Don Pathan
The Nation
Coming to terms with the past has not been easy for Thailand and Vietnam, the two Southeast Asian nations who have fought each other bitterly in various circles for the most part of their 25 years of diplomatic relations.
But with guidance from the country’s Royal Family, as well as the strong political will of Thailand’s successive leaders, the bitterness has subsided.
“Never before has the relationship between Thailand and Vietnam been in such good shape as it is now,” said the Vietnamese ambassador to Thailand, Do Ngoc Son, in an interview with The Nation.
There have been a lot of changes in the past 25 years, said the envoy, pointing to a number of political breakthroughs, most of which took place in recent years.
Son said regular visits by members of the Royal Family had helped pave the way for the leaders of the two sides to come to the negotiating table to pin down some of the stickiest issues that have been shelved for the best part of the relationship.
In the past decade, many of these issues were centred on the region’s security, with Vietnam being on one side and the core Asean members – Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines and Singapore – on the other. The battlefield was, naturally, the rice paddies of Indochina, as well as the United Nations.
A major breakthrough came in 1989 under the Paris Peace Agreement, which paved the way for Vietnamese troops to pull out of Cambodia. It was followed by a UN-sponsored general election in the wartorn country.
In 1992, Hanoi was granted Asean “observer” status, and three years later became a full member of the regional grouping.
“This has allowed all of us to create a deeper understanding of one another,” Son said. “It wasn’t just with Thailand, but relations with all Asean countries improved.”
But coming under the Asean umbrella wasn’t a cause for jubilation as Hanoi wanted it to be. Many of the core members were still suspicious of Hanoi’s “hidden agenda” in Vientiane and Phnom Penh. In the process, sensitive issues between Vietnam and Thailand, such as refugee repatriation, overlapping claims and the Khmer Rouge, would have to wait for political developments to be worked out.
But despite these difficult times, Son said, there was always a need in Hanoi to forge stronger bonds.
“We have always attached great importance to Thailand for various reasons – strategic, economic, historical, geographical, and the similarity in the cultures,” Son said.
A major breakthrough came in 1997 when Thailand and Vietnam became the first two countries in Southeast Asia to ink a maritime boundary, said Son.
According to Son, the agreement showed that there existed mutual political will between the two sides, and therefore paved the way for other sticky issues to be brought up.
Today, the mutual trust has expanded to other areas, including the granting of citizenship to second and third generation ethnic Vietnamese who are descended from the so-called Dien Bien Phu refugees.
Most of the Dien Bien Phu refugees left Vietnam for Thailand in the late 1940s to avoid fighting between Vietnamese nationalists and French forces. Many migrated to Thailand in the previous decade along with the leading members in the nationalist circle who came here to map out their strategy against the French.
The second major wave that fled the country following the fall of the American-backed Saigon regime in 1975 came regularly until a comprehensive plan of action backed by the UN High Commissioner of Refugees was put in place. The last group of these refugees went back in early 1999 following the closure of the Sikhiu camp.
Today, about 60 percent of the so-called descendants of Dien Bien Phu have been granted Thai citizenship, while all of the first generation have been granted residency status, thus allowing them to return to visit their homeland.
“We highly appreciate this humanitarian and reasonable policy,” Son said. “They [the Dien Bien Phu refugees] have contributed greatly to the betterment of Thailand and can also serve as a bridge to promote friendship between the two countries.”
On the economic front, Son said the two countries are looking to strengthen their global strategy in the world’s rice market before other rice-producing countries, like India and Pakistan, would be considered to take part in the scheme.
“Rice is the most important commodity for the two agricultural-based societies. We are looking at this as a way to relieve the plight of the poor farmers.”
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25th ANNIVERSARY OF DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS: The fisherman's friend: Thai-Vietnamese ties in a sea change
Don Pathan
The Nation
Published on Aug 4, 2001
Once bitter enemies across the Cold War divide, Thailand and Vietnam have moved in recent years toward close security and economic cooperation
A few days ago a Vietnamese oil vessel rescued 18 Thai sailors from a burning ship that caught on fire just off Vietnam's southern coast. All the Thai sailors survived, although two were badly burned.
The recent rescue was a far cry from what used to take place in Vietnam's territorial waters. It is not exactly a secret that for the most part of their 25-year history of diplomatic relations, the two sides didn't see eye to eye.
Just three years ago, the name of the game was to catch Thai trawlers fishing illegally in Vietnamese waters. It was a nasty cat-and-mouse game that often struck a raw nerve with both Bangkok and Hanoi. For the Vietnamese authorities, catching Thai trawlers was good business. One vessel could fetch up to a million baht. So lucrative was the trawler trade that even non-coastal Vietnamese provinces were getting into the act.
Today, the chase is no more. Gone are the bitter days when Thai fishermen cluttered up Vietnamese jails waiting to be bailed out by greedy boat owners who were often slapped with inflated fines.
And with illegal fishing and territorial disputes effectively becoming non-issues, the two countries are turning to each other to map out plans for further cooperation in downstream investments.
To curb illegal fishing and piracy, the navies of both countries are carrying out joint patrols in common waters.
Besides fisheries, the two countries are working together to find ways to control the international rice market. Along the way, the world's two leading rice exporters have attracted great interest from other rice-producing countries like India and Pakistan.
In the area of security cooperation, Thailand and Vietnam have shown that they have reached a level of maturity where frank discussion and exchange of information can take place. Thai authorities have acted swiftly over a recent bomb scare incident carried out by an anti-Hanoi group labeled "terrorists" by the Vietnamese government.
Moreover, a Thai court is currently trying a Vietnamese-American activist, Ly Thong, on charges of hijacking. Ly was reported to have bribed a Thai pilot to fly him over Vietnam to drop anti-communist leaflets over Ho Chi Minh City.
Three years ago when another anti-Hanoi movement was taking shape in Trad province, Thai officials did not hesitate to penetrate the ring and break it up. Thailand wanted to show Hanoi that it was serious about security cooperation.
But this level of trust between the two countries did not come overnight. During the Cold War, the two countries were on opposite sides, fighting each other locally in the rice paddies of Indochina, as well as internationally in New York and Paris.
A major breakthrough came in 1989 when Vietnam pulled its troops from Cambodia, paving the way for the 1991 peace settlement. Four years later, Hanoi became a member of the Asean family, pushing bilateral ties with Thailand to a higher plane.
The mudslinging died down, making way for the strengthening of links that led to the smooth repatriation of all Vietnamese refugees. In February 1999, the Sikhiu camp in Nakhon Ratchasima was closed, thus ending one of the most disturbing chapters in the modern history of Thailand and Vietnam.
In that year, the two countries also found a middle ground over overlapping claims in the Gulf of Siam. Vietnam became the first country in the region to reach such an agreement with Thailand.
Meanwhile, in Thailand's Northeast, the so-called Dien Bien Phu refugees who fled their homeland in the late 1940s to escape the fighting between French troops and Vietnamese nationalists are well on their way toward receiving their Thai nationality and residency.
Unlike the previous decades where tremendous prejudice and dubious security measures prevented them from moving up the social ladder, today the sons and daughters of the Dien Bien Phu refugees are changing the face of the underdeveloped region, turning the sleepy region into a thriving business community.
In a few days, the two former enemies will celebrate the 25th anniversary of diplomatic ties. In spite of what they have overcome, a number of challenges still lie ahead. But judging from the cooperation between the two nations in recent years, it would be safe to say that it's all downhill from here.
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