[Vnbiz] Bush discusses trade, human rights with Vietnam's PM

[Tran Dinh Hoanh]

http://www.voanews.com/english/2008-06-24-voa62.cfm?rss=united%20states

  Bush Discusses Trade, Human Rights with Vietnam's PM By Paula Wolfson
White House
*24 June 2008*


President Bush has met at the White House with Vietnamese Prime Minister
Nguyen Tan Dung.  VOA's Paula Wolfson reports the wide-ranging talks covered
issues from trade to human rights.

  [image: President Bush, right, meets with Vietnamese PM Nguyen Tan Dung in
the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, 24 June 2008] President
Bush, right, meets with Vietnamese PM Nguyen Tan Dung in the Oval Office of
the White House in Washington, 24 June 2008As they posed for pictures after
their talks, both men chose their public words carefully.

They said they discussed their desire to strengthen bilateral relations,
boost trade and work together on issues such as the environment.

President Bush said he also used the opportunity to bring up human rights
concerns.

"We talked about the freedoms: religious and political freedom," he said.
"And I told the prime minister that I thought the strides the government is
making towards religious freedom are noteworthy."

Human rights organizations and Vietnamese-American groups had called on the
president to make human rights a priority in the talks. Critics in Congress
hosted a news conference just prior to the prime minister's visit in which
they warned the status quo in Vietnam is not acceptable.

For his part, the prime minister made no mention of human rights concerns in
his statement at the end of the White House meeting. Instead, he said the
United States and Vietnam are building a constructive and friendly
partnership. He said new consultative groups are being established.  And he
made specific mention of efforts to heal the decades old wounds left by the
Vietnam War of the 1960s and 1970s.

"I also agreed to strengthen cooperation to address humanitarian issues left
over from the war, such as the American MIA issue, mine clearing,
remediation of the agent orange consequences, the Vietnamese MIA issue," he
explained.

President Bush last met the Vietnamese Prime Minster in 2006, when he
traveled to Hanoi to attend a summit meeting of Pacific Rim nations.
-- 
Tran Dinh Hoanh, Esq., LLB, JD
Washington DC
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