,
GREENSBORO, NORTH CAROLINA
Mr. Nie. Honorable Philip Crane, ladies and gentlemen, my
name is Y Hin Nie. On behalf of the Montagnard community, I
want to thank Congressman Crane for his help bringing this
hearing together. Further, I want to thank the Members of the
Subcommittee for holding the hearing on U.S.-Vietnam trade
relations, and we place our trust in today's hearing.
Today, I want to emphasize that there is not free
immigration for Montagnards in Vietnam. The waiver of the
Jackson-Vanik amendment has not promoted free immigration for
Montagnards. There are many obstacles for Montagnard family
members to reunite with their loved ones in Vietnam.
I would like to remind this legislative body that the
Montagnards have been punished today because Montagnard
soldiers were allies of the U.S. Army during the Vietnam War.
There is extreme prejudice to our people for this reason, and
other reasons.
Almost all the people are Christians. They are not allowed
under Hanoi to worship freely. The Christian church under Hanoi
authority is not permitted to practice their religious beliefs.
Many Montagnards became Christians through the effort of
American missionaries in Vietnam. Most Members of this
Committee are probably not aware that the Vietnamese government
does not permit any Protestant church to exist throughout the
entire central highlands. This basic human right is denied to
our people. Also, this same basic human right that allows
families to be together is restricted from our people.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver should not be renewed because in
the last year, the Montagnard people still have terrible
obstacles to travel freely and to unite with their loved ones.
Even when we communicate by letter, local security tears letter
and sends less than one piece of four pieces to the children in
Vietnam.
Many of you not may know that we, as American citizens,
when we return to Vietnam are harassed by local police. The
local security demand that we answer questions about other
Montagnards living in our community. We are treated as enemy in
our home. Americans citizens should not be treated that way in
Vietnam. And we are Montagnard-American citizens when we return
to visit our families.
Vietnam may be a police state, but we refuse to become a
tool of the Hanoi government simply because we love our family
and we miss them. This situation happened every single time
when we return to family in Vietnam.
Montagnard families still have to pay huge bribe money or
land to get emigration documents that U.S. and Hanoi requires.
The Vietnamese government still investigates Montagnards as
terrorists.
I would like to emphasize to our U.S. Department of state
that in Vietnam the Montagnards have right to remain eligible
under refugee status. We have been persecuted people in Vietnam
and that situation has not changed.
With respect to the aforementioned issue, on behalf of the
Montagnard people I would like to strongly encourage this
Subcommittee to support Jackson-Vanik of 1974 in hopes that
issues concerning human rights in Vietnam and emigration
practices of Hanoi authority may be overcome. The Clinton
administration should not renew Jackson-Vanik waiver until
Montagnard and other ethnic minority groups in Vietnam are
allowed freely to emigrate, practice their religion, and allow
them to travel free in the central highland of Vietnam and
allow them free movement for NGO assistance with humanitarian
aid.
Please, this is the only honorable and just course of the
U.S. in its relationship in Vietnam. The Jackson-Vanik waiver
should not be renewed at this time.
May God bless you and the United States of America. Thank
you, Mr. Chairman.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Y Hin Hie, Montagnard Advocacy, Greenesboro, North
Carolina
Ladies and Gentleman
My name is Y Hin Nie. On behalf of the Montagnard
Community, I want to thank Congressman Crane for his help in
bringing this hearing together. Further, I want to thank the
members of the Subcommittee for holding this hearing on U.S.-
Vietnam trade relations, and the President decision to possibly
renew the Vietnam trade waiver under Jackson/Vanik amendment to
the act of 1974. We also appreciate their interest and
assistance in the matter of emigration policies and practices
in Vietnam, particularly, in Montagnard Reunification family's
cases. I would like to state again, the Montagnard people
believe in the trustworthiness of the United States of America
as a leader in democratic freedom. We place our trust in today
hearing.
Today, I want to emphasize that there is not free
emigration for Montagnards in Vietnam. The waiver of Jackson/
Vanik Amendment has not promoted free emigration for
Montagnards. There are many obstacles for Montagnard family
members to be reunited with their loved-ones in Vietnam. I
would like to remind this legislative body that the Montagnards
have been punished today because the Montagnard soldiers were
allies of the U.S. Army during Vietnam War. There is extreme
prejudice towards our people for this reason and other reasons.
Almost all of our people are Christian and we are not
allowed under the Hanoi authority to worship freely. The
Christian Church under Hanoi authority does not yet permit the
practice our religious beliefs. Many Montagnards became
Christian through the efforts of American Missionaries in
Vietnam. Most members of this committee are probably not aware
that the Vietnamese Government does not permit any Protestant
church to exist throughout the entire Central High lands. This
basic human right is denied to our people. This same basic
right to allow families to be together is restricted from our
people. The Jackson/Vanik waiver should not be renewed because
in the last year, our Montagnard people still have terrible
obstacles to travel freely and be reunited with the loved ones.
Even when we communicated by letter local Security in Vietnam
pears letter and send last that 1 of 4 pieces to their children
in the U.S.
Many of you may not know that we, as Americans citizens
when we return to Vietnam, are harassed by the local police.
The local security demands that we answer questions about other
Montagnards living in our community. We are treated like
enemies in our own homes. Americans should be not treated this
way in Vietnam and we are Montagnard American citizens when we
return to visit our families. Vietnam may be a police state,
but we refuse to become tools of the Hanoi government simply
because we love our families and we miss them. This situation
happens every single time when we return to visit our families
in Vietnam.
Montagnard families still have to pay huge bribes, money or
land to get emigration documents that the U.S. and Hanoi
require. The Vietnamese government still investigates our
Montagnard people as terrorists.
I would like to emphasize to our U.S. Department of State
that Montagnards have right to remain eligible under refugees'
status. We have been a persecuted people in Vietnam and that
situation has not changed.
May I make very clear today, the war is over and families
should be together. The Montagnard community is peaceful and
honorable. We respect the laws of Vietnam, but we Hanoi must
modify its views today. The relationship between the United
States and Hanoi government must also change. The Montagnard
people are no longer the enemy of Hanoi Government. We all
deserve to be free human beings in a humanitarian world!
With respect to the afore mentioned issues, and on behalf
of the Montagnard people; I would like to strongly encourage
this subcommittee to support the Jackson/Vanik Amendment of
1974 in the hope that issues concerning human Rights in Vietnam
and emigration practices of Hanoi authority may be over-come.
The Clinton Administration should renew the Jackson/Vanik
waiver until Montagnards and other minority groups in Vietnam
are allowed to freely emigrate, practice the religion of their
choosing, travel freely in the Central Highlands of Vietnam,
and allow free movement for NGO assistance with humanitarian
aid. Please, this is the only honorable and just course for the
United States in its relationship with Vietnam. The Jackson/
Vanik waiver should not be renewed at this time. May God bless
you and the United States of America. Thank you.
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1553.002
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED] T1553.003
When the Americans left Vietnam in 1975, certain elements
of the Montagnard Dega people of the Central Highlands mounted
a guerrilla movement within their ancestral lands, at the
behest of the departing Americans, to whom they had been loyal
throughout the years of the American presence. The Americans,
on whom the guerrilla depended for support, provided none. Even
so the Montagnard Dega guerrillas fought on for more than ten
years, and elements of the resistance persist of this day.
In retaliation the Vietnamese government has pursued a
policy of repression of all Montagnard Dega people, whether
affiliated with the guerrilla movement or not. The Montagnard
Dega people have been forbidden their lifestyle, their
languages, their religion, their freedom. Christian marriage
between Montagnards is forbidden. Cross cultural marriage with
ethnic Vietnamese is government policy. This is an attempt to
eradicate the Montagnard Dega culture in one generation.
The overseas Montagnard community is now launching an
effort for reconciliation between the Vietnamese Government and
all the Montagnard people. Continued loss of life and continued
loss of the several thousand year old Montagnard culture must
now stop.
The Montagnard Dega People of the world wish to bring to an
end the hostilities that have plagued our people for decades.
We wish to come to an agreement with the Vietnamese people and
their government concerning the future of the Dega. We are
tired of and frightened by the terrible suffering our people
have endured. We are aware that we do not stand guiltless in
the affairs concerning hostilities with the Vietnamese. We feel
if the Vietnamese choose to come to terms with the rest of the
free world then we should be able to reach an agreement
concerning the world of the Dega. We, though, neither accept
all blame for the hostilities with the present government of
Vietnam nor do we place all blame upon them. Many of our
present problems started during the French-Indochina War and
were compounded greatly during the Second Indochina War between
the United States, the North Vietnamese and their counter-parts
in the South. The world realizes what a terrible position the
Montagnard Dega were put in and that we were forced to make
decisions that may not have been in the best interest of the
Montagnard Dega society as a whole. We were forced to come of
age quickly and made choices that were appropriate at the time.
We are guilty of being naive concerning the ways of the world
and its politics. We were citizens of South Vietnam and
supported our country the best we could under Vietnam and
supported our country the best we could under the
circumstances. We have no ill feelings towards any participant
of either war and are absolved of any circumstances that we are
still being persecuted for. We wish for the Montagnard Dega
people to be able to pursue a life from from the horrors of a
life of war and rebellion. We feel the United States and the
Socialist Republic of Vietnam have a moral obligation to help
end all hostilities. Now is the time of healing between all
nations involved in the conflicts that have plagued all of
Southeast Asia for the last fifty years. As many countries and
their citizens throughout the world now resolve their
differences, we, the Montagnard Dega, have earned the right to
resolve honorably our difference with the government of Vietnam
and to be functional part of the world of Southeast Asia. We
have many attributes to offer; we wish to be treated with the
same dignity and respect as other persons of the free world.
Following are the terms we place before the Socialist Republic
of Vietnam. We are interested in making our country a beacon of
light that will shine brightly through all of Southeast Asia
and the world. No matter what our past differences, we are all
citizens of Vietnam. It is time for all Vietnamese to reunify
under a common goal, and we believe that by working together
with the United States, the United Nations and other free world
countries these reasonable goals are attainable.
The above points are hereby presented to all interested and
legitimate parties. It is our wish to bring to an end the
hostilities between the ethnic people of Vietnam and the
Central Government of Vietnam. It is our wish that all people
of Vietnam be able to live in peace and harmony, extending
goodwill not only to one another but also the rest of the
world. It is time for the people of the Socialist Republic of
Vietnam to come together for the good of our country. If the
government of the Social Republic of Vietnam desires an end to
the hostilities that have plagued our country for many years,
they will sit down with legitimate parties concerned and work
out a fair and binding solution. We offer ourselves in good
faith to be government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam to
act as a mediator between rival factions of the ethnic,
indigenous groups and the government. We Montagnard Dega hope
and pray that the Socialist Republic of Vietnam needs our call
and acts appropriately.
During 1994 a detailed team study was undertaken within the
North Carolina Dega community to better understand the depth of
retribution by the Socialist Democratic Government of Vietnam
perpetrated against the Montagnard people of the Central
Highlands of (South) Vietnam. This study was concluded in late
1994. New information, when learned and verified, is added to
that study. The research respondents were voluntary and no
records exists of who contributed to the research. The research
fell into several categories, including:
A. imprisoned/Tortured, B. Missing, C. Murdered/Death.
As information developed, a pattern of annihilation of the
Montagnard people in Vietnam surfaced beyond expectations--the
following documented deaths are in part the cause of the
``Declaration'' and are added as partial evidence of the
evidence of reconciliation...and not retribution. If there is
to be a Montagnard people in Vietnam's future, then the door to
peaceful coexistence must be opened today.
This study was funded by the Montagnard-Dega Association.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Nie.
Mr. Carlson.
STATEMENT OF JUELS CARLSON, ASSOCIATE, CARGILL, INCORPORATED,
ON BEHALF OF THE U.S.-ASEAN BUSINESS COUNCIL
Mr. Carlson. Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee,
I am appearing before you today on behalf of both the U.S-ASEAN
Business Council and Cargill, Incorporated. Cargill has just
assumed chairmanship of the Council's Food and Agricultural
Committee, and Vietnam is one of the 59 different countries in
which Cargill has operations. The U.S. ASEAN Business Council,
its over 400 member companies, and Cargill individually
strongly support extension of the waiver of the Jackson-Vanik
amendment for Vietnam.
The Export-Import Bank and the Overseas Private Investment
Corp. programs, which waiver of the Jackson-Vanik amendment
authorizes, are vital to Business Council members who rely on
the support from these government agencies to level the
competitive playingfield against firms from other countries
that receive substantial support from their governments.
Moreover, the United States has completed negotiating a
groundbreaking bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam. Since
the agreement was initialed last fall, however, there has been
no further action. The Vietnamese have insisted on a long
internal review process that only recently shows some sign of
coming to an end.
U.S. negotiators fought hard for this agreement, which is
viewed by many as a stalking horse for Vietnam's eventual entry
into the World Trade Organization. The agreement is of course a
prerequisite for Vietnam to receive the same reduced tariffs
that all but a handful of countries receive under normal trade
relations status, but all reports indicate that most of the
benefits of the agreement will actually flow to U.S.
individuals and companies seeking to do business with and in
Vietnam, including U.S. farmers, as Vietnam opens its
agricultural markets to increased imports.
This perhaps helps explain why the Vietnamese government
has been spending so much time reviewing and debating the terms
of the agreement since it was first initialed.
I am now working as an independent consultant to Cargill
and other clients in Vietnam, Russia and the Ukraine. But in
1994, I opened a one-person office in Saigon for Cargill. Now
Cargill employs over 300 people in Vietnam and has become a
leading commodity trading company there. Cargill supplies
fertilizer to Vietnamese farmers and corn and soybean meal to
the Vietnamese feed industry and is looking to provide U.S.
commodities such as wheat, soybeans and cotton to the
Vietnamese market.
In addition to the two representative offices in Hanoi and
Saigon, Cargill runs two new animal feed manufacturing plants
in Dong Nai and Hanoi and is building a third in Can Tho in the
Mekong Delta, and it has a poultry breeding farm and hatchery.
Most recently, Cargill learned it has received approval to
purchase a 12 percent interest in a deep water port in Vung Tau
province.
As I have outlined in my written statement, it has not been
an easy road, but our business is profitable and we are not the
only investor pleased with Vietnam.
Vietnam is making progress, but there is a lot more that
Vietnam can do to increase foreign and domestic investments
that will create jobs. In my written statement I list some of
the steps Vietnam should take to improve its economy. These
include things like privatizing state-owned entities and
improving its banking system.
However, perhaps the most important is that the bilateral
trade agreement should be signed and implemented as soon as
possible. Their exporters will have new access to the world's
biggest market, but the reforms that Vietnam has agreed to
undertake will do even more for that country's long-term
economic welfare as well as for U.S. companies seeking to do
business and invest there. National treatment, transparency,
improved market access, and other changes are long-awaited
reforms for the Vietnamese system.
The United States can do its part by extending the Jackson-
Vanik waiver and working with Vietnam to successfully implement
the terms of the bilateral trade agreement. The U.S.-ASEAN
Business Council and Cargill both have found over the years
that engagement, both commercially and politically, builds the
best bridges to peace and mutual prosperity. In fact, U.S.
companies export more than just products when they invest
overseas. They export U.S. values and good business practices.
For example, all of our employees in Vietnam have been
trained to work under world class quality and safety standards,
and we give them better wages and benefit packages, including
retirement and medical insurance. For our communities we have
actively participated in building relations. For example,
Cargill replaced a rickety footbridge that kept washing out
near our Dong Nai feed mill with a modern cement and steel
bridge. We have also built schoolrooms and provided supplies
for neighborhood schools and provided scholarships for poor
students, and the company has developed a partnership with a
training center for the handicapped in Saigon, where we have
donated playground equipment and a variety of other supplies on
a regular basis.
But Vietnam must do its part, too, by becoming more outward
thinking and responsible in today's world. Otherwise, the
capital, the management resources and investors that Vietnam
knows it needs to attract simply will go elsewhere.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify here today.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Juels Carlson, Associate, Cargill, Incorporated, on behalf
of the U.S.-ASEAN Business Council
Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, Iam appearing
before you today on behalf of both the US-ASEAN
BusinessCouncil, and Cargill, Incorporated. The council is a
private, non-profit organization that works to expand trade and
investment between the United States and the member countries
of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. ASEAN members
include Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia,
Myanmar (Burma), the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and
Vietnam. Cargill hasjust assumed the chairmanship of the
council's Food and AgricultureCommittee.
