News, 28-29/6/99
hytran
* Hanoi police bust heroin ring, detain 33 people
HANOI, June 28 (Reuters) - Vietnamese police have busted a drug
trafficking ring and detained 33 people, but its alleged customs
officer leader is still on the run, Hanoi police said on Monday.
A senior drug squad officer said Nguyen Xuan Quang, who worked at the
Tay Trang border gate with Laos in northwestern Lai Chau province, was
suspected of masterminding a heroin trafficking scam that had operated
since 1996.
``Thirty-three people were detained and five others are still being
hunted, including Quang,'' the officer told Reuters.
He added that those detained said the ring had smuggled 12.25 kg (27
lb) of heroin over the past three years.
The officer said 234 grams of the drug had been confiscated during
police raids, but declined to identify any of those being detained.
Vietnam's most notorious drug scandal came in 1998 when eight people
were sentenced to death and 14 others given jail terms in a scam that
saw senior police and customs officials involved in a major heroin
smuggling racket.
International anti-drug agencies say Vietnam is becoming an
increasingly important conduit for heroin, opium and amphetamines
originating in the infamous Golden Triangle, centred on Myanmar, Laos
and parts of southwestern China and northern Thailand.
Illegal drug abuse in communist-ruled Vietnam has increased
dramatically in recent years, and last year the number of people
prosecuted for drug offences rose 142.2 percent when compared to 1997.
Vietnamese courts in 1998 dished out 49 death sentences for
drug-related crimes, official media has said.
* Vietnam sees Jan-June GDP growth of 4.3 pct
HANOI, June 28 (Reuters) - Vietnam on Monday estimated gross domestic
product grew 4.3 percent in the first half of the year compared with
the same period last year, a figure analysts said belied the country's
economic problems.
An official at the General Department of Statistics told Reuters the
estimate but declined to give further details, such as a breakdown of
growth in key sectors.
Economists expect Vietnam's economy to grow about three percent this
year, from an official estimate of 5.8 percent in 1998.
But they have also said Vietnam's hesitancy to reform the economy and
improve the climate for foreign and local investors meant the
communist-ruled country would likely be left behind Asian economies
undergoing a revival.
``I'm not sure if Vietnam is going in the opposite direction to the
other economies. But Vietnam is not moving,'' said Ari Kokko, a Vietnam
expert at the Stockholm School of Economics.
``Everyone is moving fast and that means Vietnam does tend to get left
behind,'' he told Reuters.
Vietnam's economic growth has gradually slowed in the past 18 months in
line with a sharp fall in foreign direct investment inflows and poor
export performance.
Hanoi had previously estimated GDP growth at four percent in the first
quarter compared with the same period in 1998.
Despite the positive growth, a host of problems -- particularly
government inaction on economic reform -- make Vietnam a risky
investment prospect, analysts have said.
Investors also still complain about tough foreign exchange rules, tight
labour laws, bureaucracy, restricted access to certain sectors of the
economy, corruption and a lack of infrastructure.
Vietnam, which partly avoided the wrenching regional downturn because
it had no financial markets, has long insisted it would reform at its
own pace.
* Vietnam protests Malaysian move in disputed Spratlys
ABC, 29/6/99 - Vietnam has reiterated its claim to sovereignty over the
disputed Spratly Islands, describing a recent move by Malaysia in the
archipelago, as a violation of Vietnam's sovereignty.
The Vietnamese Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Vietnam
possesses adequate historical evidence and legal grounds to prove its
sovereignty over the Spratlys,
The statement was in response to a question by the state-run Vietnam
News Agency, about what it described as Malaysia's occupation of shoals
in the island group.
Malaysia has acknowledged building structures on Investigator Shoal.
Brunei, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam - all members of the
Association of Southeast Asian Nations - together with China and
Taiwan, have overlapping claims in the Spratlys.
* Vietnamese art has loud debut - Patrons pass shouting protesters to
view the controversial exhibit at the Bowers Museum.
The Orange County Register, 27/6/99 - About 200 art lovers flocked to
the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art's controversial debut of Vietnamese
contemporary paintings Saturday, lured by what they say is the chance
to view the country's flourishing cultural scene.
Museum-goers included residents from around Orange County as well as
several dozen Vietnamese-Americans, who passed rows of shouting
refugees.
