U.S. urges Vietnam to resolve case against Americans
WASHINGTON - The United States on Friday urged Vietnam to quickly resolve a case involving three Vietnamese-born U.S. citizens accused of plotting against the nation's communist government.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Washington was working closely with Vietnam's government on the matter.
"We are trying to work with the Vietnamese government on all of these various cases to get them resolved in a speedy manner, consistent with Vietnamese law," said McCormack.
He said U.S. Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice had raised the issue with Vietnam's foreign minister and would address it again.
Among those being held in Vietnam is a resident of Orlando, Florida, Nguyen Thuong Cuc. Her 13-month-long detention has drawn attention in the United States ahead of
President George W. Bush's November 17-20 visit to Vietnam.
She goes by the name Thuong Nguyen Foshee in the United States and has close ties with Bush's Republican Party.
U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez, a Florida Republican, has linked her release to passage of a bill granting Vietnam permanent normal trade relations status.
The White House has sought to win approval of permanent normal trade relations with Vietnam before Bush visits the country.
Two others involved in the case are U.S. citizens, U.S. officials have said, and a fourth was listed as having a U.S. address. Three others were Vietnamese living in Vietnam.
A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman said on Thursday that consular officials had visited all three U.S. citizens, who are detained in Ho Chi Minh City.
Reuters - November 3, 2006.
Rice to raise fate of arrested US dissidents on Vietnam visit
WASHINGTON - US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will raise the case of three US citizens facing trial on terrorism charges in Vietnam when she visits Hanoi later this month, her spokesman said.
Vietnamese prosecutors announced on Thursday that they would try the three Vietnamese-born Americans along with four other persons for allegedly plotting to undermine the communist state.
The announcement came just ahead of a visit by US
President George W. Bush, who is due to attend Vietnam's largest ever international conference, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (
APEC) summit, on November 18-19.
The detained US citizens include a prominent Florida Republican, Thuong Nguyen "Cuc" Foshee, 58, whose arrest in September 2005 prompted a US senator to hold up legislation that would normalise trade ties between the former enemy nations.
State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Washington was following the cases "very closely" and that Rice had already raised them with her Vietnamese counterpart.
"I would expect that if the cases are still ongoing, then she will -- I believe she will address them on her visit to Vietnam this time," he said.
Rice is due to accompany Bush to the APEC summit.
"We are trying to work with the Vietnamese government on all of these various cases to get them resolved in a speedy manner, consistent with Vietnamese law," McCormack said.
The other arrested Americans were Huynh Bich Lien of San Gabriel, California, and Le Van Binh of Tampa, Florida.
The three and four Vietnamese were arrested last year on charges of plotting against the regime on the orders of Nguyen Huu Chanh, an activist Hanoi considers a terrorist.
Prosecutors alleged that the group, working under the guise of a Cambodian based charity organization, planned to jam state-run Voice of Vietnam radio and smuggled transmitters into southern Vietnam to broadcast anti-regime messages.
A guilty verdict on terrorism charges carries a sentence ranging from 12 years' jail to death under Article 84 of Vietnam's criminal code.
The dissidents' alleged leader, Chanh, has long been a thorn in Vietnam's side, having founded in 1995 the anti-communist group the Government of Free Vietnam, headquartered in Garden Grove, California.
The group includes former top officials of the US-backed Saigon regime that was defeated by Northern communist forces in 1975, and it has in the past advocated the military overthrow of the government in Hanoi.
Vietnam announced the trial at a sensitive time, after Washington and Hanoi struck a major trade deal in late May that paved the way for Vietnam's expected admission to the World Trade Organisation next week.
A US Senator from Florida, Republican Mel Martinez, has taken up the case of Foshee and placed a hold on voting on a crucial bill that would permanently normalise US-Vietnam trade relations, unless she is released.
Agence France Presse - November 3, 2006.
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