RADIO REVIEWS WORLD OPINION ON 'FAKE' POW

Created: 4/22/1993

OCR scan of the original document, errors are possible

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Radio Reviews World Opinion on 'Fake' POW

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48

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SOUTHEAST ASIA

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Hanoi Voice of VietnamEADLINE:

Radio Reviews World Opinion on 'Fake' POW

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anoi Voice of Vietnam Network in

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[Text] Dear friends:umber of miscreants in the United States rocently spread the news that Vietnam still holdingmerican prisoners of war, just as

they spread those fake documents and photographsmi unmet

produced earlier about American survivors in

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Thisotally brazen fabrication which has been strongly criticized by the public- In today's International Topic feature, we would lis* to review public opinion about this news report.

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THE HEM YORK TIMES onpril reported that a

secret document found in Moscow showed that after

here weremerican prisoners of war

still held in Vietnam. Mr. Nguyen Xuan Phong, acting

chief of the Vietnamese Foreign Ministry North Americas Department.

regarded this news report as sheer

fabrication and once again pointed out the fact that after the signing ol the Paris agreementietnam returned to tho United States all American prisoners captured inEXT:

According to figures provided by. Departments of Defense and State, theremericans missing In action still unaccounted for in Indochina. Of them, there wereases in Vietnam.

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With its humanitarian cooperative efforts. Vietnam has thus for handed over to the United States moreets of American remains and has conducted joint investigations into overeports on live Americans andases of questionable dossiers. The results showed tbat there was no evidence of any American prisoners of war now being detained or living freely inEXT:

In an interview with AP, Mr. Nguyen Xuan Phong said that this document might have been fabricated by those opposing the normalization of.EXT:

Meanwhile, according to BBC,. secretary of defense said in Washington on the evening ofpril chat the Russian translation of the document alleging chat North Vietnam was holdingmerican prisoners of war should be given carefulEXT:

The British newspaper FINANCIAL TIMES carried an article onpril dealing with the American sussing in action during the Vietnam War. The article saidi Vietnam is not the only one to regard as faVe tho document recently made public. agency on the figure of American prisoners of war inEXT:

The article went on:. Senate is increasingly

inclined toward tho view that the best way to onsure

progress in the MZA issue is tolose relationship with

Vietnam. The press article also made it known

that recently Democratic Senator Claiborne Pell,

chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee;

and Republican Senator Lugar. President

Clinton, colling on him to lift the embargo against

Vietnam.

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tatement made public onpril. Senator John

Kerry, former chairman of. Senate Select Committee on

PCaf/MU Affairs, said: The document

alleging that there weremerican prisoners of war still detained in Vietnam should be examined and analyzed carefully. The translation from Vietnamese into Russian might leadisinterpretation of the nationalities of the prisoners of war held captive. .TEXTi

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According4 April dispatch of RPT [Radio Franco Internationale} and Radio Australia, immediately after this suspenseful news report was released by THE NEW YORES TIMES, . Government appeared to be cautious.. Departments of State and Defense did not rule out misinterpretations andTEXT:

Other newspapers in the United States such as THE

WALL STREET JOURNAL. THE LOS ANGELES

TIMES, and THR WASHINGTON TIMES all expressed

doubts over the authenticity of the document and suggested that the figuremerican prisoners of war raised in the document may include hundreds of Saigon puppet regime prisoners of war and other Asians classilied in thecategory with the Americans because they.EXT:

Public opinion in the United States and in many other countries also exposed the ugly attempts of those forces in the United States and in other countries to block and undermine the process of normalisation of. relations as they are trying to deliberately spread misleading news on the Pow/mzaTEXT:

Under its Current Affairs Trends column, the newspaperI PHONG onpril gave the following comment on thisEXT:

It should be recalled that in the POW/MIA issue alone, the tricksters have showed that their inventive power is very abundant. One cannot help but remember various cases such as those fake photographs which once sparked controversy among. public, or an allegation by an ex-Russian Intelligence officialroup of American prisoners of war had been sent to Russia,laimigh-ranking Russian personality that there were American prisoners of war in Russia. When brought to light, these stories turned out toercent fabrications. President Bush once complained that those with no conscience benefited from the agony of others and that this was an outrageously immoral act indeed. .TEXT:

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