The Vietnamese lawsuit against over 30 US makers of the defoliants used in the Vietnam war is not necessarily the best approach to get compensation, according to the president of a US veterans' organization.
Bobby Muller was in Vietnam to sign an unprecedented Memorandum of Understanding between the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundation (VVAF) and Vietnam's Ministry of Defense.
The long-negotiated MOU marks the first phase of a project to map and assess the impact of unexploded ordnance and landmines that still litter large parts of Vietnam.
Muller says a better option would be to avoid legal battles over responsibility, and lobby for increased aid.
"There are extraordinary human needs here and let's expand the programs of assistance to address those needs [to see] whether or not in fact at the end of the day they are directly connected to the exposure to dioxin," Muller said.
In late January, the Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange, on behalf of six plaintiffs, filed a lawsuit in a federal court in New York against 38 US companies involved in the manufacture and supply of herbicides used during the Vietnam war.
The vice-president of the Vietnamese organization, Professor Nguyen Trong Nhan, says that as many as 4.8 million people lived in areas where defoliants were sprayed, and that today, there are over 3 million sufferers from afflictions related to dioxin exposure.
The herbicide was used to destroy food crops, clear areas around military bases and predominantly to deprive northern Vietnamese forces of jungle cover.
Dioxin from Agent Orange has been linked by researchers to a range of diseases and afflictions including cancer and birth defects.
On behalf of American war veterans seeking compensation from Agent Orange manufacturers, Bobby Muller was involved in a lawsuit against the chemical companies in the 1980s, but the lengthy and expensive legal battle meant the US veterans ended up settling out of court.
"Basically for the convenience of both sides, because it was a very costly and time consuming effort, and the chemical companies kept getting beat up in the press, we just came to terms on an out of court settlement for relatively small amounts of money," Muller told journalists in Hanoi.
The settlement involved government compensation for people suffering from various ailments, but no official acceptance that Agent Orange was the cause.
"While we received medical care and compensation, the government still will not say these various problems were because of dioxin exposure. What we have is the vagueness of `We are not saying yes, and we are not going to say no, but we are going to give you the benefit of the doubt,'" Muller said.
The Vietnamese organization is optimistic about their chances of winning compensation, and says that should any of the cases be successful, then thousands more will follow, the vice president of the Vietnamese victim's association recently said.
"According to our US lawyers, if any of the victims win, other victims with the same afflictions will win. We don't have to wait for victory there are many preparations for other law suits in the US," said Professor Nguyen Trong Nhan, vice-president of the recently formed Vietnam Association for Victims of Agent Orange.
The lawsuit may not be the best option Muller said.
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