WALL STREET JOURNAL
24-5-16)

Obama Voices Human-Rights Concerns in Vietnam

President escalates criticism a day after U.S. lifts embargo on arms sales to country

By Carol E. Lee

HANOI—President Barack Obama stepped up his criticism of Vietnam’s human-rights record and reflected on “the pain and sacrifices on both sides” of the Vietnam War in a speech on the second day of his three-day visit to the Southeast Asian country.

Mr. Obama, after playing down human-rights concerns in Vietnam at the start of his trip, argued Tuesday that governments that allow dissent and political freedoms are rewarded with stability and economic prosperity.

“When there’s freedom of expression and freedom of speech…that fuels the innovation that economies need to thrive,” Mr. Obama said in a speech at the National Convention Center in Hanoi.

Before delivering the speech, Mr. Obama met with some of Vietnam’s civil-society leaders, where he said he has “significant concerns in terms of areas of free speech, freedom of assembly, accountability with respect to government” in the country.

One of those with whom Mr. Obama met was Vietnamese pop star and activist Mai Khoi, who said afterward that the meeting “gives official recognition to the movement for an independent civil society in Vietnam.”

“It sends a clear signal to the Vietnamese people that the international community highly values attempts by independent candidates like me to get into the National Assembly,” she said in a statement. Ms. Mai Khoi was blocked from running in Sunday’s legislative elections as an independent after she failed to pass the Communist Party’s screening process.

Mr. Obama noted that some of the activists he had invited “were prevented from coming for various reasons.”

“There are still some folks who find it very difficult to assemble and organize peacefully around issues that they care deeply about,” he said.

As in his previous remarks imploring countries to do better on human rights, Mr. Obama described some of the “shortcomings” in the U.S., such as racial bias in the criminal justice system and gender disparity in pay.

“No nation is perfect,” Mr. Obama said. “We still have problems and we’re not immune from criticism. I promise you, I hear it every day. But that scrutiny…has helped us grow stronger and more prosperous and more just.”

Mr. Obama cited the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a policy that would create economic growth in Vietnam but also facilitate more cooperation among countries in Southeast Asia and advance human rights.

The TPP, a centerpiece of Mr. Obama’s so-called Asia rebalance, faces an uncertain future. The Democratic and Republican presidential candidates have said they oppose the trade pact, and it has stalled in Congress. U.S. lawmakers are divided over the pact, which isn’t expected to come up for a vote at least until after the November election.

Mr. Obama’s latest comments were far sharper than his mention of human-rights concerns on Monday, when he met with Vietnamese government officials including President Tran Dai Quang and said the U.S. would lift its ban on arms sales to Vietnam. The president has come under criticism for making that decision without securing more from the Vietnamese government on human-rights improvements.

Mr. Obama’s decision was part of a broader effort to enhance ties between the U.S. and Vietnam to counter China’s growing assertiveness in the region.

As part of the attempt to shift the nature of relations between the two countries, Mr. Obama has reflected in public on the impact of the Vietnam War. “The very war that divided us became a source for healing,” he said. “Today Vietnam and the United States are partners. I believe our experience holds lessons for the world. We have shown that hearts can change.”

As Mr. Obama continued his visit to Vietnam, China emphasized its geographic proximity to—and its professed commitment to close ties with—its southern neighbor. Vice foreign ministers from China and Vietnam met Tuesday in a southern Chinese provincial capital to review agreements reached in 2009 that demarcated the countries’ land border, the Chinese foreign ministry said. Unlike the continuing and sometimes violent disputes over their South China Sea claims, the land-border agreements were seen as a breakthrough that has helped trade and economic ties to thrive.

The significance of the meeting, according to Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, is that China and Vietnam “will always be good neighbors, good friends, good comrades and partners.” The two countries will elevate relations “featuring long-term stability, good neighborliness and comprehensive cooperation,” Ms. Hua said at a media briefing in Beijing.