Vietnam is one of the 59 different countries inwhich
Cargill has operations on the ground. Globally, Cargill is an
international marketer, processor and distributor of
agricultural, food, financial and industrial products. The
company employs some 82,000 people and is headquartered in
Minneapolis, Minnesota.
The US-ASEAN Business Council, its over 400 member
companies, and Cargill individually strongly support
extensionof the waiver of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment for
Vietnam. Although in Vietnam Cargill does not utilize programs
such as the Export-Import Bank or the Overseas Private
Investment Corporation, which waiver of the Jackson-Vanik
Amendment authorizes, many business council members do. Many.S.
companies rely on the support of these government agencies to
level the competitive playing field against firms from other
countries that receive substantial support from their
governments.
The Bilateral Trade Agreement
But, there is a much more important reason for extending
the Jackson-Vanik waiver. It is the first real step toward full
normalization of economic relations with Vietnam. Renewing the
waiver demonstrates to the Vietnamese government and to
consumers there that the United States is serious in its desire
to become a full partner with Vietnam in its trade and its
development.
Moreover, since President Clinton first proposed a waiver
of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment a little over a year ago, the
United States has completed negotiating a groundbreaking
bilateral trade agreement with Vietnam. This agreement is of
course a prerequisite for Vietnam to receive the same, reduced
tariffs that all but a handful of countries receive under
normal trade relations status. Since Vietnamese and U.S.
negotiators initialed a final pactlast fall, however, there has
been no further action. The Vietnamese have insisted on a long,
arduous internal review process that only recently shows some
signs of coming to an end.
This agreement was hard-fought and contains substantial
concessions for U.S. traders and investors. In fact, it is
viewed by many as a stalking horse for Vietnam's eventual entry
into the World Trade Organization. Unfortunately, the exact
terms of the agreement are not yet published. However, all
reports indicate that most of the benefits of the agreement
will actually flow to U.S. individuals and companies seeking to
do business with and in Vietnam. U.S. farmers also stand to
realize gains as Vietnam opens its heavily protected
agricultural market to increased imports.
This helps explain, for example, why the Vietnamese
government has been spending so much time reviewing and
debating the terms of the agreement since it was first
initialed. The waiver that you are considering today will help
demonstrate the U.S. government's continued commitment to the
bilateral trade agreement and help pave the way for the United
States to receive the many market-opening benefits and reforms
that the agreement incorporates.
Cargill's Experience in Vietnam
Until December 1998, I served for almost five years as
Country Manager starting up operations for Cargill,
Incorporated, in Vietnam. I am now working as an independent
consultant to Cargill and other clients in Vietnam, Russia and
Ukraine, focusing on agricultural and food products and issues.
I am not a scholar on Vietnam and in fact had never visited
the country prior to August 1994. Prior to that I opened the
first Cargill office in the USSR and developed investments in
Russia, Uzbekistan and Ukraine in 1990-91, so that I had a good
deal of experience in doing business in centrally planned
economies. This experience with state owned enterprises and
with thefeudal nature of multiple ministries and multiple
levels of governmentkept me out of lots of trouble in Vietnam.
In 1994 I opened a one-person office there. Since then,
Cargill's businesses have grown rapidly, despite start-up
delays that were mostly caused by the Ministry of Trade,
Customs, and local district officials who could block land
leases on plants located outside of industrial zones. Cargill
now employs some 300 Vietnamese workers in a wide range of jobs
in businesses fromHanoi in the north to Can Tho in the south.
Cargill now has representative offices in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh
City. The company has built and is operating two new animal
feed manufacturing plants in Dong Nai and Hanoi that produce
feed for poultry, cattle, swine and fish. Cargill also operates
a poultry breeding farm and hatchery, which produces about half
the day-old chickens in southern Vietnam. Although Cargill is
in the process of selling its global coffee and rubber
businesses, Cargill has operated a warehouse facility for both
those commodities, also in Dong Nai province.
Most recently, Cargill has just learned that it has
received approval to purchase a 12 percent interest in the
former French port at Phu My on the Thi Vai river in Vung Tau
province. This infusion of capital will allow the port to make
important improvements to allow the port to stop losing money
and make full use of its deep water location. This will lead to
reduced transportation costs for imported fertilizer and feed
products from the United States and other sources. Once again,
this was not an easy process, but Cargill persevered and has
won this approval, just as the United States must persevere and
see the bilateral trade agreement through to adoption.
Cargill has also become a leading commodity trading company
in Vietnam. Cargill has been one of the largest buyers of the
country's agricultural products, including coffee, rice and
rubber. Cargill also supplies fertilizer to Vietnamese farmers
and corn and soybean meal to the Vietnamese feed industry and
is looking to provide U.S. commodities, such as wheat, soybeans
and cotton, to the Vietnamese market. As in any market where
Cargill invests, the company is committed to a long-term
relationship with its suppliers andcustomers in Vietnam.
In all, in terms of capital Cargill has invested over 25
million U.S. dollars and has approval to double this amount
when market conditions are appropriate. Our business is
profitable, and we're not the only investor pleased with
Vietnam. Companies that export clothing, footwear and furniture
are doing well, as are many of the consumer product companies,
all of which see sales increases to Vietnamese consumers year
after year.
Positives and Negatives
Cargill has had its share of challenges in establishing
itself in Vietnam. First, however, I'd like to focus on the
positives, and people certainly top the list. I can't say
enough about Cargill's 300 Vietnamese employees. They are the
fastest learning, most loyal, hardest working and most
competent people Cargill employs anywhere in the world. They
are proud of what they do, and Cargill is proud of them. As a
sign of our confidence in the work force there, Cargill has
reduced the number of its foreign employees in Vietnam down to
two.
Vietnam's strong agricultural base is another positive for
a business like Cargill. Productive private farms produce a
food surplus, which frees up limited surplus capital for other
uses. Vietnam also has the advantage of not bearing the burden
of an inefficient industrial base that plagues other centrally
planned countries like Russia.
Vietnam's new industrial and export zones give foreign
investors some protection from the army of officials who police
and limit business activity. In some cases, these zones also
provide infrastructure.
Vietnam is making progress. The government has been
speeding up approvals, and some costs like land leases have
been lowered, but these tend to be small and incremental steps
and do not represent major changes.
I would especially like to single out the Ministry of
Agriculture and Rural Development for praise. It's not perfect,
but it is one of the most honest and enlightened Ministries in
Hanoi. Its officials understand that food security is more tied
to economic well-being than to the country's ability to produce
all that it needs. They realize the critical need to build a
competitive food industry, with the help of foreign investment,
zero import duties and, sometimes, zero import quotas.
Studies after studies have shown that hunger persists
around the world largely because poverty persists. For
countries like Vietnam, where 70 percent of the labor force
work in agriculture and forestry, increasing agricultural
productivity can help boost the livelihood of a vast group of
people.
A vital agricultural and food sector can then provide
consumers with affordable and safe food. What they save on food
they will spend on other products and services--all of which
help to create more business activities and jobs.
Agriculture officials certainly recognize this, since
agricultural growth has been robust. Industrial crops like
coffee and rubber have experienced the fastest growth, while
the rice yield has doubled since 1987. Vietnam is now the
world's second largest rice exporter, and Cargill participates
in that business.
Let me turn to some of the negatives for foreign businesses
in Vietnam. Aside from Vietnam's small market, which cannot
support large industrial projects, such as car manufacturing,
many of the country's weaknesses lie with the government.
Not all the ministries work as cooperatively as the
Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development. In its zeal to
raise revenues, the Ministry of Finance has imposed relatively
high tariffs on food and feed imports, so that Vietnamese
consumers and farmers end up paying more for basic needs.
To many business people, the Ministry of Trade seems to see
its mission not as promoting trade, but as controlling and
discouraging trade. In its concern over the need to maintain
control over rice exports, the Ministry of Trade denies the
Vietnamese rice farmer access to the higher prices that a free
market in rice would provide.
Actions by Customs officials continue to cost investors in
time and money.
Overall, government polices discourage wealth creation by
Vietnamese citizens and small and medium-sized private
businesses. Multiple levels of government agencies control
business activities, and it seems at times there are more
people involved in controlling business than in doing business.
The most obvious barrier is the 80 to 90 percent income tax on
all monthly income of Vietnamese citizens above 500 to 600 U.S.
dollars. Most foreign investors in Vietnam see this tax as a
manifestation of the government's fear that it will lose
control if the citizens become wealthy and economically
independent. In the same light, government officials keep a
tight lid on businesses by imposing licenses and a repressive
tax structure, which in effect prevent people and companies
from doing business. As a result, small and medium-sized
businesses that could provide new jobs simply aren't being
formed.
Foreign investors in Vietnam can also face challenges at
the provincial level, as provincial leaders sometimes maintain
their own fiefdoms. Getting land leases outside of industrial
zones continues to be very time consuming and difficult because
of the ability of provincial or lower level officials to slow
down or block investments. However, there are exceptions. For
example, I do want to highlight the wonderful provincial
leaders of Dong Nai province. Their honesty and help have
netted the province many profitable investments and created
many jobs for their people.
There are a number of things that Vietnam can do to
increase foreign and domestic investment that will create jobs.
With new investment down last year and even lower this year,
creating jobs for a nation of 80 million people with an average
age of about 22 years should become a national goal.
The government can tackle this on many fronts. First, the
government should discourage joint ventures with state-owned
enterprises. The government should stop putting more bank
credits into SOEs. They tend only to be profitable when they
have a monopoly, and monopolies are always costly for
consumers, who must subsidize them. In reality, SOEs should be
privatized, so that the market can work more efficiently.
Second, Vietnam should encourage investments in industrial
zones that have the support of provincial and local officials.
Investing for political reasons is finished. Competitors for
foreign capital now are Thailand, South America, Eastern Europe
and a host of other countries around the world. Vietnam needs
competitive industries. The country does not need more plants
in politically acceptable locations or in politically desirable
industries such as capital intensive oil refineries that are
located far from markets and raw materials.
Third, Vietnam must improve its banking system. Banks can't
lend to private borrowers if they can't judge credit risks, and
foreign banks can't innovate if they are not permitted to
introduce new products.
Fourth, Vietnam should encourage investments in small and
medium-sized businesses that can make quick decisions to grow
as they gain experience. International funding should also
focus on small and medium-sized businesses, so that they can
start up quickly, use local materials and serve domestic and
export markets. These businesses can create more jobs and
develop local management skills faster than the big, capital
intensive projects, whose technology sometimes becomes outdated
before they are completed.
Lastly, the bilateral trade agreement should be signed and
implemented as soon as possible. There is no question about the
benefits of the agreement to Vietnam, as value-added exporters
will have new access to the world's biggest market. But, the
reforms that Vietnam has agreed to undertake will do even more
for that country's long term economic welfare, as well as for
U.S. companies seeking to do business and invest there.
National treatment, transparency, improved market access, and
the other changes--though we understand there are a number of
carve-outs and exceptions--are long-awaited reforms for the
Vietnam system.
Having laid out both the strengths and weaknesses of
Vietnam, I am optimistic about its future. The country is well-
positioned to grow: It has the people and natural resources.
Thousands of overseas Vietnamese are eager to pool their
talents and skills. Many corporations want to take part.
The United States can do its part by extending the Jackson-
Vanik waiver and working with Vietnam to successfully implement
the terms of the bilateral trade agreement. The U.S.-ASEAN
Business Council and Cargill both have found over the years
that engagement, both commercially and politically, builds the
best bridges to peace and mutual prosperity.
In fact, U.S. companies export more than just products when
they invest overseas. They export U.S. values and good business
practices. For our employees, who are used to wearing flip-
flops on construction sites, we require steel-toed shoes and
hard-hats and safety rails. We give them better than average
wages and benefits packages.
For our communities, we actively participate in building
relations. Cargill, for example, replaced a rickety footbridge
that kept washing out near our Dong Nai feed mill with a solid
stone bridge that will last for years and be far safer for the
citizenry. We used the leftover money from that project, which
was raised by our employees, to build additional schoolrooms
for a neighborhood school. And, the company has developed a
partnership with a training center for the handicapped in Ho
Chi Minh City, where we have donated playground equipment.
But Vietnam must do its part, too, by becoming more
outward-thinking and responsible in today's world market.
Otherwise, the capital, management resources and investors that
Vietnam knows it needs to attract simply will go elsewhere.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Carlson.
Mr. Hoang.
STATEMENT OF DAN DUY-TU HOANG, VICE PRESIDENT, PUBLIC
RELATIONS, VIETNAMESE-AMERICAN PUBLIC AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, FALLS
CHURCH, VIRGINIA
Mr. Hoang. Mr. Chairman, and Members of the Committee, I
appreciate the opportunity to testify before you today. The
Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee, a national grass-
roots organization of Vietnamese American voters, strongly
opposes waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment for Vietnam for two
main reasons.
First, the Vietnamese government continues to deny its
citizens basic human rights. The essence of the Jackson-Vanik
amendment is to promote human rights in communist world
countries by conditioning the granting of U.S. investment and
credits.
Second, by providing Vietnam with access to cheap U.S.
Credits and investments while the Hanoi government stalls at
economic and political reform is a waste of U.S. taxpayer
money. Moreover, it is a signal to the Vietnamese government to
continue dragging its feet on reform in all areas.
We believe that maintaining the Jackson-Vanik amendment in
the case of Vietnam will help pressure the Vietnamese
government for more concrete reforms. Let me elaborate on the
reasons why we oppose extending the waiver.
At this moment, Dr. Nguyen Xuan Tu, a biologist and writer
whose pen name is Ha Si Phu, is under strict house arrest in
Dalat City in Vietnam. In the least year, authorities have
raided his residence on at least two occasions, each time
removing his personal computer and working papers. According to
two credible sources, Human Rights Watch and the Free Vietnam
Alliance, on MIA 12, 2000, the public security again entered Ha
Si Phu's home and presented him with a written order
threatening to bring charges of treason, which carries a
maximum penalty of death. Ha Si Phu's only activity has been to
write a series of essays critiquing Marxist-Leninist doctrine
and advocating political pluralism.
In Hanoi, geophysicist Nguyen Thanh Giang remains under
heavy police surveillance and harassment. He was jailed for 2
months in 1999 for pro-democracy writings. Since MIA of last
year, Nguyen Thanh Giang has been under virtual house arrest
with his phone disconnected, mail stolen and home ransacked by
security officials.
In Saigon, a medical doctor named Nguyen Dan Que also faces
house arrest. While Dr. Nguyen Dan Que has not been charged
with any crime, security police surround his home 24 hours a
day, a point that was underscored on April 12th when a reporter
from the French newspaper L'Express tried to pay a visit. Not
only was Sylvaine Pasquier turned away by the public security,
she was herself detained for intense questioning.
The situations of Ha Si Phu, Nguyen Thanh Giang, and Nguyen
Dan Que highlight the government's repression of peaceful
dissent. Ha Si Phu has been under house arrest for the last 3
years without ever being brought to trial. Professor Nhuyen
Thanh Giang has been persecuted without ever being formally
charged with any crime. Dr. Nguyen Dan Que was released from
jail in October, 1998, in a much-publicized amnesty of
prominent political prisoners and then confined quickly to his
home. All three men, along with many others in Vietnam, are the
victims of the government's administrative detainment policy,
which effectively legalizes arbitrary arrest and detainment.
Under the infamous Directive 31/CP, signed into law in April
1997, security officials can detain any individual without
charge for up to 2 years. The purpose of that administrative
detainment policy is to repress political dissent while
avoiding the official trials and lengthy prison sentences which
attract international attention.
Arbitrary arrest in Vietnam also extends to religious
figures. During his January visit to Vietnam, Congressman Ed
Royce met with several prominent religious leaders and heard
firsthand the government's restrictions on religious worship
and persecution of clergymen. Venerable Thich Quang Do, the
second highest leader of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam
and a nominee for the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize by 29 Members of
Congress, told Mr. Royce, ``If I walk out the gate of this
Pagoda, I know an accident will conveniently happen to me.'' .
Now, this travesty was brought to light thanks to Mr.
Royce's insistence on hearing a variety of voices in Vietnam,
and I hope that Members of the Subcommittee, in future trips to
Vietnam, will seek to visit dissidents to get a balanced view
of the country as Representatives Ed Royce, Tom Campbell, Chris
Smith and Loretta Sanchez have done on their recent trips.
It is not unreasonable that American corporations and the
Vietnamese government should lobby for a waiver of the Jackson-
Vanik amendment. Who would want to do business in a corrupt,
red-tape, and nontransparent economy without subsidized Export-
Import loans and OPIC risk insurance? What is unreasonable,
however, is that U.S. taxpayers should have to fund programs
which permit investments not economically viable on their own
merits and which allow the Vietnamese government to put off
economic and political reforms.