The men and women waving signs totaled about 150 from morning through
late afternoon. They said Hanoi's regime is repressive, so the art does
not represent true creative expression.
The protest kept others away, including some Santa Ana council members,
who told curators that they would stay home on opening day.
The patrons who turned up surpassed the Bowers' average Saturday
attendance of 80 to 100 people.
Last fall, the museum's biggest recent show of Mesopotamian artifacts,
"The Royal Tombs of Ur," drew 19,178 visitors in its three-month run. A
typical exhibit is much smaller, officials said. The current "Winding
River" show will be on display through Oct. 3.
Enthusiasts Saturday raved about the show, describing haunting hues
brushed over the old quarters of Hanoi to images that explore the soul
of rural Vietnam and the beauty of Ha Long Bay.
"This is gorgeous work,' marveled Melissa Thompson, an Anaheim mother
of two. "I have been so curious about this whole debate between art and
politics that I wanted to see it with my own eyes."
Near her stood Manh Nguyen, a Mission Viejo radiologist who braved the
taunts of fellow immigrants. He said he admired the sense of being
alive that leaped at him from various pieces among 75 hung in the
gallery.
One painting that caught his eye, "Buffalos and Landscape" by Hanoi
artist Hong Viet Dung — for its impressionistic colors and expression
of solitude, was the favorite of Bowers President Peter Keller.
"It reminds me of autumn in Pennsylvania, where I grew up," said
Keller, who hails from Allentown. "Except instead of buffalos, we had
deer."
Nguyen told Keller of his travels to Hanoi, where he befriended artists
and witnessed vibrant forms of expression.
"I think art is above politics," he said. "Any institution that
displays works in literature and arts from the Vietnamese people — not
the Vietnamese government — I would go to see."
Others came eager to see the entire collection and to take a stance
against censorship. Earlier this week, Keller pulled what critics call
a pro-communist painting from the exhibit and then reversed his
decision at the urging of dozens of museum supporters.
Protesters continued Saturday trying to sway public opinion to support
their cause.
"We are not censoring art the way the communist government censored
us," explained Kinh-Luan Tran, an attorney working on behalf of the
demonstrators. If paintings, music or literature from communist
countries such as China, Cuba or parts of Europe were on display, he
said, protesters would oppose them as well.
"We are against communism as a whole. It is about destruction and
violation of basic human rights. That is the same everywhere," Tran
added. "But obviously, when the materials are from our own country, we
feel more passionate about it."
Lac Tan Nguyen, vice president of the Vietnamese Community of Southern
California, said he is troubled by calls to his office, from people who
chided: "If you want to oppose communism, go back to Vietnam and oppose
it."
He is upset at what he calls the museum's "tricky" maneuver in
previewing the show to Little Saigon leaders, then ignoring their
concerns about work they consider communist propaganda.
Protest leaders are working with immigrant artists and a chapter of the
writers' group PEN International to gather the names of artists in
Vietnam who are not allowed freedom of expression, lawyer Lan Quoc
Nguyen said.
Compared with the Little Saigon protests earlier this year — when
thousands of immigrants marched against the display of communist icons
— Saturday's turnout proved less than expected, observers said, mainly
because of location.
Westminster is more familiar to the expatriate community than Santa
Ana, although the city is home to thousands of Vietnamese residents.
"Because they know Little Saigon so well, and a lot of people live
around there, they can go home, shower, eat and come back," said Quang
X. Pham, who is leading an effort to build a Vietnamese cultural
center. "Here the distance takes the elderly out of the equation."
The majority of demonstrators are from the "old guard," what organizers
describe as a core group of supporters, including senior citizens,
hard-liners and former political prisoners. Members of the youth
movement active in earlier rallies have not been vocal in the museum
debate. Leaders of that group left the county Friday for a weekend
retreat.
Since opposition has been focused on the paintings, the part of the
show featuring ancient bronze artifacts — among them daggers, jewelry
and drums — from Vietnam's Dong Son era seemed largely ignored Saturday.
But Keller, the Bowers president, remained upbeat.
"We used to worry about the image of the Bowers Museum," he said, "but
now everyone knows us."
* Vietnamese Art Show Not So Revolutionary
Bowers Museum: Despite anti-Communist protests, the 'Winding River'
exhibition is politically benign. Some of the best works transcend
politics.
LAT, 28/6/99
SANTA ANA--When the smoke clears, the art remains.
