Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai departed yesterday on a groundbreaking visit to the United States, seeking closer ties with Washington and support for Vietnam's bid to join the WTO.
Khai's June 19-25 visit to the US is the first by a Vietnamese prime minister since the Vietnam War ended 30 years ago. Khai said in an interview with The Associated Press last week that his presence in the US would symbolize that the two countries have put resentments over the war "behind us."
Khai departed just after dawn on a Vietnam Airlines jet bound first for Seattle, where he was to oversee the purchase of four Boeing jetliners by Vietnam Airlines and meet with business leaders including Microsoft Corp. Chairman Bill Gates.
Following his summit with President George W. Bush tomorrow, Khai will travel to New York, where he will ring in the session at the New York Stock Exchange.
He will end his trip with a stop in Boston to hold talks with the presidents of Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology on expanding educational exchanges.
In last week's interview, Khai, 71, said economic and social reforms in Vietnam -- along with increased trade, defense and diplomatic cooperation with the US -- had converged to produce the best timing for the visit.
The United States has become Vietnam's top trading partner since the two established diplomatic ties a decade ago. Two-way trade totaled US$6.4 billion last year, while investment in Vietnam by US firms has risen 27 percent per year since a bilateral trade agreement was signed in 2001.
US Navy ships have visited Vietnamese ports, and the two countries have exchanged high-level delegations of officers.
Khai, a Soviet-trained economist, said Hanoi is aiming for an agreement with Washington on Vietnam's WTO bid "as soon as possible."
They're also set to talk about democratic reforms in Vietnam, religious rights, and stepped-up military cooperation.
Washington has often been critical of the communist government's record of restricting political and religious freedoms, although it wasn't clear whether Bush would raise such issues with Khai.
Hundreds of Vietnamese political dissidents have been jailed for urging democratic and religious reforms, often using the Internet, according to New York-based monitoring group Human Rights Watch.
The group claims religious dissidents have been harassed and minority hill tribes who follow churches not recognized by the state have been forced to recant their faith.
"America's political and business leaders should not assume that a stronger Vietnamese economy has brought greater respect for human rights," Brad Adams, the group's director for Asia, said in a statement e-mailed to reporters.
"US relations with Vietnam cannot flourish unless economic liberalization is accompanied by human rights reforms," Adams said.
Despite potential for such disagreements, Khai said that his visit alone symbolized a major improvement in relations.
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