~ Le Viêt Nam, aujourd'hui. ~
The Vietnam News

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Vietnamese refugees in Cambodia decline offers to settle in the United States

Three quarters of Vietnamese refugees who recently fled persecution in their homeland and were offered residency in the United States in November rejected the proposal, the U.N. refugee agency said Wednesday. Only 41 of nearly 200 refugees accepted the November offer to move to America, said Cathy Shin, a protection officer for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Phnom Penh.

It was not immediately clear why so many of the refugees who come from various highland ethnic minority groups but are known collectively as Montagnards _ rejected the offer. However, the U.N. agency said in a statement that it was "concerned that some Montagnards are leaving their homes under the mistaken impression that the refugee agency can help them regain their ancestral lands which they claim have been confiscated."

This was "well beyond the scope" of the agency's mandate and they "have been concerned that Montagnards may be exposing themselves to ... risk acting on this illusion." More than 1,000 Montagnards fled Vietnam's Central Highlands after a 2001 crackdown against them for protesting alleged religious repression and land confiscation. The refugees have been resettled in third countries, mostly the United States. The government crushed similar protests in April this year, prompting another exodus.

The U.N. is sheltering 703 Montagnards at sites in Phnom Penh and in Ratanakiri, where many entered Cambodia. The UNHCR noted last month that growing numbers of Montagnards were crossing into Cambodia, many in the mistaken belief that the United Nations will help them reclaim confiscated lands in Vietnam. Once the agency made it clear that it couldn't help them recover land, some asylum seekers said they wanted to return to Vietnam, said Ron Redmond, UNHCR spokesman in Geneva.

The Associated Press - December 8, 2004