|
| |
News Article
November 19, 2000
Interview with President Bill
Clinton
NGUYEN NGOC BICH: Good evening, Mr. President.
CLINTON: Yes, good evening.
BICH: You must be exhausted by now. That's why we are so grateful to you for
granting RFA your very first post-Vietnam trip interview. My name is Nguyen Ngoc
Bich, and you can call me just Bich for short. I am the Director of the
Vietnamese Service at Radio Free Asia. Mr. President, my first question to you
is: How do you feel? Do you feel you have accomplished your goal by this first
trip ever made by a president of the United States to a reunified Vietnam?
CLINTON: Yes, I think it was a very successful trip. First, because we were able
to see and support the attempts that are being made there to recover the missing
in action from the Vietnam conflict and to continue our cooperation with the
Vietnamese government in that regard. We also gave them several hundred thousand
pages of documents to help them identify the some 300,000 people still missing
who are Vietnamese. Then I think it was important because we contributed, I
believe, to the continuing economic progress of the country which I think will
lead to more openness. And thirdly, I think it was important because I was able
to speak on television to the country about the kind of future I hope we will
share with Vietnam and the fact that I hope there will be more openness and more
freedom than now, and I also had finally some good discussions and some
constructive disagreements with the leadership of Vietnam.
BICH: Yes, your speech at Hanoi University certainly was very impressive and so
I think it made a real big impression on the country. As this was your first
trip to Vietnam, could you give us a general impression of the country--at least
what you saw of it--and of the people? Were they warm and welcoming?
CLINTON: They were very warm and very welcoming and clearly interested in the
trip, and the young people with whom I talked were clearly interested in having
closer ties with America--so I felt very good about that. I also was interested
in all the changes that are occurring in the northern part of the country. I
think that there clearly was a lot of new investment going on in Hanoi, a lot of
new businesses coming up or a lot of changes there that I think will tend to
make the South and the North perhaps less different in terms of the economic
life and maybe the political outlooks of the people at least in the cities. Now
the only village that I went to was the one where the search for the pilot was
going on.
BICH: People say that in Vietnam there is some difference, a distance between
potential and realizations. Do you get the feeling that the people are impatient
for progress, especially among the young, or do you think that as the government
over there says, people are pretty satisfied with the present pace of things?
CLINTON: Well, I would say that they understand that the country is doing better
and they like that. But my impression is that they want to move forward as
rapidly as they can. After all, sixty percent of the whole country is under 30.
And I think they have a keen awareness that they have to make a lot of changes
in order to keep, you know, creating the jobs that I think they need. They need,
you know, 1.4 million jobs every year, and on the morning of my last day there I
had an amazing roundtable discussion with a number of young Vietnamese, men and
women, who range in age from early 20s to mid-30s and who did everything from
working for Cargill, the big international grain company, to running the Vietnam
office of Saatchi and Saatchi, which is the big London advertising agency, and
then there was one young man who had a job in the [Communist] party and others
who had other jobs. But what was interesting to me was that they were thinking
about the big questions, you know, how much personal freedom is needed in life?
What kind of decision should be made by the individual, and what kind of
decision should be made by a family or village or the nation and the government?
How much of an account should be private and how much should be public? The man
who ran the city government in Ho Chi Minh City [Vo Viet Thanh] was quite proud
of the fact that they had done a remarkable job of creating jobs in the private
sector, that he has downsized the government, poverty has been reduced by 70
percent, and homelessness reduced by 70 percent, so I think there are a lot of
people there who have the feeling that if they go more to a private economy and
if they had more entrepreneurial spirit then there would be more personal
freedom associated with it.
BICH: Yes, I understand that the First Lady also had some strong words to
recommend human rights at her talk in the morning of Sunday?
CLINTON: Yes, she met with a group of women there, which is something she tries
to do in every country in the world she visits, and she's been speaking about
that, and especially human rights as they affect women and young girls ever
since she went to the Beijing conference several years ago.
BICH: That�s wonderful. Now what is your reading of the progress so far made
about the U.S.-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement? Do you get any indication
while you were there as to when the Vietnamese National Assembly might get to
ratify that pact?
CLINTON: I think they'll ratify it pretty soon. I think, I had the feeling they
want to make absolutely sure that we are going to ratify, and they understand
that timing is not good for ratification now but I think as soon as we ratify it
they will, and then we told them that we would be spending a couple of million
dollars a year over the next three years to help insure the rapid and thorough
implementation of the agreement. And we told them that we would like to have a
high-level meeting, at least annually, to plot a joint economic strategy to the
future and they agree to do that. My instinct is that they do want to get the
maximum benefit out of this trade agreement.
BICH: But then, what would be your impression as to when the U.S. Congress might
ratify that?
CLINTON: O I think they'll do it as soon as they'll have a chance, probably
early next year. You know, I wish I could do it now but I just don't know if
it's practical. And so I think that, I don't think there is any shot that that
won't be approved by Congress. There's just so much support for it.
BICH: On a more sensitive matter, you have been very diplomatic in handling the
question of human rights, religious and other democratic freedoms in Vietnam.
But Hanoi's sensitivity to this question is all too obvious. Did you make any
headway in your talks with Secretary General Le Kha Phieu or Prime Minister Phan
Van Khai on this front? How do you think the U.S. could work with Vietnam on
this matter in a more open fashion?
CLINTON: Well, I had very open conversations with all of them--with the prime
minister, with the secretary general and with the president. And what I believe
is that once they realize that we are not trying to tell Vietnam how to run
every aspect of their lives, then we feel that we are going to be... and in a
friendly relation we have to be honest about our disagreements and we have to
say why we think human rights and religious rights and individual freedoms have
meant to our country. I think we will be in a dialogue there and I think that
plus the process of economic and social change which is going on in Vietnam will
lead the country in a positive direction. That's what I believe, and I think it
will be very important for my successors to continue that dialogue. I don't
think we can drop human rights or religious freedom from our concerns anywhere
in the world.
BICH: Can we ask just one last quick question?
CLINTON: Sure.
BICH: Did you have a chance to play your saxophone while you were over there?
CLINTON: No but I loved the music, I did, however I heard a Vietnamese saxophone
player at the entertainment at the state dinner and he was really, really good.
All the musicians were great, I was very impressed by the musical performances
that were done after the state dinner.
BICH: You wouldn't allow us just maybe one or two more quick questions?
CLINTON: We have to wrap up. We're in Alaska and we have to get up on the plane.
BICH: Thank you, Mr. President.
CLINTON: Goodbye!
|