Dear members, in conclusion, it is in the interest of the
United States to encourage Vietnam's transition to a market
economy. Such a transition can only be achieved through
sustained economic and political reform. Since the President's
decision to waive the Jackson-Vanik amendment in March, 1998,
and to extend the annual waiver since, the Vietnamese
government has backtracked on reform. Extending the waiver for
another year gives Hanoi more excuse to put off essential
reforms. At the same time, it creates a moral hazard as
American companies effectively gamble on a flawed economic
system by investing when and where they otherwise would not
without the benefit of taxpayer subsidies.
Waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment now, and then hoping
and praying that the Vietnamese government will reform, just
does not work. The first requirement for free enterprise is
free people. As long as the Vietnamese government continues to
run a police state, arbitrarily arresting and detaining the
country's best minds, don't expect it to respect the laws and
conditions good for business either. Thank you.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Hoang.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Dan Duy-Tu Hoang, Vice-President, Public Relations,
Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee, Falls Church, Virginia
Dear. Mr. Chairman and Members of the Committee,
I appreciate the opportunity to testify before you today.
The Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee (VPAC), a
national grassroots organization of Vietnamese American voters,
strongly opposes waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment for
Vietnam for two main reasons:
(1) The Vietnamese government continues to deny it citizens
fundamental human rights The essence of the Jackson-Vanik
amendment is to promote human rights in communist-ruled
countries by conditioning the granting of U.S. government
credits and investment.
(2) Providing Vietnam with access to cheap U.S. credits and
investment, while the Hanoi government stalls on economic and
political reform, is a waste of U.S. taxpayer money. Moreover,
it is a signal to the Vietnamese government to continue
dragging its feet on much needed reform in all areas.
Maintaining the Jackson-Vanik amendment in the case of
Vietnam will help pressure the Vietnamese government for more
concrete reforms. Let me elaborate on the reasons why we oppose
extending the waiver.
Repression of Political and Religious Views
At this moment, Dr. Nguyen Xuan Tu, a biologist and writer
whose pen name is Ha Si Phu, is under strict house arrest in
Dalat city, Vietnam. In the last year, authorities have raided
his residence on at least two occasions, each time removing his
personal computer and working papers. According to two credible
sources, Human Rights Watch and the Free Vietnam Alliance, on
May 12, 2000, the public security again entered Ha Si Phu's
home and presented him with a written order threatening to
bring charges of treason, which carries a maximum penalty of
death. Ha Si Phu's only activity has been to write a series of
essays critiquing Marxist-Leninist doctrine and advocating
political pluralism.
The unjust treatment of Ha Si Phu is of great concern to
the Vietnamese American community. Our moral outrage is shared
by many others. As I understand, there is an effort underway in
the House of Representatives led by the Congressional Dialogue
on Vietnam to demand the Vietnamese government to immediately
release Ha Si Phu. This parallels the protests of the broader
international community, including human rights organizations
and scientific groups, against the Vietnamese government's
persecution of Ha Si Phu. His case, though, is not unique.
In Hanoi, geophysicist Nguyen Thanh Giang remains under
heavy police surveillance and harassment. He was jailed for two
months in 1999 for pro-democracy writings. Since May last year,
Prof. Nguyen Thanh Giang has been under virtual house arrest
with his phone disconnected, mail stolen, and home ransacked by
security officials.
In Saigon, a medical doctor named Nguyen Dan Que also faces
house arrest. While Dr. Nguyen Dan Que has not been charged
with any crime, security police surround his home 24 hours a
day, a point that was underscored on April 12, 2000 when a
reporter from the French newspaper L'Express tried to pay a
visit. Not only was Sylvaine Pasquier turned away by the public
security, she was herself detained for intense questioning.
The situations of Ha Si Phu, Nguyen Thanh Giang, and Nguyen
Dan Que highlight the government's repression of peaceful
dissent. Ha Si Phu has been under house arrest for the last
three years without ever being brought to trial. Prof. Nguyen
Thanh Giang has been persecuted without ever being formally
charged with any crime. Dr. Nguyen Dan Que was released from
jail in October 1998 in a much publicized amnesty of prominent
political prisoners and then quickly confined to his home. All
three men, along with many others in Vietnam, are the victims
of the government's administrative detainment policy, which
effectively legalizes arbitrary arrest and detainment. Under
the infamous Directive 31/CP, signed into law in April 1997,
security officials can detain any individual without charge for
up to two years. The purpose of the administrative detainment
policy is to repress political dissent while avoiding the
official trials and lengthy prison sentences which attract
international attention.
Arbitrary arrest in Vietnam also extends to religious
figures. During his January visit to Vietnam, Congressman Ed
Royce met with several prominent religious leaders and heard
first hand the government's restrictions on religious worship
and persecution of clergymen. Venerable Thich Quang Do, the
second highest leader of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam
and a nominee for the 2000 Nobel Peace Prize by 29 U.S. Members
of Congress, told Mr. Royce: ``If I walk out the gate of this
Pagoda, I know an accident will conveniently happen to me.''
(This travesty was brought to light thanks to Mr. Royce's
insistence on hearing a variety of voices in Vietnam. We
earnestly hope that members of the Committee in future trips to
Vietnam will seek to visit dissidents to get a balanced view of
the country as Representatives Ed Royce, Tom Campbell, Chris
Smith and Loretta Sanchez have done in their recent trips.)
Perhaps the most worrisome part of the government's record
on religion is its ongoing crackdown against the Hoa Hao faith.
In May 1999, the government created a state-sanctioned Hoa Hao
Representative Board consisting entirely of senior communist
party cadres to oversee the affairs of the Hoa Hao Buddhist
community. To curtail an independent Hoa Hao organization,
authorities have repeatedly tried to stop gatherings by Hoa Hao
Buddhists on their most solemn religious occasions and detained
large numbers of worshippers. This climate of repression has
created the potential for major social unrest in the southern
provinces of Vietnam where five million Hoa Hao Buddhists live.
Waste of U.S. Taxpayer Money
It is not unreasonable that American corporations and the
Vietnamese government should lobby for a waiver of the Jackson-
Vanik amendment. Who would want to do business in a corrupt,
red-tape, and non-transparent economy without subsidized
Export-Import loans and OPIC risk insurance? What is
unreasonable, however, is that U.S. taxpayers should have to
fund programs which permit investments not economically viable
on their own merits and which allow the Vietnamese government
to put off economic and political reforms.
Everyone talks about the corruption problem in Vietnam,
especially the government. But according to a Reuters article
(``;Despite campaign, graft hobbles Vietnam,'' 5/17/2000),
Hanoi has nothing to show one year into a major anti-graft
campaign. Not a single senior government or party official has
been publicly accused, let alone punished, for corruption. The
most senior official rebuked for ``mismanagement,'' Ngo Xuan
Loc, was dismissed as deputy prime minister only to quickly
return as senior advisor to the premier. The root of the
problem is that the communist regime is accountable only to
itself.
Red tape is another legendary problem. Consider this
account from the Rushford Report (``;Vietnam, twenty-five years
later,'' 4/5/2000): ``Every small business operator one sees
has a piece of paper in his or her pocket giving permission to
do business, the same kind of noodle shop down the street might
have a different set of papers. It is a criminal offense not to
have that permission slip.'' The bureaucratic mess gets worse
for larger ventures, especially when they involve foreigners.
Finally, there is the problem of non-transparency in
Vietnam. This stems from the lack of reliable information,
which follows from the government's monopoly on the media and
the ``firewalls'' it uses to block many Internet sites. The
stifling of free information not only discourages foreign
investors, but also denies Vietnamese the knowledge they need
to do business and take part in their national affairs.
Conclusion
It is in the interest of the United States to encourage
Vietnam's transition to a market economy. Such a transition can
only be achieved through sustained economic and political
reform. Since the president's decision to waive the Jackson-
Vanik amendment in March 1998 and to extend the annual waiver
since, the Vietnamese government has backtracked on reform.
Extending the waiver for another year gives Hanoi more excuse
to put off essential reforms. At the same time, it creates a
moral hazard as American companies effectively gamble on a
flawed economic system by investing when/where they otherwise
would not without the benefit of taxpayer subsidies.
Vietnamese Americans in general and VPAC in particular
would dearly like to see material improvements in the lives of
people in Vietnam. But sustainable development and economic
progress that benefits all--not a disproportionate few in
power--can only be achieved on a framework of human rights,
rule of law, and democracy.
Waiving the Jackson-Vanik amendment now, and then hoping
and praying that the Vietnamese government will reform just
does not work. The first requirement for free enterprise is
free people. As long as the Vietnamese government continues to
run a police state, arbitrarily arresting and detaining the
country's best minds, don't expect it to respect the laws and
conditions good for business either.
Chairman Crane. Now I would like to have our colleague from
the State of Oklahoma introduce our next distinguished guest.
Mr. Watkins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Members of the
Committee. I am honored that my friend, Barry Clark, who
represents Oklahoma in Vietnam in this real pioneering effort,
who I think has got some great words to share with us, but I am
glad he is here.
Barry, I know that you are doing a great job there working
at it and trying to lift the vision not only for Oklahoma but
for Vietnam of what the real world of freedom is all about.
So, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate you allowing Mr. Clark to be
here as one of the panel members.
Chairman Crane. Well, we are happy to have Mr. Clark.
Now, proceed, Mr. Clark.
STATEMENT OF BARRY L. CLARK, PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR, PACIFIC
VENTURES, INCORPORATED, TULSA, OKLAHOMA
Mr. Clark. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Subcommittee
members, for the opportunity to be here today to testify before
you.
My name is Barry Clark; and I am President of Pacific
Ventures, which is an Oklahoma-based consulting and private
equity company. Our offices are in Tulsa, Oklahoma, as well as
in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. The focus of our
consulting business is to assist American companies entering
the Vietnamese market. We have been in Vietnam since 1995, 1
year after President Clinton lifted the trade embargo.
From my first visit to Vietnam in 1993 to moving there for
3 years in 1995, I have witnessed firsthand the changes as
Vietnam took the first uncertain steps toward a market economy.
These changes are providing new economic and civic hopes for
many of the Vietnamese people and new business opportunities
for American companies. Similar to most people doing business
in Vietnam, our challenges have been frequent, costly and time-
consuming. Nevertheless, we are confident that the
opportunities are real and significant, and we remain
determined to see them through.
In addition to private enterprise, Pacific Ventures also
represents the State of Oklahoma. In September 1996, the State
of Oklahoma became the first State of any Nation to open a
trade office in Vietnam. Since the Vietnamese government was
not accustomed to dealing with individual States, the State of
Oklahoma's Department of Commerce asked Pacific Ventures to
represent their clients in this newly emerging market. Through
our company infrastructure, Oklahoma now has offices in Hanoi
and Ho Chi Minh City with a staff of 12 Vietnamese and two
Americans. Oklahoma is still the only American state to have a
full-time presence in Vietnam.
The reason the State of Oklahoma opened this trade office
was due to several of Oklahoma's major industries matching
those of Vietnam's. These industries are of vital importance to
both of our economies. They are oil and gas, agriculture,
education and infrastructure development.
For the businesses we represent directly and through our
ties to the State of Oklahoma, we manage the daily challenges
of arranging meetings, securing licenses, conducting market
research, identifying potential partners, and navigating the
labyrinth of red tape. Our preliminary business, as we
participated in the opening of Vietnam's consumer markets, was
to establish one of the first soft-serve ice cream companies.
We represent life and health insurance companies looking to
enter the Vietnamese market and are also a licensee for the
Disney Book Co.
Through our contract with the State of Oklahoma, Pacific
Ventures has led nine delegations of Oklahoma business and
institutions to Vietnam to sell Oklahoma-made goods and
services, as well as six delegations from Vietnam who have come
to Oklahoma to purchase equipment. The Oklahoma goods and
services sold to Vietnam have included oil-field drilling
equipment, which you might expect from Oklahoma, but also bio-
tech products, such as sewage treatment enzymes, assistance in
building environmentally sound landfills, beef cattle genetics,
and infrastructure building equipment.
But the export for which the State of Oklahoma has great
pride is education. Oklahoma has more than 9,000 foreign
students studying in its colleges and universities. Oklahoma is
third in the Nation in the number of Vietnamese students in
higher education in our state. A good example is Petro-Vietnam,
the Vietnamese national oil company, which has 57 students--
young people which the company sees as its future leaders--as
full-tuition paying undergraduate and graduate students at the
world-famous Sarkeys Energy Center at the University of
Oklahoma in Norman. These students will go back to Vietnam not
only with a world-class education in petroleum science and
engineering but also with a better understanding of the
American way of life. It wouldn't be complete if I didn't add
that we also hope that they return home with knowledge of, and
an appreciation for, the products and services of American, as
well as Oklahoma companies.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver has brought about dramatic changes
that are indeed part of the rising tide that is floating more
hopes and dreams for Vietnamese entrepreneurs and small
business owners. Vietnam has great potential as a friend and
trading partner of the United States. I think Ambassador
Peterson has stated it best: ``With the continued opening of
the economy, the middle class will grow, the population will
become more educated and exposed to more ideas, and Vietnam
will continue to evolve to become a more open society. But
changes come in increments. By extending the Jackson-Vanik
waiver and taking other steps along the path of normalization,
including extension of normal trade relations, the U.S. will
advance our interest in encouraging Vietnam's ongoing
transition.'' .
In conclusion, I want to express the appreciation of
Oklahoma government and business leaders for Ambassador
Peterson's passionate leadership and to his staff at the U.S.
Embassy for all of their assistance and support. They have made
our work in Vietnam much more productive than we could have
ever been otherwise. Again, thank you for this opportunity,
sir.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Clark.
[The prepared statement follows:]
Statement of Barry L. Clark, President and Director, Pacific Ventures,
Incorporated, Tulsa, Oklahoma
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the subcommittee, for
the opportunity to testify before you today. My name is Barry
Clark and I am President of Pacific Ventures, which is an
Oklahoma-based consulting and private equity company. Our
offices are in Tulsa, Oklahoma as well as Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh
City, Vietnam. The focus of our consulting business is to
assist American companies entering the Vietnamese market to
sell their products and services. We have been in Vietnam since
1995, one year after President Clinton lifted the trade
embargo. From my first visit to Vietnam in 1993, to moving
there in 1995 for three years, I have witnessed firsthand many
of the changes as Vietnam took the first uncertain steps
towards a market economy. These changes have provided new
economic and civic hopes for many Vietnamese people--and new
business opportunities for American companies. Similar to most
people doing business in Vietnam, our challenges have been
frequent, costly and time-consuming, but never the less we are
confident that the opportunities are real and significant and
we remain determined to see them through.
In addition to private enterprise, Pacific Ventures
represents the State of Oklahoma. In September 1996 the State
of Oklahoma became the first state of any nation to open a
trade office in Vietnam. Since the Vietnamese government was
not accustomed to dealing with individual states, the State of
Oklahoma's Department of Commerce ask Pacific Ventures to
represent their clients in this newly emerging market. Through
our company infrastructure Oklahoma now has offices in Hanoi
and Ho Chi Minh City with a staff of twelve Vietnamese and two
Americans. Oklahoma is still the only American state to have a
full-time presence in Vietnam. The reason the State of Oklahoma
opened this trade office was due to several of Oklahoma's major
industries matching those of Vietnam's. These industries are of
vital importance to both economies: They are oil and gas,
agriculture, education, and infrastructure development. For the
businesses we represent directly and through our ties to the
State of Oklahoma, we manage the daily challenges of arranging
meetings, securing licenses, conducting market research,
identifying potential partners and navigating the labyrinth of
red tape. Pacific Ventures also supports companies or joint-
venture projects until they are capable of operating on their
own. Our preliminary business as we participated in the opening
of Vietnam's consumer markets was to establish one of the first
soft-serve ice cream companies. We represent life and health
insurance companies looking to enter the Vietnamese market, and
are also a licensee for Disney books in Vietnam.
Through our contract with the State of Oklahoma, Pacific
Ventures has led nine delegations of Oklahoma businesses and
institutions to Vietnam to sell Oklahoma-made goods and
services as well as six delegations from Vietnam, that have
come to Oklahoma to purchase equipment. The Oklahoma goods and
services sold to Vietnam have included oil-field drilling
equipment, which you might expect from Oklahoma, but also bio-
tech products such as sewage treatment enzymes, assistance in
building environmentally sound landfills, beef cattle genetics,
and infrastructure building equipment.
