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News
December 30, 2002
Former Vietnam POW Sen.
McCain Returns
(Associated Press) - Sen. John McCain, a former prisoner of war in Vietnam,
received a warm welcome from Hanoi leaders who praised his efforts to promote
reconciliation between the former enemies, officials said Monday.
McCain, R-Ariz., is in Vietnam on a personal trip _ his first since causing a
flap in 2000 during the 25th anniversary of the end of the Vietnam War by
declaring the "wrong guys" had won.
McCain and his family were in Vietnam for a private vacation, a U.S. Embassy
official said. He arrived in Hanoi on Friday and was scheduled to travel to
Danang and Ho Chi Minh City before leaving Jan. 2.
The state-run English-language Vietnam News reported that McCain met with Deputy
Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, who praised the Arizona senator's efforts to
promote implementation of a trade agreement last year that lowered tariffs and
opened Vietnam wider to foreign investment.
McCain, held for nearly six years as a prisoner of war, has been an outspoken
supporter of normalizing diplomatic ties and helped push through the trade pact.
But he caused a stir with comments during his visit two years ago.
"I think that they lost millions of their best people who left by boat,
thousands by execution and hundreds of thousands who went to re-education
camps," McCain told reporters during the 2000 trip as he toured Ho Chi Minh
City, which was known as Saigon when it was the capital of U.S.-backed South
Vietnam.
His remarks irritated the Hanoi government.
But McCain has since redeemed himself in Vietnam's eyes by backing the country's
efforts to fight a move by the American catfish industry to levy tariffs on
imported Vietnamese catfish.
Catfish farmers in the Mississippi Delta have claimed Vietnam is dumping fish at
below-market prices. The farmers' lobby successfully fought to prohibit
Vietnam's use of the "catfish" label.
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