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Human rights retort

The new ambassador from Vietnam grew defensive yesterday when asked about human rights in his country, which is still dominated by a Communist Party that jails opponents and represses dissent.

Ambassador Le Cong Phung referred to the "old days of the black-white issue" in the United States, a reference to the tortuous path of race relations from slavery to the civil rights movement. He appealed for time for his own government to develop ways to deal with political disputes.

"Tell me," he asked reporters at the Vietnamese Embassy, "how long has the United States existed?"

Mr. Phung noted that the current nation of Vietnam is a little more than 30 years old. In December 1974, North Vietnam invaded South Vietnam in violation of the Paris peace accords signed in January 1973. By April 1975, Saigon fell to North Vietnamese troops, and the Socialist Republic of Vietnam was born a year later.

"I can assure you human rights are improving," he insisted. "Human rights are better than in the past."

The State Department, however, lists Vietnam as an "authoritarian state" with an "unsatisfactory" human rights record. The government denies its citizens "privacy rights and freedom of speech, press, assembly, movement and association," the department said in its latest human rights report on Vietnam.

"We differ in how we approach the problem and how we see the problem," Mr. Phung said of U.S. criticism of Vietnam's human rights record.

The ambassador encountered opposition to Vietnam's political repression five days after arriving in Washington two months ago, when Vietnamese-Americans protested outside the embassy.

On Tuesday, President Bush pressed the issue when Mr. Phung presented his diplomatic credentials at the White House.

However, Mr. Phung emphasized he and Mr. Bush mostly talked about the new relationship between the two former enemies.

"We have had ups and downs. We had a war, now we are turning into a partnership. That's what the president told me," Mr. Phung said.

Vietnam now has diplomatic relations with nearly all countries, and its economy is growing by more than 8.5 percent a year, he said. The ambassador also made a strong pitch for U.S. investment and promised that Vietnam will educate trained professionals to work for American firms.

"We have differences ... and we have to tackle the differences," he added. "But we have a saying in Vietnam: Try to make a big problem into a small one. Try to make a small problem into no problem."

Moral responsibility

Two leading House Democrats are calling for President Bush to budget $1.5 billion to help resettle Iraqi refugees displaced by the war and aid nations that are providing them with refuge.

"Our government has a moral responsibility to provide leadership for this expanding humanitarian crisis," said Rep. Alcee L. Hastings of Florida, chairman of the congressional Commission for Security and Cooperation in Europe, and Rep. John D. Dingell of Michigan, chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

Their requests include $80 million to help resettle 20,000 refugees and another $80 million in benefits for Iraqi recipients of special U.S. immigration visas. They also propose $700 million in aid to Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon to help them with Iraqi refugees already in those countries.

"We implore you to include, at a minimum, these necessary and critical funds in your budget request [to Congress]," the Democrats said in a letter to Mr. Bush. "The lives of millions [of] Iraqis literally depend on this aid."

c Call Embassy Row at 202/636-3297, fax 202/832-7278 or e-mail jmorrison@washingtontimes.com.