Vietnamese prime minister to visit US
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-05-05 21:45

HANOI, Vietnam - Vietnam's prime minister announced on Thursday that he plans to become the communist country's highest-ranking leader to visit the United States since the Vietnam War ended 30 years ago.

Phan Van Khai told reporters during an official visit to Australia that he will travel to Washington at the end of next month, but it was not immediately clear who he would meet with there.

Prime Minister of Vietnam Phan Van Khai said on Thursday he plans to visit the United States in late June -- the first such trip by the communist country's top leader since the end of the Vietnam War 30 years ago. Khai inspects an honor guard during his arrival at Parliament House in Canberra, May 5, 2004. Khai is in Australia on a two-day visit and will talk with his Australian counterpart John Howard and business leaders. [Reuters]

"Thirty years has passed since the end of the war; this is the first-ever visit by a leader of a unified Vietnam to the United States," said Khai, who typically does not take questions from foreign media.

Officials at the U.S. Embassy in Vietnam said they could not confirm the trip, and Vietnam's Foreign Ministry declined to provide additional details.

Khai's comments came a day before U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Robert B. Zoellick was expected to visit Vietnam to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the normalization of diplomatic relations between the former foes.

The two countries have grown closer in the past decade in a number of areas, and rumblings of a prime ministerial visit to the U.S. have been circulating in Hanoi for months.

"The purpose of my visit to the United States is to elevate our relationship to a higher plane," Khai said during a joint news conference with Australian Prime Minister John Howard.

In 2000, Bill Clinton became the first American president to visit Vietnam since the war ended in 1975. A year later, the countries signed a landmark trade deal that has grown far beyond both sides' expectations — netting $6.44 billion in two-way trade last year.

Other high-level visits have also taken place, including Vietnam Defense Minister Pham Van Tra's historic meeting in November 2003 with Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld in Washington. Tra became the first senior military official of Hanoi's government to visit the United States.

That same month, a U.S. Navy ship paid a port call to what is now called Ho Chi Minh City — another first since the former U.S.-backed South Vietnam surrendered to communist forces on April 30, 1975. The 30th anniversary of that date was celebrated with red silk banners, a colorful parade and speeches over the weekend in the former Saigon.

While maintaining its communist roots, Vietnam has been moving toward a market economy. It is pushing to join the World Trade Organization and is currently involved in bilateral negotiations with the United States that would help boost the communist country's plan to enter the global trade body.

But despite the warming relations, some friction remains.

Last year, the State Department named Vietnam as one of the world's worst violators of religious freedom. Vietnam has recently released a handful of dissidents from jail but continues to detain and harass those who refuse to worship in Communist-approved churches.

The Agent Orange issue also continues to loom. A U.S. court recently dismissed a class-action lawsuit filed by Vietnamese accusing American companies of war crimes for making the defoliant, used to destroy jungle cover for Vietnamese troops.

Washington insists there is not enough scientific evidence to link Agent Orange to health problems. The dispute scuttled a joint research project on the defoliant earlier this year after the two sides couldn't agree on parameters for the study.

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