But the export, for which the State of Oklahoma has great
pride, is education. Oklahoma has more than 9,000 foreign
students studying in its colleges and universities. Oklahoma is
third in the nation in the number of Vietnamese students in
higher education. A good example is Petro--Vietnam, the
Vietnamese national oil company, which has 57 students (young
people which the company sees as its future leaders) as full-
tuition paying undergraduate and graduate students at the
world-famous Sarkeys Energy Center of the University of
Oklahoma. These students will go back to Vietnam not only with
a world-class education in petroleum science and engineering,
but also with a better understanding of the American way of
life. It wouldn't be complete if I didn't add that we also hope
that they take back knowledge of and an appreciation for the
products and services of American as well as Oklahoma
companies. The Jackson-Vanik wavier has brought about dramatic
changes that are indeed part of the rising tide that is
floating more hopes and dreams for Vietnamese entrepreneurs and
small business owners. Vietnam has great potential as a friend
and trading partner of the United States. I think Ambassador
Peterson has stated it best: ``With the continued opening of
the economy, the middle class will grow, the population will
become more educated and exposed to more ideas, and Vietnam
will continue to evolve to become a more open society. But
changes come in increments. By extending the Jackson-Vanik
waiver and taking other steps along the path of normalization,
including extension of normal trade relations, the U.S. will
advance our interest in encouraging Vietnam's on-going
transition.''
In concluding, I want to express the appreciation of
Oklahoma government and business leaders for Ambassador
Peterson's passionate leadership and to his staff at the U.S.
Embassy for all their assistance and support. They have made
our work in Vietnam much more productive than we could have
been otherwise. Again, thank you for giving me the opportunity
to speak today.
Chairman Crane. I thank all of you for your testimony.
I would now like to yield very briefly to our Ranking
Member, Mr. Levin.
Mr. Levin. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The timing is maybe imperfect, although I was going to say
perfect. You have completed your testimony, and we have votes
on the floor.
I just wanted to say to all of you that we take your
testimony seriously, and we will be sure that it is widely
circulated. I want to say to the two of you who have come here
to oppose the waiver that I want to send your testimony over to
the State Department for their comments. We will do that, and I
am sure we will receive a reply from them.
So thank you, all of you, for coming. Also, to those who
submitted written testimony for the record, it will, Mr.
Chairman, as you know, be submitted in the record and will be
considered seriously by us before this matter comes to the
floor. Thank you.
Chairman Crane. Thank you, Mr. Levin.
Again, thank you all for your participation in the hearing
this morning.
With that, the subcommittee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:10 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
[Submissions for the record follow:]
American Legion
Washington, DC 20006
June 13, 2000
Honorable Philip M. Crane, Chairman
Subcommittee on Trade
House Committee on Ways and Means
1102 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20313
Dear Mr. Chairman.
The American Legion is opposed to the renewal of the
Jackson-Vanik waiver for trade with Vietnam. This position is
based on the continued failure of the Vietnamese government to
fully cooperate with efforts to account for the over 2,000
Americans that remain missing from the war in Southeast Asia.
The American Legion does not accept the conclusions of the
Clinton administration that the Vietnamese government has fully
cooperated with accounting efforts. Granted, the Vietnamese
have provided assistance in the area of remains recovery (e.g.
locating and helping exhume aircraft crash sites). However, the
United States government is paying handsomely for that
cooperation. The Vietnamese government holds in their archives
voluminous data that we believe would be helpful in solving
many of the 2,000-plus unresolved cases. Thus far the
Vietnamese have been unwilling to share this information.
What is needed is unilateral cooperation on the part of the
Vietnamese government and Communist Party in providing
information relating to stored remains, and to records on a
significant number of unresolved cases designated as ``last
known alive,'' or ``died in captivity.''
As was the case with our recent opposition to Permanent
Normal Trade Relations with the People's Republic of China, The
American Legion is troubled that economic and trade concerns
continue to take precedence over issues of national security.
The highest national priority is accounting for our missing
servicemembers. Vietnam is capable of providing significantly
more cooperation with our efforts to bring about the fullest
possible accounting. The American Legion urges the Committee to
take these factors into account and oppose the Jackson-Vanik
waiver for trade with Vietnam.
Sincerely,
John F. Sommer, Jr.
Statement of Anheuser-Busch, St. Louis, MO
In its press release (No. TR-21) of May 30, 2000 the Ways
and Means Subcommittee on Trade requested public comment on the
``nature and extend of U.S. trade and investment ties'' with
Vietnam as well as issues related to pending bilateral trade
agreement with Vietnam. Anheuser-Busch strongly supports the
process of developing closer economic ties with Vietnam. In our
view, the further integration of Vietnam into the world economy
will enhance its economic development, increase its standard of
living and strengthen demand for consumer products. Given its
size, location and culture, it has tremendous market potential
for companies in the brewing industry.
Anheuser-Busch has a longstanding interest in Vietnan.
Currently, however, there are no authorized sales of our
flagship brand, Budweiser, in Vietnam. For more than a decade,
we have sought without success to register our world famous
Budweiser trademark in Vietnam. The details of the history of
this effort are set forth in the attached document (Exhibit I).
As we have expressed directly to the Vietnamese
authorities, we strongly believe that the relevant departments
have has ample time to consider our application to register our
Budweiser trademark and make a decision with respect thereto.
Adequate protection of intellectual property rights is an
integral part of the U.S./Vietnam bilateral trade agreements as
well as Vietnam's standing with the world investment community.
Adequate protection and equitable treatment include a fair and
timely decision process with respect to intellectual property
issues.
We urge the Committee and the Administration to impress
upon the Vietnamese the importance of a timely decision with
respect to this matter as the two countries move forward in the
development of their overall economic relationship.
Exhibit 1
Summary of Main Arguments in Support of the Request of Anheuser Busch
Company's Request for Registration of the Trademarks:
``BUDWEISER'' and ``Budweiser'' in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam
1. Background
Anheuser Busch Company (``A-B'') is one of the largest
companies in the world. Since 1957, A-B has been the largest
producer of beer in the world.
2. Trademark Dispute
For most of this century, A-B has been involved in a
dispute with Budejovicky Budvar Narodni (``BB'') over the right
to use the trademark BUDWEISER in a number of countries
throughout the world. Notwithstanding the parties' competing
claims over the right to use the BUDWEISER trademark, one fact
remains undeniable: A-B began using the BUDWEISER trademark in
1876, nearly 20years before BB was founded in 1895.
After having sold large volumes of BUDWEISER beer in the
southern part of Vietnam before 1975, A-B applies to register
its BUDWEISER trademark in Vietnam in 1989. In 1993, A-B
applied to register the trademark BUD in Vietnam as well.
However, four previously registered trademarks of BB consisting
of the trademark BUDWEISER blocked these applications of A-B.
In 1997, A-B successfully cancelled these four prior
registrations of BB on the basis of non-use.
The cancellation of BB's four trademark registrations
should have cleared the way for registration of A-B's BUD and
BUDWEISER trademarks. However, only the BUD trademark proceeded
to registration. The formal reason for the delay in allowing A-
B's application for BUDWEISER to proceed to registration was
that BB has two other trademark registrations (BUDWEISER BUDVAR
and BUDWEISER BUDBRAU) blocking A-B's application for
BUDWEISER. Notwithstanding the prior applications of A-B for
BUDWEISER and the pendency of A-B's cancellation action against
BB's first four BUDWEISER trademark registrations for non-use,
BB as permitted to register BUDWEISER BUDVAR and BUDWEISER
BUDBRAU (which are essentially the same marks as the ones that
were being cancelled).
2.1 Priority of A-B's Application over BB's Subsequent
Registration of BUDWEISER BUDVAR and BUDWEISER BUDBRAU
According to the ``first to file'' and other relevant legal
principles. A-B's applications should have been given priority
over these subsequent registrations of BB. Therefore, once BB's
first four BUDWEISER trademark registrations were officially
cancelled, A-B's application for BUDWEISER should have
proceeded to registration, as A-B's application for BUD (which
has also been blocked by these first four registrations (was
allowed to do. Similarly, BB's subsequent two registrations for
BUDWEISER BUDVAR and BUDWEISER BUDBRAU, having a later priority
date than A-B's application for BUDWEISER, should have been
cancelled.
In addition, it should be noted that permitting BB to
register BUDWEISER BUDVAR and BUDWEISER BUDBRAU during A-B's
pending cancellation action against the same marks undermines
fundamental tenet of Vietnamese trademark law which states that
a trademark is subject to cancellation if it is not used for
the specified period of time.
2.2 The Worldwide Fame of A-B's BUDWEISER Trademark
Apart from the priority of A-B's applications, another
legal basis for allowing the registration of A-B's BUDWEISER
trademark in Vietnam relates to the well-known, indeed famous
status of A-B's BUDWEISER mark internationally. Overwhelming
evidence supporting this claim, including registrations in over
125 countries worldwide and sales volumes almost 100 times
greater than BB, was contained in documents that were submitted
to the NOIP on May 5, 1999.
As a well-known trademark, A-B's BUDWEISER is entitled to
special protection under Article 6bis of the Paris Convention
(to which Vietnam is a party), and Circular No. 437/SC. As
such, the NOIP should allow immediate registration of A-B's
BUDWEISER in order to give this well-known trademark the
protection it deserves, and at the same time cancel BB's
remaining registrations for BUDWEISER BUDVAR and BUDWEISER
BUDBRAU, neither of which can reasonably called well-known.
3. Investment
To efficiently supply the demand for A-B's BUDWEISER
worldwide, A-B has invested in local brewing plants or has
licensed its famous BUDWEISER mark to local manufacturers,
including in China, the Philippines, Japan, South Korea, Canada
and others. In addition, A-B has invested in facilities in
foreign countries for the manufacture of aluminum beer cans,
containers and other packaging using the most modern
manufacturing methods, including a commitment to recycling
previously used products and materials. This latter commitment
is particularly important to countries in Asia which are
experiencing growing pollution problems.
A-B perceives Vietnam as an exciting new market. If AB were
to engage in commercial activities in Vietnam, this would
contribute significantly to the promotion of commercial
relations between the U.S. and Vietnam. However, the ability of
A-B to consider engaging in such activities in Vietnam depends
on it having the right to use its most important trademark:
BUDWEISER. Accordingly, A-B is keen to be given the right to
use the BUDWEISER trademark in Vietnam (through formal
registration of the same) at the earliest possible date.
For the foregoing reasons, A-B is hopeful that the relevant
authorities in Vietnam will issue A-B a Certificate of
Registration for the BUDWEISER trademark as soon as possible.
Statement of Dr. Nguyen Dinh Thang, Executive Director, Boat People
S.O.S., Merrifield, VA
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee,
Time has come again for Congress to review the President's
decision to renew the waiver to the Jackson-Vanik Amendment for
Vietnam. By granting this waiver to Vietnam, the President
promised that it would substantially promote free and open
emigration.
While there are many factors influencing U.S.-Vietnam
relationship, the Jackson-Vanik Amendment focuses solely on the
question of free and open emigration. The justification,
validity and effects of the waiver should therefore be
evaluated solely on the basis of whether it has promoted free
and open emigration.
By statutory definition, free and open emigration means
more than just the issuance of exit permits to citizens who
want to emigrate. It also means that no citizen should be made
to pay more than a nominal fee on emigration or on the visas or
other documents required for emigration.
The Vietnamese people has been burdened by an outrageously
corrupt system. Vietnam's corruption ranks among the worst in
Asia, according to a report released this month by the Hong
Kong-based Political and Economic Risk Consultancy (PERC). Even
Vietnam has to admit that corruption permeates all government
functions. A police report released earlier this month
indicated that corruption is on the rise--the level of detected
embezzlement has increased some 10,000 times over the past five
months.
Emigration is not immune to graft. Practically every single
person who wants to emigrate must pay three to four times the
annual salary of an average Vietnamese citizen. That is
certainly more than a nominal fee. Since few Vietnamese
citizens can afford such bribes, their U.S. relatives are often
the ones to bear the burden.
Corruption seriously affects U.S. refugee programs in
Vietnam. Our State Department has cited statistics showing that
tens of thousands of refugees have been resettled since the
U.S. first granted Vietnam the waiver to the Jackson-Vanik
Amendment two years ago. These refugees too had to pay their
way out. The State Department's statistics are not an indicator
of free and open emigration. On the contrary, they constitute
thousands upon thousands of violations of the principle of free
and open emigration called for in the Jackson-Vanik Amendment.
Of course there are many Vietnamese citizens who are
eligible for emigration but who cannot afford the bribes; they
continue to be denied clearance for interview under U.S.
refugee programs. At the last hearing I presented a number of
specific examples. None of them has been cleared for interview
a year later.
Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee,
There are those who argue that granting the waiver to
Vietnam would strengthen the hands of the reformist faction
within the Vietnamese leadership. Developments over the past 12
months do not support this speculation. There has been no
serious reform, be it institutional, social or political, to
point to. The Vietnamese leadership recoils when it realizes
that the bilateral trade agreement with the U.S. entails major
reforms.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver has failed to improve the human
rights conditions in Vietnam. Two years ago, Vietnam released a
handful of political and religious prisoners. All of these
former prisoners of conscience continue to be held under house
arrest. Vietnam has since sent to jail a larger number of
political dissidents and religious leaders than it had
released.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam has not made
emigration more free and open, has not produced any reform, has
not ameliorated the business environment for U.S. investors,
and has failed to improve human rights conditions in Vietnam.
Vietnam's corrupt system continues to affect many U.S. citizens
and their loved ones in Vietnam, and to subvert U.S. refugee
programs.
I recommend that this Subcommittee establishes benchmarks
to track progresses or the lack thereof in each of the above
areas. Specifically, I recommend that the Subcommittee requests
the General Accounting Office to survey immigrants and refugees
from Vietnam about how much they must pay for emigration and to
track the number of U.S. businesses that are still in business
and actually make a profit in Vietnam.
I also recommend that this Congress delays the renewal of
the waiver until Vietnam meets a number of conditions. Namely,
Vietnam must clear all cases submitted by the U.S. for
interview, stop its corrupt practices in emigration, and
institute reforms to guarantee transparency in all areas of the
government.
Thank you Mr. Chairman and members of the Subcommittee.
Statement of Andre Sauvageot, General Electric Company
I am André Sauvageot, residing in Hanoi as the Chief
Representative for the General Electric Company in Vietnam. I
have held this position for over 7 years. As I did for your
hearing on the initial waiver and also last year for the
renewal of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, I am submitting the
following updated information to assist the Committee in its
decision regarding the renewal of the Jackson-Vanik waiver for
Vietnam.
I. Vietnam Experience Prior to Joining General Electric
My involvement in Vietnam began in 1964 as a U.S. Army
Captain assigned as a District Advisor in South Vietnam. This
entailed participating in combat operations with small South
Vietnamese units and afforded opportunities to learn about life
and civil administration at the village level. I completed 8
years of Vietnam service with varied assignments including US
Liaison & Coordination Officer for the Military Assistance
Command (MACV) in the Prime Minister's Office. My last
assignment, ending in March 1973, was as the Interpreter for
the Chief of the American Delegation to the Four-Party Joint
Military Commission charged with implementing the Paris
Agreement on ending the war.
From 1976 to 1978 the Army assigned me to the US Department
of Health, Education & Welfare as an Assistant Director to the
Indochina Refugee Assistance Program to help with the
resettlement of Vietnamese refugees in the United States. In
1984, I retired as a Colonel from the Army after 27 years
service.
From 1982 to as recently as 1993, I served as the
interpreter for the highest level American delegations visiting
Hanoi. The initial focus was solely on the MIA/POW issue, but
later broadened to include some of Vietnam's humanitarian
concerns. Until December 1992, I was employed by the U.S.
Embassy in Bangkok as the Regional Advisor for the
Comprehensive Plan of Action designed to encourage voluntary
repatriation of Vietnamese ``boat people'' back to Vietnam.
This involved constant visits to the camps in Hong Kong and
Southeast Asia with follow-up visits to returnees in Vietnam. I
enjoyed steadfast support from Vietnam's leadership and the
freedom to travel freely in Vietnam at my own initiative
throughout my mission.