"A Winding River: The Journey of Contemporary Art in Vietnam" is a
meander through the last 70 years of Vietnamese art, and despite
well-publicized protests by anti-Communist Vietnamese activists, the
exhibit at the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art in Santa Ana is surprising
for being both aesthetically accessible and politically benign.
The exhibit includes about 75 works from 53 artists in a range of
media--from ink on paper or silk to woodblock prints to oil paintings.
It's easy to pick out the Asian elements--a tendency to render people
and objects in a flat, unmodeled style--as well as to see, especially
in the painting, the influence of 19th century French schools. There
are portraits, narratives, landscapes and village-scapes, and even a
few abstracts.
But let's go straight to two of the controversial works:
- "Young Woman Forging Steel" is a rather pedestrian painting of a
young woman in military uniform handling a pair of tongs amid a drab
factory setting. It's competently done but hardly exciting, and quite
unlikely to change anyone's politics.
- "Mother's Heart" shows a mother praying at what is probably a family
altar, with pictures of loved ones--soldiers, some wearing Communist
caps, who may have passed away--on the wall. It portrays a universal
theme, a mother's grief and concern for sons, nephews and other
relatives lost to war.
Indeed, soldiers from both sides died, fighting for what they believed
in--or perhaps were forced to believe. Alternately, one can see the
hero of this painting as the Madonna-like mother, who folds her hands
in prayer and stares beatifically into the distance. Whether the boys
are heroes or victims is for the beholder to decide.
Politics aside, this is one of the better works in the exhibition.
Boldly composed, the figures and the objects on the altar table are
outlined in a strong black and filled in with a moderation of color.
The painting is affective without being drippingly sentimental, as some
of the other works are.
If anything, the exhibition is to be faulted for some rather mediocre
selections--made by a group of five artist-scholars under the
sponsorship of the Washington-based Meridian International Center--as
well as an overemphasis on the pastoral and the quaint.
The small paintings of villages by Bui Xuan Phai, for example, have the
boring feel of an art student's attempts, and a beginning student at
that. Pham Viet Hong Lam's "Two Red Buffalo" is simply kitsch, although
it might have been interestingly placed next to another controversial
painting, "Love," whose two-headed red buffalo has been seen by
protesters as a symbol of the Communist regime.
Some of the most interesting works transcend politics and place.
Nguyen Tan Cuong shows an intuitive touch for how paint can convey
texture.
Against flat grayish backgrounds, he paints his subjects in thick
impasto--a fish on an unfolded piece of paper in "Fish" and teacups and
a teapot in "Still Life With Tea Cups."
Tran Van Thao's abstract "Night and Day" shows 10 grids around a red
center, all encrypted with signs and symbols of some secret math
formula.
Here our duty is not to decipher hidden messages but simply to
contemplate, even to enjoy. And sometimes art is no more, nor less,
than just that.
Scarlet Cheng writes frequently about the arts for The Times. She
formerly was managing editor of the magazine Asian Art News in Hong
Kong.
* "A Winding River: The Journey of Contemporary Art in Vietnam" opened
Saturday at the Bowers Museum of Cultural Art, 2002 N. Main St., Santa
Ana. $4-$8. 10 a.m.-4 p.m. Tuesdays-Sundays, through Oct. 3. (714)
567-3600.
* Cambodian party says enemies try to make splits
PHNOM PENH, June 28 (Reuters) - The leader of Cambodia's ruling party
on Monday said its opponents were trying to create splits and destroy
the party, but they would never succeed.
``The opponents of the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) persist in their
efforts to break our internal solidarity...(and) the unity among the
party leadership with a view to destroying the party,'' CPP president
Chea Sim told a congress.
``Yet they never succeed in their objective thanks to the fact that we
know how to unite and mobilise the forces which enable us to solve the
problems,'' he said.
From time to time there have been rumours of splits in the formerly
communist CPP but the party has always denied divisions.
Political analysts say a genuine split in the party, which has
effective control of the security forces, could seriously destabilise
the country.
The CPP was founded in 1978 by defectors from the leftist Khmer Rouge
who broke away from the then leader Pol Pot and fled to Vietnam. They
returned with an invading Vietnamese army and were installed in power
in Phnom Penh in early 1979.
