
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, June 1, 1993                   TAG: 9306010134
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: HANOI                                LENGTH: Medium

VIETNAM TURNS OVER INFORMATION ON MIAS

Vietnamese officials Monday turned over previously unrevealed documents and films of captured and killed American servicemen to a congressional delegation seeking to determine the fate of 2,259 Americans who remain missing in action 20 years after the end of the U.S. war effort.

Americans and Vietnamese alike said the latest information could represent a significant advance in efforts to lay to rest, finally, a conflict that tore the fabric of American society to a degree rivaled only by the Civil War. But the lingering bitterness of the struggle in Vietnam was evident on both sides during ceremonies at which the new materials were presented.

Vietnam's foreign minister complained that Americans show little sympathy for the 300,000 soldiers from his country whose fates are unknown; and a U.S. senator upbraided the Vietnamese for trying to sugarcoat their record in dealing with prisoners of war.

"Today is Memorial Day in the United States, a day when we remember all our veterans of all wars," said Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass. "So it is a day of special focus on the issue" of what happened to those missing in action, or who were thought to be prisoners of war but did not return home when the Vietnam War ended.

"Those who have fought in wars - and there are many here today - know that you don't forget those you fought alongside of," said Kerry, who received three Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star and a Silver Star during service as a Navy gunboat officer in Vietnam.

Elderly Vietnamese military leaders nodded gravely at his words, but the mutual empathy was fragile.

Shortly after Kerry's remarks, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., angrily interrupted Ho Xuan Dich, Vietnam's top official on MIA affairs, as Dich delivered a story of the good treatment American prisoners of war received from their Vietnamese captors.

"Come on, Mr. Dich, stop saying that. It is not true," barked McCain, also a much-decorated Naval officer, who spent five years as a prisoner of war in Vietnam. "I never got any magazines to read. We were not treated humanely. So let's go on to the next subject. This is not the truth."

Still, talks continued, and both sides said that painful as it might be, progress was being made that could eventually lead to normalization of relations between the countries.

by CNB