【纽约时报】War Hero in Vietnam Forces Government to Listen

老清华

War Hero in Vietnam Forces Government to Listen
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/29/world/asia/29iht-viet.html

By SETH MYDANS Published: June 28, 2009


General Vo Nguyen Giap, who led Vietnam to victory over both France and the United States.  Kham/Reuters

HANOI, VIETNAM — Vietnam’s great war hero, Gen. Vo Nguyen Giap, has stood up to defend his country once again, this time against what he says would be a huge mistake by the government — a vast mining operation run by a Chinese company.

Now 97, the commander who led his country to victory over both France and the United States has emerged as the most prominent voice in a broad popular protest that is challenging the secretive workings of the country’s Communist leaders.

In an unusual step, the government has taken note of the criticisms in recent weeks and appears to be making at least gestures of response, saying it will review the project’s environmental impact and slow its full implementation.

The project, approved by the Communist Party’s decision-making Politburo in late 2007, calls for an investment of $15 billion by 2025 to exploit reserves of bauxite — the key mineral in making aluminum — that by some estimates are the third largest in the world.

The state-owned Chinese mining group Chinalco has already put workers and equipment to work in the remote Central Highlands under contract to Vinacomin, the Vietnamese mining consortium that is aiming for up to 6.6 million tons of aluminum production by 2015.

General Giap and other opponents say the project will be ruinous to the environment, displace ethnic minority populations and threaten national security with an influx of Chinese workers and economic leverage.

The controversy draws together several issues in today’s Vietnam — its emulation of China’s environmentally destructive model of industrial development, a tentatively evolving relationship between the closed government system and its citizens, and a visceral distrust among many Vietnamese of their big neighbor to the north.

As the outlines of the project have emerged, a loose coalition of scientists, academics, environmentalists, war veterans and the leaders of unofficial Buddhist and Catholic groups have come together to challenge what Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has called “a major policy of the party and the state.” Their voices have been amplified in the echo chamber of political blogs, a new voice in public discourse here.

“There’s cross-fertilization and cross-cutting occurring on some of these issues,” said Carlyle A. Thayer, a specialist on Vietnam at the Australian Defense Force Academy in Canberra. “Groups that pushed a political agenda and got nowhere are now lending support for these things that are not political issues.”

Apart from environmentalism and economics, the theme that runs through the blogs and public opinion on the street is a deep-rooted fear of China. Vietnam was a tributary state of China for 1,000 years and was invaded by China in 1979, and the two countries continue to joust for sovereignty in the South China Sea.

In a petition to the National Assembly in April, 135 scholars and intellectuals opposed the plan, saying, “China has been notorious in the modern world as a country causing the greatest pollution and other problems.”

Reflecting the old school of those in power, the chairman of state-owned Vinacomin, Doan Van Kien, dismissed critics in an interview, saying they have “different opinions because they don’t have enough information.”

The comment clearly was meant as a criticism of the project’s opponents, not of the government that has withheld information from the public.

Mr. Kien insisted that any environmental damage would be contained, that the local population would be adequately cared for and that the Chinese would not be taking over the Central Highlands. Construction will end in two years, he said, and only a small number of Chinese workers will remain to run the operations.

With the pressure on, the government opened itself to its critics in April, convening a seminar at which scientists and economists voiced strong opposition to what one of them said could become a “major disaster.” Responding at the seminar, Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai assured critics that the government would not consider developing the mines without regard to the larger impact and would readjust the projects in an effort to protect the environment.

The government now says it will begin with only two of the four planned mining operations, and it is allowing a debate in the National Assembly.

“I think the Politburo is listening to ideas regarding a review of the bauxite project,” said Nguyen Trung, a former ambassador to Thailand. “The government should find another method of developing the Central Highlands. It should be green development.”

The degree of official flexibility is not clear because details of the original plan have not been made public. But at a minimum, the government has conceded that public sentiment could not be ignored.

“They’ve had to retreat,” said Mr. Thayer. “The government has taken on board and had to react to these pressures. To me, this carries a hope that as the Vietnamese system evolves, it may have to take these kinds of coalitions more seriously.”

But, he said, “Vietnam has not yet reached the stage where independent groups and society can take a government decision and overturn it.”

The government might well have brushed off its critics if General Giap had not spoken up, first in January and twice afterward, saying the project “will cause serious consequences to the environment, society and national defense.”

The old campaigner now appeared to be rallying public opinion against the country’s leadership, calling on scientists, managers and social activists to “suggest to the party and the state to have a sound policy on the bauxite projects in the Central Highlands.”

General Giap is the last living comrade of the country’s founding father, Ho Chi Minh. Current leaders draw their legitimacy from their link to his generation, and they have responded to his statements with careful public deference.

Asked how it felt to find himself on the opposite side from the great general, Mr. Kien, the Vinacomin chairman, let slip a little of the impatience these leaders must be feeling.

“I don’t dare to comment,” he said. “General Giap is a national hero. But I have to tell you, the general is nearly 100 years old. We have to respect him, but now we are under the leadership of the present government and Communist Party.”

老清华

没想到武元甲还活着。这篇自己翻。