The party narrowly won a contested election last July and Prime
Minister Hun Sen, a deputy CPP leader, formed a coalition with the
royalist party led by his old rival, Prince Norodom Ranariddh.
Chea Sim, who is also chairman of a newly formed Senate, said the CPP
backed government moves to bring former Khmer Rouge leaders to trial.
He also called on the government to resolve border disputes with
Cambodia's neighbours.
``I would like to urge the royal government...to carry out in a more
concrete way its policy on border issues,'' Chea Sim said.
* Cambodia to tighten petrol sector
PHNOM PENH, June 28 (Reuters) - Cambodia aims to tighten up its
unregulated retail petroleum sector and reduce prices at the pumps in
an effort to stamp out rampant gasoline smuggling, the head of the
petroleum authority said on Monday.
``Downstream is one of our concerns because we have nothing,'' the
director general of the recently formed Cambodian National Petroleum
Authority, Te Duong Tara, told Reuters in an interview.
``All of these companies are very happy because there are no laws, no
regulations to control them,'' he said.
There are seven petrol retailers in Cambodia including Caltex of the
United States, Total of France, Petronas of Malaysia and Thailand's
PTT, he said.
``Suppose something happened about safety, an emergency, noone would be
responsible,'' he said.
``We're trying to produce laws and regulations to supervise but we
would like them to respect international standards.
``If they build a gas station they need to comply with international
standards, like storage, there have to be double (layers in tanks)
protecting against leakage and contamination.''
``They need to train their staff. You can see in some gas staions,
they're filling up and smoking a cigarette. That cannot be accepted,''
he said. ``In Cambodia there's no training at all.''
He said that at the moment anyone could import gasoline but the
authority was proposing that importers be licensed.
Quality and prices also had to be regulated. Te Duong Tara said he was
seeking a cut in petrol taxes to bring prices into line with Cambodia's
neighbours and stop smuggling.
He said $1 bought two litres of petrol in Cambodia while in Thailand it
would buy three litres. In Vietnam one tonne of gasoline was $100
cheaper than in Cambodia, he said.
``There's no way you can stop the smuggling. We need to get a
comparative price,'' he said.
* Cambodia seeks end to Thai gulf gas row
PHNOM PENH, June 28 (Reuters) - Cambodia wants to develop jointly with
Thailand a disputed 25,000 square kilometre zone in the Gulf of
Thailand which is potentially rich in natural gas, the director of
Cambodia's petroleum authority said on Monday.
The overlapping claim area (OCA) could contain as much as 10-11
trillion cubic feet of gas but its exploitation has been stalled for
decades due to the conflicting claims.
``It depends upon an agreement between Cambodia and Thailand but
frankly, Cambodia is ready,'' National Petroleum Authority director
general Te Duong Tara told Reuters in an interview.
He said a joint development agreement between Thailand and Malaysia was
the model Cambodia was pushing for, but Thailand was seeking the
justification of boundaries.
``One option is very easy. Cambodia proposed to Thailand 'don't talk
about the line, consider the whole area as overlapping and then bring
the Thailand and Malaysia model','' he said. ``So we may spend only one
year to reach an agreement.''
``But another model that may take more time is the justification of the
lines,'' he said.
``Thailand prefers us to justify our claim, and Thailand has to justify
its claim, (so) we may spend more than two years. In maritime law,
every line requires a lot of work,'' he said.
``But whatever option, we are ready. Even if we need to justify (the
claim area) Cambodia has prepared the documents and we can give them to
them in a few days,'' he said.
Thailand first awarded contracts for the area in the early 1970s.
Cambodia signed conditional exploration contracts for the OCA's four
blocks in November 1997 with five foreign companies including
Australia's BHP Petroleum, the energy division of The Broken Hill Pty
Co, Conoco Inc. of the United States and Britain's Enterprise Oil
``Now it's almost 26 years (since Thailand first awarded contracts) and
because of the claims nobody can do anything. So it's better to keep
the claims away, do the exploration and share 50-50,'' Te Duong Tara
said.
``We hope that if we can reach an agreement with Thailand this year or
next year, then in a few years we can get some production,'' he said.
Foreign firms were still interested in exploring the OCA despite the
slump in fuel prices, he said.
``When the oil price drops the funds they use for exploration also
drop...but because of the potential, interest remains.''
A second smaller block to the south in the Gulf of Thailand is claimed
by Cambodia, Thailand and Vietnam.