My long involvement in Vietnam has given me a profound
respect for the Vietnamese. Their pragmatism, flexibility,
courage and intelligence make it a country that is very
amenable to constructive engagement. The recent House vote to
grant PNTR to China is an encouraging recognition of the merits
of constructive engagement. I agree with Department of Defense
experts working the MIA/POW issue full time that the Vietnamese
have provided outstanding cooperation and that the cooperation
has increased as the U.S.-Vietnam relationship expands. The
same is true on a wide range of commercial and other issues of
interest to both countries. Progress on all issues is
positively correlated with improvements in the overall
relationship based on the principle of mutual benefit.
II. Doing business in Vietnam
Doing business in Vietnamese remains tough sledding. It is
not surprising that a country long ravaged by war in a long
struggle for independence and national unity would take time to
move from feudalism through Soviet-style state socialism to a
market economy. The problems with an underdeveloped banking
system, underdeveloped legal and physical infrastructure, a
lack of transparency and widespread corruption are serious and
combine to make it difficult to do business. American companies
have the additional handicap of arriving behind foreign
competitors, which were not constrained by the U.S. Trade
embargo against Vietnam.
In addition, the lack of domestic capital and a severely
limited national budget encourage the Vietnamese and their
foreign business partners to seek off-shore funding. Financing
must often be in the form of Government-to-Government soft
loans, as budget constraints may preclude commercial financing.
To be successful, companies must be prepared to make a long-
term commitment and maintain an in-country presence.
For the committed company with the right products or
services, proper corporate policies and minds open to Vietnam,
the positives far outweigh the negatives.
The Vietnamese leadership's commitment to economic reform,
its commitment to diversification of Vietnam's international
relationships, the national unity behind the leadership on both
of these major policies, the strong work ethic, and a literate,
intelligent, trainable workforce are durable, valuable and more
significant thoughts than the difficulties which so often
frustrate foreign companies doing business in Vietnam.
The Vietnamese have forged a society in which 78 million
people of some 54 different ethnic groups, with a wide mix of
various religions and a large number of people who subscribe to
no religion at all, live peacefully together free of the
religious and ethnic strife with which so many other countries
are afflicted.
These strengths are the ingredients by which Vietnam will
effectively address its shortcomings. Vietnam will succeed in
integrating with the global economy. The question is which
companies from which countries will grow their businesses in
Vietnam; in short, will grow with the country and by their
engagement help shape the kind of market economy that emerges
in Vietnam.
III. GE Businesses currently in Vietnam
After former President Bush permitted American companies to
establish representative offices in Vietnam, GE was among the
first ten American companies to seize the opportunity, having
obtained a license on June 18, 1993.
Several of GE's major businesses, each with its own
separate headquarters in the United States, have already
successfully entered Vietnam's market.
GE Medical Systems (GEMS)
GE Medical Systems, a global business, headquartered in
Milwaukee, Wisconsin was the first of GE's eleven major
businesses to enter the Vietnam market, because medical
equipment was included among certain humanitarian items
exempted from the Trade Embargo by former President Bush in
April 1992. Since 1993, GEMS has been selling ultrasound and x-
ray equipment against stiff foreign competition from long
established companies such as Siemens from Germany. GEMS has
made a respectable beginning, including the sale of high-end
Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) equipment manufactured in
Wisconsin. This year GEMS won a $1.3 million (USD) contract to
provide ultrasound systems, financed by the World Bank.
GE Aircraft Engines (GEAE)
GE Aircraft Engines, headquartered in Cincinnati, Ohio
regards the Vietnam Airlines (VNA) as a strategic customer with
significant growth potential. VNA airline has selected GE or GE
joint venture engines with an aggregate value of some $162
million, to power its entire small fleet of Boeing and Airbus
aircraft. GEAE is currently participating in an international
bidding competition to secure a 2-year maintenance contract for
the CFM56-5B4 engines on VNA's fleet of 10 A320 aircraft.
GE Capital Aviation Services (GECAS)
One of the 29 major branches of GE Capital Services and
headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, GECAS has dry-leased 3
new Boeing 767-300ER aircraft to Vietnam Airlines (VNA) for a
period of 5 years. Now, over 4 years into the lease, GECAS, the
worlds largest aircraft lessor, is favorably impressed with the
management and the integrity of VNA, a customer that has always
paid its lease obligations on time, even after the currency
crisis hit the Pacific nations. Although the current lease
expires January 2001, GECAS will bid to renew its lease with
this priority customer in the near future.
GE Lighting (GEL)
GE Lighting, headquartered in Cleveland, Ohio has gained a
modest presence with annual sales in Vietnam running over $1
million.
GE Appliances (GEA)
GE Appliances, headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky
successfully concluded a contract over the past year with a
private company that is already aggressively selling American
manufactured appliances (refrigerators, air-conditioners,
washing machines...) in the Vietnamese market.
GE Transportation Systems (GETS)
Headquartered in Erie, Pennsylvania GETS manufactures
locomotives and locomotive components. In Vietnam, GETS has won
two international bids (1996-97) to provide parts/components to
the Vietnam Railways (VR). GETS is working on opportunities to
sell new locomotives and to upgrade VR's older locomotives. Our
technical proposal for a new locomotive customized to meet VR's
requirements was so well received that the railway asked us to
proceed with a financing proposal that combines attractive
interest rates, full financing and relatively long payment
terms. GE Capital Marketing Services is currently working with
the U.S. Export Import Bank and an American Bank to enable us
to pursue this opportunity with its significant downstream
potential.
GE Power Systems (GEPS)
GE Power Systems, headquartered in Schenectady, New York,
manufactures steam turbines and generators in New York and gas
turbines in Greenville, South Carolina; and turbine and
generator control equipment in Salem, Virginia. GETPS has won
the following contracts in Vietnam:
first ever gas compressors for the White Tiger
field to bring in gas from off-shore,
2 generators for Ham Thuan 300MW hydro plant
(contract award February 1998) and
2 steam turbines and 2 hydrogen cooled generators
for Pha Lai 2 600MW thermal, coal fired power plant.
2 turbines in the Song Hinh hydro plant.
IV. Importance of Jackson-Vanik Waiver--Framework Agreement
signed last year
We deeply appreciate the initial support of your sub-
committee and ultimately of the entire Congress for last year's
decisive majority renewing waiver of the Jackson-Vanik
amendment.
Since the U.S. Export Import Bank and the State Bank of
Vietnam signed the Frame Agreement last year after your renewal
of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, General Electric is better
positioned to meet foreign competition and thereby create
opportunities for our American workers to produce equipment for
sale into Vietnam's growing market.
The Framework Agreement permits the U.S. Export Import Bank
to rapidly enhance our ability to compete with direct funding
proposals to our customers. This includes the bidding
opportunity that we presented last year, the Thac Ba Hydro
upgrade project. This project has been delayed, partly as the
result of uncertainty concerning funding.
However, since your renewal of the waiver last year and the
signing of the Framework Agreement, interest has been rekindled
and we have presented additional technical analysis of our
proposed turbine and turbine control equipment at the request
of our customer, Electricity of Vietnam (EVN). In addition, GE
is in a more competitive position to sell locomotives made in
Pennsylvania and to bid on additional hydro projects.
As we mentioned last year, EVN's decision to upgrade the
30-year old Thac Ba hydro power plant calls for ``supplier
credit'' which means the contractor must present a competitive
financing proposal. GE's competitors include ABB (Switzerland/
Sweden) and Siemens from Germany.
GE is extremely competitive from a technical standpoint
because of its numerous, high quality reference plants and
because GE, unlike ABB or Siemens, manufactures both the
turbine and the generators, as well as the turbine and
generator control equipment.
Renewal of the Jackson-Vanik waiver will greatly enhance
GE's ability to pursue the Thac Ba upgrade, new locomotive
opportunities and other infrastructure projects. Winning Thac
Ba would help position GE for further wins in Vietnam's growing
hydro power market. Failure to sustain the Jackson-Vanik waiver
could greatly damage GE's chances against foreign competition
on projects for which ODA funding is available and for which
U.S. Export Import Bank financing is neither available or
desired.
For example, assume that Vietnam's largest donor country,
Japan, were to fund a large project wherein GE was bidding
against a Japanese company for the contract. Even with
``untied'' aid, were both the GE and the Japanese company's
proposals roughly equivalent, political considerations could
become a factor in awarding the contract. Stated differently,
diminished U.S. involvement results in less U.S. leverage.
V. Conclusion
Experience clearly indicates that as the U.S.-S.R.V.
relationship continues to improve on the basis of mutual
respect and mutual benefit, progress will continue on all
fronts. We will continue to work closely with the U.S.
Government and we appreciate the active support for American
business and American workers that we have received from
Ambassador Peterson and his fine staff in Hanoi. We will also
continue our active involvement with such organizations as the
U.S.-Vietnam Trade Council and AMCHAM.
I believe that the most rigorous analysis suggests that
there is no conflict in pursuit of US commercial objectives in
Vietnam and our other national interests. In fact, they are
positively correlated and mutually reinforcing.
Statement of Khmer Kampuchea Krom Federation, from the State of
Lakewood, California
Thank you for the opportunity to present testimony
concerning the direct experience of the Khmer Krom People in
Vietnam within the context of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment
waiver review. While we recognize that immigration and human
rights can best be fostered in a climate of economic and trade
development, we firmly believe that diplomatic pressure is
essential to effect political reform.
Thus, we respectfully submit information opposing the
Jackson-Vanik Amendment waiver based on the Vietnamese record
to date on immigration and Human Rights. When the Government of
Vietnam (GOVN) makes significant progress in these critical
areas, we would happily support the waiver since it would
signal true progress toward bettering the lot of our people.
Immigration
Under the immigration policy announced and supported by
President Clinton, three criteria are to be met: (1) no one in
Vietnam should be denied opportunity to emigrate, and (2) no
one in Vietnam should be made to pay more than a nominal fee
for emigration or documentation required for emigration, and
(3) no one should be discriminated against because of ethnic,
or religious beliefs, or due to their service to the US Armed
Forces during the Vietnam War.
There are many cases of Khmer Krom People being denied
emigration because of their background. There are multiple
bureaucratic roadblocks, bribery, and pervasive corruption at
all levels of government in Vietnam creating additional
obstacles to free emigration. In many instances, applicants to
U.S. resettlement programs are required to pay huge amounts of
money. The bribes range from several hundred dollars to several
thousand dollars.
According to State Department reports, ethnic minorities
suffer the most from corruption. There are reasons to believe
that many victims of racial persecution in Vietnam are among
ethnic minorities, especially the Khmer Krom People in the
Mekong Delta. The very disclosure of their qualifications to
immigrate to the US--under various programs such as ODP or HO--
are tantamount to an admission of guilt for cooperation with
Vietnam's enemies. A significant number of Khmer Krom are
currently under house arrest or in hiding.
Since the beginning of the HO and OPD programs there has
been little progress in immigration for the ethnic Khmer Krom.
Of the thousands of Khmer Krom of interest to the U.S., only a
handful of cases have been identified and granted exit visas.
Since the first waiver was granted in 1998, the Federation has
noted no increase in immigration as measured by Federation
Membership.
Human Rights
The first sentence of section 402(a) of the Trade Act of
1974 said that the amendment is ``to assure the continued
dedication of the United States to fundamental human
rights...'' With that in mind, Vietnam's human rights record
does not warrant the waiver of the Jackson-Vanik amendment.
Vietnam continues to violate the human rights of the ethnic
minorities, particularly, the Khmer Krom People.
On April 19, 1999, the Vietnamese government issued
Administrative Decree 26, entitled Decree of the Government
Concerning Religious Activities. In this 29-articles long
decree, the Vietnamese government laid out some serious
restrictions on religious freedom.
Article 20 dictates that ``the consecration of those who
carry the title of Abbot in the Buddhist religion, of
cardinals, bishops, administrators in the Catholic Church, and
of dignitaries of equivalent function of other religions, must
receive the approval of the Prime Minister.''
Article 21 reads that ``the nomination and transfer of
clergy, religious and specialists in religious activities must
obtain the approval of the Peoples Committee whose
administrative management covers the territory of their
activities.''
Article 24 requires that ``religious organizations and
officials, in order to invite to Vietnam religious
organizations and officials from abroad, must obtain the
authorization of the Bureau of Religious Affairs.''
Article 25 dictates that ``in order to organize a
particular gathering within a place of worship, it is necessary
to obtain authorization from the President of the Peoples'
provincial committee.''
It is important to note that human rights violations in
Vietnam are not limited to religious freedom. Three years ago,
on April 14, 1997, the Vietnamese government issued
Administrative Decree 31, entitled Government Administrative
Detainment Policy, which gives the police the power to detain
anyone suspicious of ``infringing on the national security''
for 6 months up to 2 years without trial.
Over one year ago, Reuters reported on 5/20/99 that the
government ``has amended its strict press law to tighten state
control over official media and set rules that all reporting
must be of benefit to the country.'' Not only did the
government clamp down on free speech for every citizen, but the
Vietnamese Communist Party restricted their own party members'
free speech. On 6/7/99, the Associated Press reported that the
Politburo decided to ban party members from ``distributing
documents that question party policies and decisions, and may
not write anonymous letters or make accusations against people
they disagree with.''
Rather than improving on Human Rights, the GOVN appears to
be backsliding since the first waiver was granted in 1998.
Vietnam Violates Human Rights of Khmer Krom
The Khmer Krom People are the indigenous people of the
Mekong Delta of southern Vietnam. They have lived in the Mekong
since the first century. They are descendants of the highly
advanced Khmer Empire--builders of Angkor Watt. Ethnically
distinct, the Khmer have a different language as well.
In 1857 the French, under Napoleon III, placed Cochin China
(as they called the Mekong Delta) under a protectorate. On June
4, 1949, the French ceded Cochin China to the last Emperor of
Vietnam, Bao Dai, without a plebiscite or agreement of the
Khmer Representatives.
The Khmer Krom now number between 8-10 million. During the
Vietnam war, they were loyal allies and fought with great
distinction with the US Special Forces in a dangerous,
experimental unit--the Mobile Guerilla Force. Khmer Krom were
not just soldiers--they were elite fighters. Under US Special
Forces commanders, who trained them to fight outnumbered, and
outgunned, the Khmer Krom penetrated deep into enemy territory.
Without artillery support, or hope of reinforcements, they
turned suicide missions into successes. In tribute to their
service, General Williams C. Westmoreland cited their
discipline, courage, and sacrifice in recovering the black box
of the U2 plane that crashed deep in the enemy territory in
1966. The mission was so important to the United States that
President Johnson was immediately notified of its recovery.
There are books and many eye-witness accounts of former US
Green Berets providing testimonies for these exceptional
soldiers. Now, Vietnam is punishing the Khmer Krom for their
service to the US. The Vietnamese should make peace with their
own people, if they want the fruits of a full relationship with
America.
Mr. Chairman,
While hoping to win normal trade relations with the United
States, the Vietnamese government continues to violate the US
and international Human Rights laws by destroying the sacred
religious sites of ethnic Khmer Krom in Ho Chi Minh City and
many other provinces. I would like to bring to your attention
such violations and ask for your help to save the Khmer Krom
People from extinction under the Vietnamese communists.
Culturally, the Khmer Krom culture is under a constant
pressure by the ``assimilation'' policies of the Vietnam
government. The Khmer Krom culture, deeply rooted in Hinayanna
Buddhism, is now crumbling. Originally, there were about 700
Khmer Buddhist temples all over South Vietnam, the former
French Cochin-China. However, under the Vietnam government's
hostile policies of assimilation, many temples have been
destroyed. As a result, the Khmer Krom People in those areas
have been uprooted, eliminated or forced to assimilate. The
number of Khmer Buddhist temples have been greatly reduced and
there are only 560 remaining. Agents of Vietnam Fatherland
Front, a branch of the Vietnam communist government, constantly
scrutinize the Khmer Krom temples. They are to dictating the
religious practices as well as changing the built-in
characteristics of the Khmer to assimilate the Vietnamese
culture.
Evidently, a new building has been funded by Vietnam
government to represent Khmer traditions in the province of
Travinh. It has been artistically skewed to deviate from the
true Khmer cultural characteristics to impose the Vietnamese
culture upon the Khmer, and mislead the local and international
tourists on the Khmer traditions. In many of the Khmer cultural
festivities, the Vietnam government has subtly introduced many
Vietnamese cultural characteristics, and the Khmer population
are forced to accept them to be part of Khmer traditions.
