Washington, USA - For the first time since the Vietnam War, the leader of Vietnam will begin a visit to the United States on Monday, amid widespread calls for President Bush to challenge his visitor on Hanoi's human rights record.
Protests are planned for Tuesday, and a range of activist groups are focusing attention on political repression and rights abuses in Vietnam, particularly violation of religious freedom.
The Clinton administration normalized diplomatic relations with Vietnam 10 years ago, but it has taken a decade for a first Vietnamese leader's visit to materialize. (President Clinton visited Vietnam during the closing weeks of his presidency.)
Prime Minister Phan Van Khai will be in the U.S. for three days, and he is scheduled to meet with President Bush on Tuesday.
Khai said before leaving home that the U.S. was a very important trading partner for Vietnam and that the past 10 years had created a foundation for closer and friendlier ties. He voiced hope the U.S. would support Vietnam's bid to join the World Trade Organization.
Two-way trade has risen from about $1.5 billion in 2001 to $7 billion last year.
As Khai begins his visit, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) will on Monday brief lawmakers on Capitol Hill on the state of religious freedom in Vietnam.
The commission said vice-chair Nina Shea would testify that although trade and military ties had increased, significant problems in bilateral relations - especially relating to human rights -would hinder further growth of the relationship.
"Vietnam's economic openness has not led directly to political openness, and freedoms of speech, assembly, association, and religion continue to be significantly restricted."
The commission, set up under the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to give independent advice to government recommended in 2001 that Vietnam be added to a list of "countries of particular concern" (CDCs) for persecuting minority Protestants, Catholics and independent Buddhists.
The 1998 law empowers the administration to impose sanctions or take a range of other steps against CDCs.
Three years after the USCIRF recommendation, the State Department designated Vietnam a CDC. The department said last month the U.S. had reached an agreement with Hanoi on improving religious freedom - thus precluding sanctions - although the USCIRF says important issues still need to be addressed.
The Open Doors USA ministry ranks Vietnam at No. 3 on a list of 50 countries "where Christians suffer most for their faith."
Open Doors president Dr. Carl Moeller said Bush should make religious freedom the focus of his talks with Khai.
"Vietnam has made promises this year to give religious liberty to all groups - including Christians - and allow freedom to worship," he said.
"However, the reality is that Christians are still being arrested and harassed, especially the minority Montagnard Christians in the Central Highlands."
Highlighting other issues in Vietnam, the Vietnamese-American Public Affairs Committee (VPAC) released a copy of a letter written to Bush and Khai by family members of three men serving lengthy prison terms for "espionage."
Nguyen Khac Toan helped farmers to file petitions to the government; Dr. Pham Hong Son translated and posted online a document on democracy from a State Department website; and journalist Nguyen Vu Binh published articles on the Internet calling for reform.
The family members asked Bush for his support and urged Khai to "resolve this injustice."
Several dozen lawmakers have added their voices to calls for Bush to highlight human rights.
"We call on you to convey to Prime Minister Phan Van Khai our deep concern over the conditions of human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam," they said in a letter.
Other groups have written to Bush on the matter, including Human Rights Watch, Reporters Without Borders and the Vietnam Committee on Human Rights.
On Tuesday, organizations representing members of the Montagnard, Hmong, Khmer-Krom and Tai minorities living in the U.S. are organizing a demonstration in Washington's Freedom Plaza to coincide with Khai's White House meeting.
In a joint statement, the four groups said they represented indigenous peoples which had "paid the highest price since the Communist dictatorship took over South Indochina in 1975."
They called on the U.S. to use political and economic pressure to ensure Vietnam respects the basic rights of all of its citizens, including "the right to own our ancestral lands, the right to religious freedom, freedom of assembly and the right to democracy."
Khai's visit comes 30 years after the end of the Vietnam War, which cost the lives of more than 58,000 Americans and more than a million Vietnamese soldiers and civilians.
The U.S. backed South Vietnam against the communist North in the conflict, which ended in 1975 with the South's fall and the country's reunification under communism.