Vietnam to send more settlers to restive highlands
A new wave of ethnic Vietnamese settlers is to be sent to the central
highlands, despite protests from local hilltribes there, as the
communist
authorities seek to ease population pressure in the Red River delta.
The settlers are to be sent from the delta province of Thai Binh to
develop
new economic zones and state farms in the highland provinces of Dak Lak
and
Kontum, provincial officials said Wednesday.
From now to 2005, Thai Binh plans to resettle 10,000 migrants a year to
relieve immense pressure on land in the province which houses 1.8
million
people in an area of just 1,580 square kilometres (632 square miles),
the
head of the province's labour and migration department, Bui Dinh Khang,
told
AFP.
"Some of the migrants will be sent in household groups to establish new
economic zones; others will be single people sent to work for state
farms or
defence agencies," Khang said.
The provincial authorities have just reached agreement with their
counterparts in Kontum on the settlement of a new economic zone in the
highland province, he said.
Dak Lak province already took 100 families from Thai Binh last year and
more
are due to follow this year.
The central highlands are not the only region in Vietnam to receive
settlers
from Thai Binh -- migrants have also been moved to the southern province
of
Ken Giang, which has a large Khmer minority, and the northeastern
province
of Quang Ninh on the Chinese border.
But the scale of migration to the highlands has sparked anger among the
region's indigenous hilltribes which boiled over into a wave of violent
protests in February last year, sparking an army crackdown and an exodus
of
refugees to Cambodia.
During a foreign ministry tour of the region last year, provincial
officials
told journalists they would prefer not to receive any more ethnic
Vietnamese
settlers, given the delicacy of relations between the two communities.
Well over a million ethnic Vietnamese settlers have been moved to the
central highlands since the end of the Vietnam War in 1975 as the
communist
authorities have cleared the region's forests to grow commodity crops,
particularly coffee.
The region's indigenous hilltribes, who have a long history of
opposition to
the communist authorities, are now in a minority in all of the
highlands'
four provinces.
Agence France Presse - April 10, 2002
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