Recently, the government of Vietnam ordered and had
destroyed the centuries old and sacred religious site of the
Khmer Krom People in Ho Chi Minh City. Namely, it destroyed the
sacred Pali School building, and spiritually disturbed the
Bodhi Tree where the remains of Khmer Krom ancestors have been
kept for centuries and paid tribute to every year. The remains
of thousands of Khmer Krom fighters, whose lives were dedicated
along with the US Armed Forces during Vietnam War, also lie
under the same Bodhi Tree. The sacred site is at:
Most recently in January this year, in the province of
Travinh, the government of Vietnam ordered all 141 abbots of
the province's Khmer Krom Buddhist temples to a concentration
site in the province. In other provinces of the Mekong Delta,
the Khmer Krom abbots are suffering from similar government
tactics. These religious leaders have been intimidated,
humiliated and mentally tortured. Any of the abbots who dared
to even to dream of welcoming the Millennium celebration were
threatened with imprisonment. When U.S. Buddhist monks of Khmer
Krom ethnic origin came to visit their former temples and
hometown, the Security Department from Hanoi sent their secret
police agents to intimidate and mentally torture them.
The Khmer Krom People in the province of Soctrang are now
forced to celebrate Kathinatean (giving clothing to Buddhist
Monks) on the same day. This act has violated of Buddhist
principles and practices, which is to celebrate this festival
on any day during the month of November. The UN Human Rights
delegation was made aware of this during their visit in Vietnam
in October 1998.
At the millennium celebration January 1, 2000, the Khmer
Krom People in Cambodia were blessed with permission from the
government of the Kingdom to celebrate the Millennium events.
Unfortunately, the Hanoi regime dispatched their secret police
agents to intimidate and create psychological nightmares within
the Khmer Krom communities in Cambodia.
During the WWII and after 1975, Human Rights of this
minority have been brutally abused by the Vietminh and the
government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam respectively.
Their sufferings are parallel to the recent sufferings of the
ethnic Albanians in Kosovo and the East Timor people in
Indonesia. As an example, a recent newspaper report on March
16, 1999 about the religious right and freedom in Vietnam reads
as the follows:
GENEVA, March 16 (Reuters)--The United Nations special
investigator on religion on Tuesday accused Vietnam of
continuing to deny people freedom of worship and called for
reforms.
Abdelfattah Amor, in his report on the situation in
Vietnam, said all of the religious communities there were
prevented from conducting activities freely....
``Religion appears as an instrument of policy rather than a
component of society, free to develop as it wishes, something
which is ultimately contrary to freedom of religion or belief
as governed by international law,'' said Amor, a former dean of
the University of Tunis law faculty who visited Vietnam in
October.
Clearly, the Khmer Krom People's ability to exercise their
religious freedom has been hindered by the Vietnam government.
Economically, the Khmer Krom are indigenous and land is the
main source of their viability. Since their land has been
encroached on and occupied by the Vietnamese in the past, such
activities continue. Thus, their only economic resource is
shrinking. Their economic status has been reduced from
landowners to physical laborers earning less than the
equivalent of $1.00 U.S. dollar per working day. They are
living ten-fold below the poverty level, but the government of
Vietnam constantly prevents any international organizations
from observing these facts or to help these people. The Khmer
Krom People, whose farmland is the only vital source for their
sustenance, have been deprived and deceived by land policies of
the Vietnam government and, as a result, over 95% of Khmer Krom
are living in harsh conditions below the poverty level, without
stable jobs and without sufficient food and medicine.
According to a recent Associated Press reported from Hanoi
on Wednesday, December 09, 1998: the Khmer Krom people have
only about 309 pounds of foods for consumption per year per
person which is only 50% of the average availability of food to
a Vietnamese. According to a Vietnamese weekly paper, the Trong
Dong (Silver Drum) reported in Southern California on Friday,
November 27, 1998: to alleviate starvation, the Khmer Krom of
Travinh province (of Vietnam) have to sell their blood...
There seems to be no genuine effort of the Vietnam
government to develop Khmer Krom People economically.
Therefore, education for the Khmer Krom children is poor both
in the percentage of students attending grades schools and
higher education. According to our records, no Khmer Krom
students have been allowed to study abroad. According to
Deutsche Presse-Agentur, reported from Hanoi on Friday,
November 13, 1998: only 20 students of Vietnam's millions of
ethnic minorities have been selected to attend higher
education. This demonstrates that the Khmer Krom and other
minorities are not allowed to have opportunities to live their
lives in the modern society. Their future is now at stake.
A newspaper published inside Vietnam, Tien Phong (The
Pioneer) dated 5/9/1999 has identified some of the wide-spread
and typical abuses of Vietnamese officials toward the Khmer
Krom farmers by robbing their land, their crops or their house:
1) On January 25,1999 Mr. Nguyen Viet Khoi, a Vietnamese
police captain in the city of Soctrang, robbed the farmland
from a Khmer Krom family (Mr. Ly, Senh), then imprisoned Mr. Ly
for 3 years, his wife and his 4 adult children at lighter terms
in prison.
2) A Khmer Krom farmer, Phuong Thi Lan Anh of Thanh Quoi,
My Xuyen, Soctrang, her house was robbed by a Vietnamese
official and she became homeless.
3) Mr. My Dinh of Nham Lang, Soctrang, a Khmer Krom farmer,
his land was robbed by a Vietnamese official after he left his
hut to attend a Buddhist religious service at the temple.
4) On August 10, 1999 Mr. Tran Van Thach, a Vietnamese
police major in Soctrang, robbed Mrs. Phen, a Khmer Krom
farmer, of all her 10 tons of grains she had harvested to feed
her family for the entire year.
The Vietnamese communist government in 1976, and again
recently, have murdered, imprisoned and persecuted the Khmer
Krom people, including political and religious leaders and the
general public in order to expedite its assimilation policies
of minorities. Additional examples of blatant violations on the
basic human dignity and freedom of the people of Khmer Krom are
as follows:
The Khmer Krom People's civic and religious leaders who
have been murdered by Vietnam Communist government included:
Dr. Son Ngoc Thanh, Senator Son Thai Nguyen, Mr. Son Thuong,
Ven. Kim Sang, Ven. Lam Em, Ven. Thach Phok, Ven. Thach Ret,
Ven. Yim Rong, Ven.Thach Ngos, Ven. Kim Toc Chuong, and
countless numbers of others.
The Khmer Krom People's children have been discriminated
against in education and since the Vietnam government provides
them with no real venue for advancement, a minimum number of
them are being able to get access to higher education in
Vietnam, and none of them are being sent to study abroad, where
sources of modern technology have originated and developed.
Conclusion:
The Khmer Krom People who are now poor farmers, do not live
in the city or the urban areas where UN officials, foreign
diplomats, news-agencies, or international organizations
frequently visit or are stationed. They bravely served in the
U.S. armed forces during the Vietnam war, and because of their
ethnic and religious background the government of Vietnam has
severely abused their human rights, and their sufferings have
never been heard of by the international community.
On behalf of the Khmer Krom People, the Khmer Krom
Federation recommends that the waiver be extended only after
Vietnam agrees to:
1) Comply with U.S. laws, Charter of the United Nations,
the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Minorities
Rights, and respect the rights of Khmer Krom People and others
in Vietnam;
2) End forced assimilation of the Khmer Krom People and
other ethnic minorities, stop planting communist agents as
religious leaders in the Khmer Krom Buddhist temples and let
the Khmer Krom Buddhist monks elect their own leaders without
interference from GOVN;
3) Stop persecuting the Khmer Krom veterans who formerly
fought side by side with the U.S. Armed forces during the
Vietnam War and now are living in Vietnam;
4) Provide equal access for job opportunities to Khmer
Krom;
5) Allow Khmer Krom students from Vietnam to attend U.S.
universities and allow more visas for students from Vietnam to
allow access to U.S. colleges and universities;
6) Stop interfering with curriculum and education programs
of the Khmer language for Khmer Krom children. Let the Khmer
Krom children learn the authenticity of Khmer language, not the
new language designed by the government of Vietnamese
Communists to brainwash the Khmer Krom children and keep them
from learning the real Khmer language;
7) Allocate a 10% quota on products and services from
Vietnam that are being allowed access to U.S. markets in such
ways that products and services must be produced or served by
Khmer Krom workers and/or Khmer Krom owned businesses;
8) Permit international organizations and/or U.S. non-
governmental organizations to consider providing their services
for the Khmer Krom people in the Mekong Delta areas of Vietnam;
9) Distribute equally international aid of any form to the
Khmer Krom and minority people in Vietnam;
10) Yield a portion of the aid from the U.S. Department of
Agriculture to Vietnam for assisting the Khmer Krom farmers to:
a) Educate with know-how techniques to increase crop yields
by such measures as rotating agricultural products;
b) Make available directly to Khmer Krom farmers the
chemicals for plant nutrition, pest control and fertilizers;
and
c) Provide capital for equipment and technological
assistance and expertise to Khmer Krom peasants and merchants;
11) Allow the U.S. Embassy in Hanoi and the U.S. Consulate
in Ho Chi Minh City to freely monitor the human rights for the
Khmer Krom and other ethnic minorities in Vietnam;
12) Ask the United Nations High Commissioner for Human
Rights to establish UN offices in the Mekong Delta areas to
monitor human rights abuses against the Khmer Krom people;
13) Return all properties that the government of Vietnam or
its agents have confiscated from the Khmer Krom people in all
provinces of South Vietnam, including but not limited to lands,
buildings, religious sites, cultural centers, etc.; and
14) Stop forcing the Khmer Krom in the province of Soctrang
from having to celebrate the Katinatean on the same day in the
entire province.
Statement of Hon. John McCain, a United States Senator from the State
of Arizona
As the United States and Vietnam work to resolve the
remaining obstacles to the conclusion of a bilateral trade
agreement, I am pleased to submit this statement supporting
extension of the Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam.
I have strongly supported the process of normalizing
economic and diplomatic relations with Vietnam over the past
decade. My support for closer ties between our two countries
has always been premised on my belief, which has been affirmed
by the process of normalization, that our interests in Vietnam
are served not by isolating that country but by working
together in areas where we agree and by lobbying earnestly for
change in areas where we differ.
Such an unsentimental, dispassionate approach to a
bilateral relationship burdened by the weight of history has
paid dividends. Our POW/MIA accounting work, which I will
discuss further below, has accelerated dramatically over the
course of the past decade, with the result that hundreds of
American mothers, fathers, wives, sons, and daughters know the
fate of their lost loved ones--a fate grievously unknown to
them during the period when we sought to isolate Vietnam rather
than seek its government's cooperation on the search for our
missing personnel. Hundreds of American companies are doing
business in Vietnam, and the bustling commercialism of Ho Chi
Minh City and other urban centers serves as a reminder that
although we lost the war, Western influence in Vietnam is
pervasive and growing. Moreover, our refugee assistance
programs in Vietnam have been quite successful. It is those
refugee programs, in the context of the broader bilateral
relationship, that we gather to review today.
As we all know, the Jackson-Vanik amendment exists to
promote freedom of emigration from non-democratic countries.
The law calls for a waiver if it would substantively enhance
opportunities to emigrate freely. Opportunities for emigration
from Vietnam have clearly increased since the President first
waived the Jackson-Vanik amendment in 1998. The waiver has
encouraged measurable Vietnamese cooperation in processing
applications for emigration under the Orderly Departure Program
(ODP) and the Resettlement Opportunity for Vietnamese Returnees
agreement (ROVR).
The best measure of the Jackson-Vanik waiver's success is
the thousands of Vietnamese who have freely emigrated to the
United States since the President first waived the Jackson-
Vanik amendment in 1998. Then, 3,754 Vietnamese had departed
for the United States through ROVR; today, 15,886 have done so.
Then, 2,461 former re-education camp detainees had not been
cleared by the government of Vietnam for interview with
American officials; today, that number has been reduced to 750.
Then, the Vietnamese government was denying U.S. officials
access to Montagnards potentially eligible for refugee
resettlement; today, all but 408 Montagnards identified as
eligible for interview have been cleared by the Vietnamese
government for processing by the United States.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver is working, as measured by its
inducement of Vietnamese cooperation with our refugee
resettlement objectives. We are approaching completion of many
refugee admissions categories under the Orderly Departure
Program, bringing to an end a historic process that has allowed
over half a million Vietnamese to emigrate to the United States
since the 1980s. The Vietnamese government has agreed to help
implement the resumption of ODP processing for former U.S.
government employees, which we suspended in 1996. The United
States is also implementing a new, in-country refugee program
to assist those Vietnamese who have suffered or who fear
political or religious persecution.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver has given momentum to this
process. Revoking the waiver would likely stall this momentum,
to the detriment of those who seek to emigrate.
The Jackson-Vanik waiver has also allowed the Overseas
Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), the Export-Import Bank
(EXIM), and the Department of Agriculture (USDA) to support
American businesses in Vietnam. Competitors from other
industrialized countries have long had the benefit of lending
and insurance guarantees provided by their own governments.
Withdrawing OPIC, EXIM, and USDA guarantees would hurt U.S.
businesses and slow progress on economic normalization. It
would reinforce the position of hard-liners in Hanoi who
believe Vietnam's opening to the West has proceeded too
rapidly.
We should also be prepared to approve a U.S.-Vietnam
bilateral trade agreement once it is completed. Having visited
Vietnam regularly since 1985, I can attest to the changes in
Vietnamese society that have resulted from the limited economic
reforms adopted by the government. Although it is a long-term
prospect, I take seriously the proposition that the growth of
the middle class and greater exposure to Americans as a result
of deepening economic ties between our countries will render
Vietnam more susceptible to the influence of our values.
A number of outstanding differences continue to stand in
the way of closer U.S.-Vietnam relations. Human rights,
including the freedom to speak, assemble, and worship, remain
subject to the whims of political leaders in Hanoi. Political
and economic reforms lag far behind American expectations. Our
companies operating in Vietnam suffer from bureaucratic red
tape and corruption.
I harbor no illusions about the human rights situation in
Vietnam. There is clearly room for significant improvement. The
question is how best to advance both the cause of human rights
and U.S. economic and security interests in Southeast Asia. The
answer lies in the continued expansion of U.S. relations with
Vietnam despite our continuing differences with the regime in
Hanoi, which is struggling to define the terms of Vietnam's
relationship with the United States.
The choice is Vietnam's. For our part, we can best
influence that debate by institutionalizing our bilateral
trading relationship, working together on areas of mutual
interest in regional economic and security affairs, gingerly
moving forward on military-to-military ties, continuing our
human rights dialogue and other efforts to build needed respect
for individual freedoms and the rule of law, and cooperating in
the search for our missing personnel.
Although the Jackson-Vanik waiver does not relate directly
to our POW/MIA accounting efforts, Vietnam-related legislation
often serves as a referendum on broader U.S.-Vietnam relations,
in which accounting for our missing personnel is the United
States' first priority. Thirty-nine Joint Field Activities
conducted by the Department of Defense over the past seven
years, the consequent repatriation of 288 sets of remains of
American military personnel during that period, and resolution
of the fate of all but 41 of the 196 missing Americans last
known alive in Vietnam attest to the ongoing cooperation
between Vietnamese and American officials in our efforts to
account for our missing service men. Such cooperation served as
an important motivation for Secretary of Defense William
Cohen's historic visit to Vietnam in March of this year. I am
confident that such progress will continue.
Just as the naysayers who insisted that Vietnamese
cooperation on POW/MIA issues would cease altogether when we
normalized relations with Vietnam were proven wrong, so have
those who insisted that Vietnam would cease cooperation on
emigration issues once we waived Jackson-Vanik been proven
wrong by the course of events since the original waiver was
issued in 1998.
It is important to stress that the Jackson-Vanik amendment
relates narrowly to freedom of emigration. It does not relate
to the many other issues involved in our bilateral relationship
with Vietnam, although rejecting the waiver would likely have
an adverse effect on other American interests there. The
Jackson-Vanik waiver is a tool we can selectively use to
encourage free emigration. The waiver has contributed to that
objective in Vietnam. At a minimum, using it as a blunt
instrument to castigate the Vietnamese government for every
issue of contention between our two countries will not advance
America's interest in free emigration from Vietnam and may well
have broader, if unintended, implications.
Whatever one may think of the character of the Vietnamese
regime, such considerations should not obscure our clear
humanitarian interest in promoting freedom of emigration from
Vietnam. The Jackson-Vanik waiver serves that interest.
Congress should support it.
Statement of Rong Nay, Montagnard Human Rights Organization,
Greensboro, NC
My name is Rong Nay and I am the Assistant Director of the
Montagnard Human Rights Organization, representing the
Montagnard people living both in the United States and in the
Central Highlands of Vietnam.
