The New York Times has run an article with entitled “Obama in Vietnam Will Focus on Future, Rather Than the Past” in the “White House Letter” column on the threshold of the US President’s visit to the Southeast Asian country from May 23 to 25.

US President Barack Obama.

The article said, for Obama the trip to Vietnam offers an opportunity to help solidify not only his promised pivot of American policy toward Asia, but also to deepen economic and security ties with an increasingly important regional player.

According to the paper, the US President is more likely to call for cooperation between the two countries to jointly address the consequences of Agent Orange/Dioxin.

Over the half past century, Vietnam has heavily suffered from the remnants of the toxic chemicals used by the US during wartime in Vietnam. Nearly 4.8 million Vietnamese people were exposed to the chemicals and about three million others are struggling with a lot of fatal diseases. The AO/dioxin after-effect is now affecting the fourth generation in Vietnam.

Every year, Vietnam spends 10 trillion VND (450 million USD) on monthly aid programmes for the AO community. In recent years, the US government has supported the Southeast Asian country with environmental detoxification as well as bomb and mine clearance.

VNA