Cambodia and Vietnam are now trying to settle their maritime boundary.
Te Duong Tara said he thought it would take longer to resolve the
second disputed area.
``It may take longer because we have to have tripartite meetings
otherwise Cambodia cannot accept it,'' he said.
Meanwhile Australia's Woodside Petroleum Ltd is reviewing data from all
six of Cambodia's offshore blocks where foreign firms have drilled nine
test wells.
The tests were generally disappointing but Te Duong Tara said he hoped
the 15-month reappraisal and review of the data would produce some
encouraging results.
``Among the nine wells drilled there were three discoveries of both oil
and gas together,'' he said. ``At Angkor-1 (test well) there is
potential -- it almost looks like it is commercial.''
Enterprise Oil said the Angkor-1 test well produced a maximum flow rate
of 4.7 million cubic feet of gas per day and 180 barrels of condensate
a day.
* Cambodian investigators urge more time for Khmer rouge hearings
ABC, 29/6/99 - Cambodian investigators preparing to put two former
Khmer Rouge leaders on trial, have asked for more time to gather
evidence and for the hearings to start in September.
Cambodia's military court is preparing to try captured rebel military
chief Ta Mok, known as "The Butcher" and Pol Pot's security chief Kang
Kek Ieu, known as chief executioner Duch.
So far they have been charged under a 1994 law outlawing the Khmer
Rouge, and do not face any charges relating to the 1975-1979 murderous
Khmer Rouge regime under Pol Pot.
Investigating judge, Ngin Sam An, says investigators have not collected
enough evidence, and a two-month delay is needed.
The comments seemed to be setting the stage for a "two stage" trial
proposed by Prime Minister Hun Sen on Friday.
The initial charges would see the pair legally stay behind bars while
giving the government and international community more time to hammer
out plans for a genocide trial.
* Cambodian PM and World Bank optimistic on reforms
ABC, 29/6/99 - Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen has held aid talks
with World Bank representatives in Phnom Penh.
Aid to Cambodia was cut when after Hun Sen ousted Prince Norodom
Ranariddh, his co-prime minister, in a violent coup in 1997.
Following a closely contested election, the two bitter rivals settled
their differences in November and formed a new government.
However, donors remained skeptical that Cambodia would go through with
long-promised reforms and made new aid pledges conditional on progress.
World Bank representative Bonaventure Mbida-Essama said after meeting
with Hun Sen that although there are still problems, he has been
impressed with the government's commitment to reform since the
conditional aid was pledged by donors in February.
With 470 million US dollars in foreign aid hanging in the balance,
Cambodia has begun projects to clean up corruption in the lucrative
timber trade, reform government revenue collection and reduce the
bloated military and civil service.
* Malaysia PM defends structures in Spratlys zone
KUALA LUMPUR, June 27 (Reuters) - Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir
Mohamad reiterated on Sunday that the two reefs in the South China Sea,
on which Malaysia has erected structures, belonged to it and not the
Philippines.
He said the Peninjau and Siput reefs were within Malaysia's exclusive
economic zone, hence the countries involved in the claim to the
disputed Spratly islands should respect Malaysia's right to build
whatever structure it thought fit on its own territory.
``We have built on our zone and not outside of the zone for climatic
research and marine life studies and also to prevent ship collisions,''
Mahathir was quoted as saying by the national Bernama news agency.
Malaysian Foreign Minister Syed Hamid Albar said earlier this week that
Malaysia had sent scientists to the two reefs within Malaysia's
continental shelf boundaries, and that they were not infringing on
Philippine territory.
On Thursday, the Philippines formally protested against Malaysia's
construction of the structures in the Spratly islands, and warned
building in the area could trigger accidental armed conflicts.
Mahathir said he felt the issue would not bring about any tension in
relations between Malaysia and the Philippines.
The Spratlys are a cluster of isles, reefs and rocky formations in the
South China Sea believed to be potentially rich in oil and natural gas.
The area is claimed wholly or in part by China, Taiwan, Vietnam,
Malaysia, the Philippines and Brunei.
Mahathir said Malaysia built the structures not on the basis of the
islands' oil and gas resources, but because it feared other countries
would resort to doing this as had already happened on several other
reefs.
The Philippines as well as Vietnam had a presence in the area but
Malaysia had never questioned them, he said.
hyt...@my-deja.com
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