I would like to thank Congressman Crane and the Members of
the Trade Subcommittee for the opportunity to share our
feelings about the plight of the Montagnards that relate to the
Jackson-Vanik amendment, free emigration and trade with
Vietnam.
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, on June 18,
1998 and June 17, 1999 we strongly testified against the
Jackson-Vanik Waiver for Vietnam for the following reasons:
The Vietnamese government continues carrying out a
policy of punishment and discrimination against the Montagnard
people in the Central Highlands of Vietnam.
The Vietnamese government continues to deny all
basic human rights of the Montagnard people, and it maintains a
policy of Cultural Leveling to force the Montagnards into
extinction. For example, Montagnard languages can not be spoken
or taught in school, and the Vietnamese government has
destroyed Montagnard religions. All Montagnard churches in the
Central Highlands have been closed since 1975 and it continues
to prohibit religious freedom by controlling the activities of
the Montagnard Protestant Church. Even the right to conduct
religious services in our home is also denied. Violations of
this nature result in extremely harsh reprisals.
The Vietnamese government has not made sufficient
progress towards a free emigration policy to warrant the
waiver. A large number of eligible applicants has been denied
exit permits or has not been processed because they were former
FULRO movement families, former U.S government employees or
religious leaders.
Besides administrative roadblocks, pervasive corruption at
all levels of government creates additional obstacles to free
emigration. In many instances, applicants to U.S. resettlement
programs are demanded huge amount of money that the Montagnard
people cannot afford. This in effect violates the spirit of the
Jackson-Vanik amendment and also is against the law and policy
in the United States.
The Montagnards have been blocked from international
humanitarian aid groups since the collapse of South Vietnam in
1975. Several hundred foreign NGOs were permitted in Vietnam
for relief and development efforts, but no American and almost
no other foreign humanitarian aid agency is permitted in the
Central Highlands for the Montagnards. Efforts to deliver aid
to Montagnards in the villages almost always fail because of
corruption within the province people's committees.
The Vietnamese government maintains ``Restricted Areas'' in
the Central Highlands where elderly Montagnards of past US
loyalties are kept and denied medical treatment. No foreigners
are allowed access into these areas. No one in the world would
know that they intentionally do it. But this is being done
secretly.
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, we are here
in Capitol Hill, Washington DC, a world far away from the
Central Highlands of Vietnam. We are honored to have our voice
heard again today, and we strongly inform you that the
Vietnamese government has not changed their policy since 1975.
Our Montagnard people have been cheated and discriminated
for many years in Vietnam, but now we are being told to bribe,
cheat, and split up our families so that some of us will have a
chance for freedom in America. The Vietnamese government asks
many refugees to act as secret agents of their government to
inform them about the activities of our communities here in the
U.S. They use fear to control our people.
When many Montagnards from the U.S. go back to Vietnam to
visit their families, the local police government of Vietnam
forces them to present themselves at the police office and
investigates them with many questions about the Montagnards
living in U.S. Most questions are about the former leaders of
the Montagnard community. They are warned not to say anything
to their family about the life in the U.S. How can the U.S.
citizenship be forced to do this? This is not free travel or
the spirit of free emigration.
In addition, the police have to follow them everywhere
during their vacation day by saying that: ``We have to protect
you,'' but the U.S citizen has to feed and pay them for their
police service. This is not free travel or free emigration.
We are the survivor groups of the Montagnard people living
in the U.S. who strive to uphold the human dignity of the
Montagnard living in the Central Highlands whose voices remain
silent behind closed borders. Today, we are honored to have our
voice heard, to speak, to stand for the Montagnards whose
rights have been stripped away, and to present their situation
to the people of the United States. We fought for freedom and
independence against the Hanoi's violations, assimilation, and
extermination of the Montagnard people. We pray that the Hanoi
government will hear our true voice:
Why do we have no rights to live as human beings?
Why we cannot get our families out of Vietnam?
Why we cannot worship our Christian faith freely?
Why we cannot receive humanitarian aid and NGOs in the
Central Highlands?
Why we cannot have the same opportunities in education and
development as Vietnamese people?
Today, We ask only to be treated as human beings. We love
our families and our children just the way the Vietnamese do.
The intention of the Jackson-Vanik Admendmen is to promote
free emigration, but our Montagnard people continue to suffer
separated from love ones. The Hanoi government writes FULRO
anti-Revolutionary on the paperwork of the Montagnard people.
This technique is to stop our relatives to emigrate to the U.S.
Yes, FULRO was the Montagnard resistance movement, but it no
longer exists. The war is over and our families should be
together. We now struggle peacefully. The day of our freedom
and independence is gone. We are a broken people, but we can
stand up with hope and dignity.
The United States government is the only hope to get our
Montagnard people out of Vietnam and help our Montagnard people
who remain in the Central Highlands to have the rights to live
and have the opportunity to develop their lives.
I beseech you on behalf of those whose cry has been
silenced to help us end the cultural genocide that has pushed
the Montagnard people of South Vietnam to the brink of
extinction. Our people are hiding in fear or rotting in
unmarked graves. We are not free to live in our own land, we
are poised at the threshold of extinction and without help, the
Montagnard will become swallowed up by their oppressors and
disappear as a distinct people forever
The Jackson-Vanik Waiver should not be renewed until free
emigration and Human Rights are respected. We believe that Free
Trade should only be with a government that honors free
emigration and basic human rights.
Thank you so much for the privilege of presenting my
testimony
Statement of Dolores Apodaca Alfond, National Alliance of Families,
Bellevue, WA
We thank the committee for the opportunity to submit this
statement for the record. We do this knowing full well that the
decision to extend the Jackson-Vanick waiver as it applies to
Vietnam has already been made.
Sadly, our nation is now lead by a group of hypocrites. Men
and women who decry human rights violations, unless there is a
profit to be made. Men and women who are now willing to strip
our servicemen of a POW designation, should they become
captured in an ``Operation other than War,'' and turn them into
``isolated personnel.'' That's the new terminology currently
used at the Department of Defense, ``isolated personnel'' and
``operations other than war.''
The National Alliance of Families for the Return of
American's Missing Servicemen continues to be concerned with
Vietnam's failure to provide information concerning our
servicemen Prisoner and missing as a result of the War in
Southeast Asia. In previous hearings, we provided indisputable
evidence that Vietnam was salting recovery sites. We also
provided extremely compelling evidence that one man, Army
Captain John Mc Donnell, was alive in a POW camp in February
1973. Captain McDonnell is still among the unaccounted for.
Where is Vietnam's ``full cooperation?'' The answer is simple.
It doesn't exist. This administrations' claim of Vietnamese
``full cooperation'' is a myth created to justify trade with a
nation that continues to withhold the truth regarding our POW/
MIA's.
Another myth created to justify trade with Vietnam is their
progress in the area of human rights. Vietnam continues to be
an oppressive communist dictatorship. Human rights violations
are rampant. All recognized Human Rights organizations,
worldwide, continue to condemn Vietnam for its' oppression of
religious freedom and freedom of speech. Yet, the United States
turns a blind eye to these gross violations, and cites the very
minimal changes occurring in Vietnam as progress that should be
rewarded.
Would this Congress reward a man who beat his child seven
days a week, because he scaled back and only beat that child
six days a week? Of course not. Yet, this Congress continues to
reward Vietnam, while they continue to withhold POW/MIA
information and they continue their human rights violations.
Our expanded aid and trade with Vietnam has not opened
Vietnam to democracy. It has not substantially reduced the
incidents of human rights violations. Vietnam is still ranked
high on the list of Amnesty International for their Human
Rights violations. Nor, has our expanded trade succeeded in
opening all of Vietnam's records on American POW/MIAs. Vietnam
remains a closed society, oppressing its' people and doling out
POW/MIA information as it suits their needs.
Let's be honest as to why we are granting another extension
to the Jackson-Vanick wavier, as it applies to Vietnam. The
reason is simple. Big Business profits and when profits factor
into a decision principle goes out the window.
Just as we turned a blind eye to human rights violations in
China, we now turn that blind eye to the human rights
violations in Vietnam. We do this not to expose Vietnam, and
other oppressive countries such as China, to western democracy.
We do this so that corporate America can manufacture sneakers
or jackets for under $2.00 and sell them for well over $100.00.
Extending the Jackson-Vanick waiver, as it applies to
Vietnam, is NOT about human rights of the Vietnamese people. It
is NOT about seeking the truth about our POW/MIAs. It is NOT
about morality. It's about profit and we should at least be
honest about it. We should also be ashamed.
[Attachments are being retained in the Committee files.]
Statement of Sandra J. Kristoff, New York Life International, Inc.
Over six years after the United States initiated the
normalization of economic relations with Vietnam, that
process--at once technical, emotional, and of great consequence
for both countries--appears to be drawing nearer to a
conclusion. New York Life International welcomes this
opportunity to reiterate its conviction that full normalization
is profoundly important to the economic and national security
interests of the United States. We hope that the remaining
steps in the normalization process can be completed as quickly
as possible, and we urge the Subcommittee, and the House as a
whole, to advance that process by accepting the President's
renewal of the Jackson-Vanik waiver for Vietnam for another
year.
Our company, along with so many others in the American
business community, sees tremendous commercial potential in
Vietnam. There is no question that a country of some 80 million
industrious people represents a singularly attractive market
for life insurance and many other American goods and services.
At the same time, it is equally clear that New York Life's
ability to compete effectively in Vietnam rests squarely on the
existence of a fully normalized trading relationship between
the United States and Vietnam, including the legal framework
provided by a bilateral trade agreement. With our Asian,
European, and other competitors already actively engaged in the
Vietnamese market, it would be a major understatement to say
that New York Life is anxious for a rapid conclusion to the
normalization process.
New York Life deeply appreciates the hard work that
negotiators from both the United States and Vietnam have
devoted to the conclusion of a bilateral trade agreement. Our
U.S. negotiators have done a superb job in pursuing an
agreement that is comprehensive, commercially meaningful, and
will advance Vietnam's integration into the global economic
community, including the World Trade Organization. The
Vietnamese, for their part, have approached this negotiation as
an opportunity to advance their country's economic development
through greater competition and the rule of law.
The results of these efforts were evident in the
preliminary agreement that was reached last summer. We know, of
course, that this ``agreement in principle'' has not been
without controversy in Hanoi. We fully appreciate that the
commitments contained in the preliminary agreement were bound
to generate much debate in Vietnam's economic policy circles.
Nevertheless, we support the position of Ambassador
Barshefsky and her negotiators to stand by last summer's
``agreement in principle'' as the basis for moving towards a
final agreement. The elements of a deal remain in place, and we
are very much encouraged by recent signs that the two sides are
working to finalize this technically difficult process.
Certainly where life insurance and other financial services
products are concerned, the agreement in principle would have a
major impact in expanding the ability of companies like New
York Life to compete in the Vietnamese market. The agreement
reportedly is based extensively on the disciplines that exist
within the WTO's General Agreement on Trade in Services. We
anticipate that Vietnam's commitments to these disciplines
would be phased in over a 6-year period, bringing about a much
more transparent and predictable framework for doing business
in that country's life insurance market.
Since the lifting of the embargo and the beginning of
political normalization, the United States and Vietnam have
made great strides in healing painful divisions and building a
productive dialogue. Many Members of Congress deserve enormous
credit for their role in moving the relationship forward. The
Administration has worked diligently to strengthen bilateral
ties, while vigorously addressing important issues such as the
POW/MIA effort. New York Life has especially appreciated the
tremendous skill and credibility Ambassador Peterson has
brought to managing the relationship in Hanoi.
In addition, the American business community has also
played a prominent role in strengthening the friendship between
the two countries, and New York Life International is proud to
have been a part of that effort. In this 25th anniversary year
of the conclusion of the Vietnam War, our company is convinced
that the time is ripe to bring the normalization process to its
full conclusion. Our involvement in Vietnam to date persuades
us that full economic engagement is the right way to achieve
the U.S. interest in a stable, prosperous, and progressively
freer society in Vietnam.
We remain hopeful that the two governments will conclude
the bilateral trade agreement rapidly, so that Congress can
consider and approve that agreement by the end of its current
session. That outcome clearly will require significant efforts
on the part of everyone involved. But the costs of allowing the
normalization process to slide into another year are
considerable, both for American business interests and for the
broader national interest in placing U.S.-Vietnam relations
firmly on a new track.
In the interim, it is vitally important that Congress allow
the current Jackson-Vanik waiver to remain in effect for
another year, as the President has proposed. While the waiver
currently does not allow for the extension of NTR status, the
programs that are available by virtue of the waiver, including
those of OPIC and the Ex-Im Bank, are making important
contributions to the expansion of an American commercial
presence in Vietnam.
More importantly, the waiver sends a signal of engagement
that is essential to ensuring continued progress in all areas
of the relationship, including with regard to the ongoing trade
negotiations. In particular, renewal of the waiver will provide
a critical message of support for the ongoing process of
economic reform and liberalization in Vietnam. While that
reform effort has not always progressed as swiftly or as
smoothly as we would like, a rejection of the Jackson-Vanik
waiver would certainly be seized upon by opponents of reform as
an excuse to reverse the considerable progress achieved during
the last decade.
New York Life International is grateful for the
Subcommittee's interest in U.S.-Vietnam economic and commercial
relations. We hope that members of the Subcommittee will join
us in urging officials of both the U.S. Administration and the
Vietnamese Government to ``seize the moment'' by rapidly
concluding the bilateral trade agreement.
Statement of Bruce R. Harder, Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United
States
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee:
The Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States is
pleased to be able to make a written statement for the record.
This statement is the written testimony of Bruce R. Harder,
Director, National Security and Foreign Affairs of the Veterans
of Foreign Wars of the United States. We understand that the
purpose of today's hearing is to evaluate U.S. trade relations
with Vietnam and to consider President Clinton's renewal of
Vietnam's waiver under the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the Trade
Act of 1974.
This written testimony presents the VFW leadership's views
on the impact of the President Clinton's 12-month renewal of
Vietnam's waiver under the Jackson-Vanik Amendment to the Trade
Act of 1974. The VFW's remarks are limited to describing the
effect that the President's action is expected to have on the
Prisoner of War (POW) and Missing in Action (MIA) issue that
resulted from the Vietnam War.
Our opinion is based on a recent VFW leadership trip to
Southeast Asia that took place from March 18th to April 2,
2000. The VFW delegation included: the Senior Vice Commander-
in-Chief, John F. Gwizdak, Junior Vice Commander-in-Chief James
N. Goldsmith, Past Commander-in-Chief Billy Ray Cameron, and
Director, National Security and Foreign Affairs, Bruce R.
Harder. On the fact-finding trip, the VFW delegation visited
Thailand, Laos, and Vietnam.
The purpose of the trip was to collect facts, receive
update briefings, meet key personnel, discuss progress on POW/
MIA accounting directly with them, and make an assessment of
the POW/MIA accounting effort in Southeast Asia. Our national
officers traveled to Southeast Asia to demonstrate our
continuing commitment to the ``fullest possible accounting''
process for Missing Americans from the war. We traveled to
Southeast Asia to gain first hand experience and listen to key
U.S. and foreign government officials and foreign veterans'
organizations.
On the trip, the VFW delegation met with top level U.S.
government personnel in each country. Our visit included office
calls with the either the U.S. Ambassador or Chargé de
Affairs in the case of Lao P.D.R.; the Commanders of Joint Task
Force Full Accounting Detachments One (Thailand), Two
(Vietnam), and Three (Laos); the Commander of the JTF-FA Joint
Field Activity (JFA 00-3L) in Laos, and other key U.S.
diplomats and U.S. military personnel. In addition, the VFW
delegation spent three days in the field working out of the Ban
Along Base Camp in Southeastern Laos on a Joint Field Activity
searching for remains of missing Americans from the war. As in
the past, we found the Americans deployed under the command and
control of Joint Task Force-Full Accounting including teams
from the Army's Central Identification Laboratory Hawaii to be
highly motivated, dedicated, and focused on the mission.
Furthermore, the VFW delegation met with Lao and Vietnam
veterans group officials and high-level foreign government
officials in Laos and Vietnam to include the Director of the
Vietnamese Office for Seeking Missing Personnel. We wanted to
make sure that the key officials in each country understood
that accounting for our missing comrades is still a priority
issue with the VFW. Our views are based on experience gained
during our recent visit, and from additional research and
interviews conducted by the VFW.
