is the fact that the appointment of a new US Ambassador has been delayed since June 1999.

Minister Srindihith concluded by commending NGOs for their special contribution to the process of development and poverty eradication. Because “NGOs have an ability to penetrate the inner circle of social communities,” he said, “they are in a better position to understand the conditions and the needs of poor people.”

Vietnam’s Foreign Minister, HE Nguyen Dy Nien, gave an upbeat account, first, of the country’s social and economic achievements since the Doi Moi process began 15 years ago, and second, of its efforts to tide over the effects of the recent financial-monetary crisis. Mr. Nien noted that from a country in constant food shortage, Vietnam has now become a major rice exporter.

Like the previous speakers, he stressed the importance of maintaining “socio-political stability” and “security.” Unlike them (but like the Democratic Republic of Vietnam 45 years ago) he identified his country’s present “target” as “national industrialization,” to be achieved in two decades.

While pursuing an “independent foreign policy of diversification and multilateralization,” Vietnam, he said, attaches special importance to relations with the United States, and particularly to “economic-commercial ties, which serve as the long-term…foundation for relations between the two countries.” Hence the significance of the Bilateral Trade Agreement signed in July, which remains to be ratified by the US Congress.

The Minister ended with requests for assistance in two areas. Speaking of the millions of Vietnamese who still suffer the effects of the mass use of toxic chemicals during the war, he thanked US NGOs for “their concern about and initial assistance to the Agent Orange victims,” and hoped that they would continue to increase their humanitarian activities in the future.

Speaking frankly of Vietnam’s need to update antiquated educational facilities, Mr. Nien called on “governments, international and non-governmental organizations, scientists and donors to give assistance to improve facilities for universities, colleges and schools, setting up cooperative programs on education and training with Vietnam, including with Vietnamese universities directly.”

The dinners and conferences organized by FRD alert an influential constituency of Americans involved in the welfare of the region to the political tasks before them: the need to get the trade agreements with Vietnam and Laos through Congress; to finance the higher education of children of Embassy and Mission staff; to mobilize funds for flood control in the Mekong basin, such as the $200,000 commitment announced by Oxfam’s president Ray Offenheiser.

These are largely regional matters in which development, cooperation, and reconciliation are all involved—not only between Americans and Indochinese but among the countries themselves. Behind that buzz, what’s happening at these gatherings, I think, is the furthering of a regional consciousness, one which coexists with respect for the independence and sovereignty of states who have suffered the whip of colonialism and invasion both. Not a new idea, this regionalism of comrades, but in the context of globalization (“the economic equivalent of a force of nature,” Clinton said in Hanoi), one whose time is ripe.

Mary Byrne McDonnell, Social Science Research Council; Lao Minister Soubanh Srithirath; Tara McAuliff FRD Corporate Liaison

Author Carol Brightman edited VIET-REPORT in the ‘60s and visited North Vietnam in 1967. She has returned twice in recent years, and participated in the Viet Minh-OSS reunions in Hanoi and New York. She can be reached at cbright@gwi.net.

Full text of Ministers Speeches available from FRD for $1 each or on our website www.usirp.org.

The dinner was made possible by support from the Chase Manhattan Bank as well as from Angkor Trading (importer of Angkor Beer), H.C. Foods (importer of Beer Lao), Maureen Flanagan Charitable Gifts Fund, Pepsicola International, Wickham Fruit Farm, Lieb Cellars, Peconic Bay Winery, Ternhaven Cellars and received assistance from the Ford Foundation, New York Life, Operation USA and the Long Island Wine Bureau. Food was provided by Cambodian Cuisine, Mangez Avec Moi and Saigon Gourmet.