The POW/MIA issue has been and remains a priority issue
with the Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States. VFW
Resolution Number 443, ``Americans Who Are Prisoners of War or
Missing in Action,'' provides the VFW's policy on the POW/MIA
issue as it relates to those Americans unaccounted-for from all
our nation's past wars. Our policy is broken down into two
simple goals. The VFW's first goal is to reach the fullest
possible accounting of Americans missing from all our nation's
past wars. Our second goal is to urge the President of the
United States of America and every member of the Congress to
speak out on every occasion to expedite the return of those
U.S. servicemen who are still unaccounted for from all our
nation's past wars. To the VFW, full accounting means the
return of either a live American serviceman or his identified
remains to this country and his family for proper military
burial with full honors.
With 2,020 (1,517 in Vietnam) Americans still missing from
the War in Southeast Asia, the government still has much work
to do before the accounting process is complete. The VFW
supports the current U.S. government effort to achieve the
fullest possible accounting effort for those Americans who did
not return home from our nation's past wars, but we believe
that more can be done to accelerate the accounting effort. For
example, assigning additional personnel and providing
additional financial resources to the U.S. Army Central
Identification Laboratory Hawaii can accelerate the accounting
process. In addition, the Defense Prisoner of War/Missing
Personnel Office should be fully staffed and excluded from any
planned Department of Defense personnel or structure
reductions. Finally, we should encourage Lao P.D.R. government
leaders to remove the personnel cap that limits the number of
Americans in country to 40 during joint field activities. In
theory, if the Lao government allowed the U.S. to double the
size of our JFA personnel, we could double the pace of the
accounting process in Laos. Because of environmental factors
and other issues such as aging witnesses, the longer the
process, the more difficult the task of accounting becomes.
The VFW believes that it plays an important role in staying
engaged with the U.S. government and other organizations on the
POW/MIA issue. We closely review the government's program,
policy, and activities for accounting for Americans who remain
``unaccounted-for'' from all of our nation's past wars. As one
of the largest and most respected veteran's organizations, we
believe it is our responsibility to closely monitor activities
and developments in the POW/MIA area and to take an active role
when it is appropriate.
I am responsible for keeping our National POW/MIA
Committee, our Department POW/MIA Chairmen, and our national
leaders informed on the POW/MIA issue. We accomplish our goals
by staying in frequent contact with the Defense Prisoner of
War/Missing Personnel Office (DPMO), and other veteran and
family organizations on the issue. In addition, I closely
monitor the news media and stay in regular contact with State
Department representatives on issues related to POW/MIA
accounting.
The VFW has been making trips to Vietnam since July 1991.
On our first trip VFW officials accompanied Congressman Lane
Evans of Illinois and representatives of other Veterans Service
Organizations to visit Hanoi, Hue City, and Ho Chi Minh City.
Since that first visit, the VFW has made regular annual visits
back to Southeast Asia. In 2000 VFW representatives will visit
Vietnam and Thailand on two separate occasions, and Laos on one
occasion. Our mission on every trip to Southeast Asia has been
the same. We urge both U.S. Government and foreign government
officials and their veteran's organizations to diligently work
toward resolving the cases of Americans missing from the war in
Southeast Asia. The VFW sends national officers to Southeast
Asia each year to help remind all involved that the mission is
not yet completed. We will not rest until the mission is
accomplished and our missing comrades are accounted for. We
will not forget those who were left behind. Our goal is to
bring home every missing American warrior.
Our trips to Vietnam have occurred both before and after
the trade embargo was lifted and diplomatic relations were
established. Since the establishment of diplomatic relations
between the United States and Vietnam, we have not seen any
decrease in the effort to account for our missing men on the
part of either the U.S. or Vietnam. On our visit to both
Vietnam and Laos this year, we saw no evidence that current
U.S. government policies on trade were having a negative effect
on the MIA accounting process.
We believe that current U.S. trade policies towards Vietnam
have resulted in both gradual improvements in U.S.-Vietnamese
relations in general and proportional improvements in
Vietnamese cooperation in efforts to account for missing
Americans from the war. A few examples of better overall U.S.-
Vietnamese cooperation are taken from the VFW report of our
most recent visit to Southeast Asia in March-April 2000.
The following conclusions from our trip report are offered
as a result our discussions, meetings, and observations during
the subject visit:
Our report states, ``In Vietnam, on the issue of
unaccounted for Americans from the War in Southeast Asia, my
conclusion is that the Vietnamese government appears to be
cooperating 'in good faith' with the U.S. government in working
to resolve the issue. However, there is always room to improve
the process.''
Evidence that Vietnamese cooperation is happening is as
follows:
a. The Vietnamese government primarily assists the U.S.
accounting effort with the Vietnamese Office for Seeking
Missing Personnel (VNOSMP) which is part of their Ministry of
Foreign Affairs. Also, it has established a unilateral program
to distribute information about missing Americans to Vietnamese
citizens.
b. The VNOSMP has made significant improvement in terms of
the quality of their Unilateral Investigations over past
several years. Since April 1996, Vietnam has conducted 15
unilateral investigations. The results of these unilateral
investigations have been delivered to JTF-FA. In April 1999,
Vietnam presented comments on the over 600 ``no further
pursuit'' cases. VNOSMP says it will invest more time and
personnel to unilateral operations to meet the desires of the
American Congress, families of the missing, and veterans'
organizations.
c. The Vietnamese Office for Seeking Missing Personnel told
us that they regularly receive information from Vietnamese
citizens about missing Americans and share that information
with JTF-FA Detachment. Two.
d. VNOSMP cooperated and worked closely with DPMO to
provide information to help complete the DPMO ``Remains Study''
which was published on June 14, 1999. According to DPMO, the
Vietnamese participated in the effort to an unprecedented
degree, sharing insights with U.S. analysts, facilitating
interviews with Knowledgeable sources, conducting
investigations when asked, and turning over documents in
response to requests. DPMO is continuing to seek more data
about the extent and limits of Vietnam's collection of American
remains. The process of seeking additional information on the
remains issue continues.
e. VNOSMP obtains access for JTF-FA research and
investigative teams.
f. VNOSMP says that it fully understands the importance of
documents to the U.S. identification process. They claim to
have provided more than 160 documents to the U.S. government
that are related to missing American servicemen. Mr. Hung said
that VNOSMP stands ready to do more and continues the search
for additional U.S. MIA related documents.
g. Vietnamese officials have agreed to focus their efforts
on the 41 Last Known Alive cases. According to VNOSMP, joint
investigations have resulted in determining that 155
individuals from the original Last Known Alive list of 196,
have died. In April and August 1999, two technical meetings
were held in Hanoi during which the most capable U.S. and
Vietnamese specialists exchanged information and discussed ways
to investigate the remaining cases.
h. VNOSMP said Tri-lateral Operations (U.S./Vietnam/Laos)
have been successful. To date, Vietnam has sent 33 Vietnamese
witnesses to Laos to participate in investigations involving 31
cases. The investigations have resulted in identifying 11
potential burial sites. In addition Vietnamese witnesses have
traveled to Cambodia to take part in the investigation of 4
cases. This resulted in the successful excavation of one case.
Vietnamese documents and witnesses are one of the best
potential sources for resolving many cases of missing Americans
in Laos and Cambodia. The Vietnamese have agreed to continue
cooperative Tri-lateral efforts, especially with Laos.
i. The Oral History Program and document turnover have been
relevant for case investigation and resolution. From January
1992 to the present, 245 oral history interviews were
completed. Vietnamese officials promised continued cooperation
in the search for additional documents, and said they have
issued directives asking the Vietnamese people to bring forward
any information they have on U.S. MIAs.
j. On live sighting investigations, VNOSMP said that they
would continue to cooperate when requested by the U.S. to
assist in investigations. VNOSMP said that they have
participated in more than 130 investigations with over 500
witnesses interviewed and none of the investigations have
resulted in any useful information. VNOSMP has concluded that
all of the live sighting reports to date have been false, and
have result in the waste of time and energy. JTFFA Detachment
Two briefed us that 96 live sighting investigations have been
conducted in Vietnam, and that none of the investigations led
to any credible evidence of a live American from the war was
held against his will after Operation Homecoming was completed
in 1973.
k. As indicated earlier in the report, bilateral operations
between the United States and Vietnam have been successful.
Since January 23, 1992, CILHI recovery teams have recovered and
repatriated 307 sets of remains from Vietnam. To date, CILHI
has identified 136 sets of remains. Five JFAs are conducted in
Vietnam each year.
Also, in Vietnam, leads and excavation sites will probably
begin to thin out in 2002. Given the current number of planned
investigations and excavations, JTFFA operations in SRV will
continue on a steady pace until at least FY2004. Cases
remaining unresolved at that point will be extremely difficult
to resolve because of the lack of information, terrain, and
other factors. Their resolution may have to wait until new
leads are uncovered in the future.
Some additional examples of progress on the POW/MIA issue
is listed below according to the four criteria used by the
Administration to measure Vietnamese cooperation.
The first criteria are the efforts by Vietnam to recover
and repatriate American remains. Since 1973, 563 Americans have
been accounted for in Southeast Asia. Of that total, 406 were
accounted--for from Vietnam. Also, since 1988, 59 Joint Field
Activities (JFAs) have been conducted in the SRV (44 since
1992). Four JFAs were conducted in SRV last year (1999).
Typically, each JFA in SRV involves more than 100 U.S.
personnel working with Vietnamese counterparts doing
investigations and excavation operations. Between February 22,
2000 and May 24, 2000, Joint Task Force-Full Accounting (JTF-
FA) conducted 2 Joint Field Activities (JFAs) in Vietnam. The
past two JFAs resulted in the repatriation of 6 sets of
remains. Over this period the Central Identification Lab Hawaii
(CILHI) has identified 2 individuals representing 2 different
cases. As of March 1, 2000, JTF-FA Detachment Two has
repatriated 307 sets of remains from Vietnam and the Central
Identification Laboratory Hawaii has identified 136 individuals
who were previously unaccounted--for.
In addition, the SRV has been responsive to U.S. requests
to conduct case-specific unilateral investigations. These
investigations include witness interviews and archival
research. Each year the SRV reserves two periods during which
Vietnamese unilateral teams conduct investigations and then
report their findings to U.S. officials. Vietnamese unilateral
investigation teams have provided reports on 48 different
cases. As of June 1, 2000, the total number of unilateral
reports received since 1996 is 272. Vietnam's unilateral
efforts have supported the U.S. ``Remains Study'' that
evaluates the SRV's official efforts to recover American
remains. The SRV responses provided to U.S. questions reflect
extensive research and investigative activity. In one instance,
the SRV's investigative results lead directly to the
identification of U.S. remains.
The VNOSMP pledged to continue cooperation with the U.S.
government to execute joint and unilateral operations designed
to resolve the cases of missing Americans from the war to the
fullest extent possible.
In November 1998, Mr. Robert L. Jones, DASD DPMO, requested
an SRV Foreign Ministry review of the ``deferred'' and ``no
further pursuit'' category of unaccounted-for cases. The idea
was to determine if the Vietnamese possessed additional
information pertaining to these cases. Vietnamese Vice Foreign
Minister Bin promised a formal response to Mr. Jones by the end
of March 1999, and the response was delivered to DPMO on time.
Analysts at JTF-FA and DPMO are now reviewing and analyzing the
Vietnamese response.
The second criteria are the continued resolution of ``last
known alive'' (LKA) priority discrepancy cases. Of the 196
persons associated with ``last known alive'' cases (individuals
who survived their loss incidents, but did not return alive and
remain unaccounted-for) in Vietnam. Fate has been determined
for all but 41 of these individuals. Determination of the fate
for individuals on this list last occurred on March 1, 2000
when the fates of 2 more individuals were determined.
Of the 155 ``last known alive'' cases whose fate has been
determined, DoD has resolved the cases or identified the
remains of 40 formerly unaccounted-for Americans who were
originally on the LKA list. Since 1993, 18 last known alive
cases have been resolved. These are the most difficult cases to
solve.
The special remains list is a representative sampling of
cases for which the U.S. government has evidence that the SRV
government, at one time, possessed remains of American
servicemen that were still unaccounted for in 1993 when the
report was prepared and given to the SRV. The U.S. government
has resolved special remains cases involving 21 individuals.
This reduces the original list of 98 individuals on this list
to the present list of 77 individuals.
The third criteria are Vietnamese assistance in
implementing the trilateral investigations with Laos. Since
1994 when the agreement for these investigations was signed, a
total of 39 Vietnamese witnesses have participated in
operations in Laos and Cambodia. In March 1999, a Laotian
witness participated in an investigation in Cambodia. As of
April 1999, Vietnam identified more than 40 witnesses for
participation in future operations in Laos. Eight witnesses
were identified since December 1, 1998.
The fourth criteria are accelerated Vietnamese efforts to
provide all POW/MIA related documents. Since 1994, when
Vietnamese unilateral search teams were created, the Vietnamese
Office for Seeking Missing Personnel (VNOSMP) has provided 14
separate turnovers totaling more than 300 documents that
consist of 500-600 untranslated pages. Recently, VNOSMP
provided 12 documents in two separate turnovers. These were
related to the U.S. study of Vietnam's collection and
repatriation of U.S. remains or `` Remains Study.'' In
addition, 263 oral histories have been conducted not including
the hundreds completed during JFA operations. Finally, over
28,000 archival items were reviewed and photographed since
January 1993 by joint research teams.
Since we did not observe a decrease in the POW/MIA
accounting and cooperation effort with the Vietnamese after the
lifting of the trade embargo, establishment of diplomatic
relations, and past waiver of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment, it
suggests that this year's waiver of the Jackson-Vanik Amendment
restrictions will not result in any decrease in cooperation
between our countries on the POW/MIA issue. The Vietnamese know
that the POW/MIA accounting is the single most important issue
governing the relationship between our two countries. Based
upon our observations and conversations with JTF-Full
Accounting personnel and other U.S. government officials during
our visit to Vietnam in March 2000, it is my opinion that
current trade relations with Vietnam have not hindered the
accounting process for missing Americans. Also, if improving
U.S.-Vietnamese trade relations and normalizing our diplomatic
relationship with Vietnam helps us reach our goal of achieving
the ``fullest possible accounting'' of missing Americans, then
these steps seem to be producing the intended positive results.
The VFW has had a POW/MIA initiative for the last several
years. Briefly, we encourage our members to come forward with
information and documentation about Vietnamese casualties from
the war. Keeping the information anonymous, we then present the
information to the Vietnamese veterans' organization when we
visit Vietnam. We have presented information about their losses
to their veterans on four different occasions. We believe this
initiative has helped improve relations with the Vietnamese
people, and shows American sincerity in attempting to resolve
this issue. Feedback from Joint Task Force-Full Accounting
personnel permanently stationed in Hanoi, indicates that this
initiative others like it, have resulted in improved
cooperation between U.S. personnel and Vietnamese counterparts.
Also, we have asked the Vietnamese veterans for help in
resolving some of the most difficult cases of our missing in
action.
In conclusion, the VFW believes that progress has been made
on POW/MIA accounting in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia since the
establishment of Joint Task Force-Full Accounting in January
1992. Over the past decade years, we have developed an
effective and cooperative relationship with Vietnam on the POW/
MIA issue. Since 1992, this partnership with Vietnam has
produced reasonable results in the accounting process, but more
work still remains. Twenty years ago the relationship between
our countries was inhospitable and as a result, the POW/MIA
accounting process was slow and less productive. Our visits to
Southeast Asia, our meetings and discussions with both the
Department of Defense and Department of State officials here in
Washington, and our constant review of monthly POW/MIA
progress, lead us to the conclusion that we should continue the
policy of engagement with Vietnam. We believe that the current
relationship between the U.S. and Vietnam is helping the POW/
MIA accounting process.
Finally, our primary goal is to achieve the fullest
possible accounting of Americans missing from the war in
Southeast Asia as well as all Americans missing from all our
nation's wars and conflicts. We think the normalization of
trade relations between the United States and Vietnam helps to
accomplish this goal. Our view is that the current effort with
Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia is producing positive results.
Certainly, we are not satisfied that it has taken so long to
reach this point. The current accounting effort should have
begun the moment the war ended, but unfortunately our country
was unable to develop an effective working relationship with
Vietnam on this issue until years after the war ended. We will
continue to remain vigilant and press our government and the
governments of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia to reach the fullest
possible accounting as soon as possible. No matter how long it
takes, the VFW will continue to support the effort and strive
to reach our goal--the fullest accounting for every missing
American warrior.
Mr. Chairman and Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for
this opportunity to present the views of the Veterans of
Foreign Wars of the United States on the issue of U.S.-Vietnam
Trade Relations.
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