US embassy cable - 03HANOI156

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 HANOI 000156 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
USDOC FOR SECRETARY EVANS 
USDOC ALSO FOR 6500 AND 4431/MAC/AP/OKSA/VLC/HPPHO 
STATE PASS USTR FOR EBRYAN 
TREASURY FOR OASIA 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: EFIS, EAGR, ECON, ETRD, VM 
SUBJECT: VIETNAM: MINISTER OF TRADE LETTER TO SECRETARY 
EVANS EXPRESSES CONTINUING CONCERN OVER ANTIDUMPING CASE 
 
 
SENSITIVE BUT UNCLASSIFIED - HANDLE ACCORDINGLY 
 
1.  (SBU)  The Vietnamese Ministry of Trade has responded 
to Secretary of Commerce Evans' letter of December 12, 2002 
with a letter from Minister of Trade Tuyen - text follows in 
para 2. 
 
2.  (SBU) Begin text of letter - original will not be 
forwarded: 
 
(Informal Translation by MOT) 
 
MINISTRY OF TRADE 
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam 
 
Hanoi, January 15, 2003 
 
H.E. Mr. Donald L. Evans 
Secretary of Commerce 
 
SIPDIS 
United States Department of Commerce 
 
Dear Mr. Secretary, 
 
I acknowledge with many thanks the receipt on 3rd January, 
2003 of your letter dated 12th December, 2002. 
 
It is obvious that we have different points of view 
regarding the market nature of Vietnam's economy.  The 
Ministry of Trade of Vietnam will send its rebuttal comment 
on DOC's ME/NME conclusion of 8th November 2002 to you soon. 
I believe you and I have shared responsibility to help 
narrow our differences with a view to fostering Vietnam - US 
trade relations, thus promoting the multifaceted relations 
between the two countries toward the implementation of 
President Bush's initiative recently proposed to ASEAN 
leaders. 
 
In this spirit, the Ministry of Trade expresses its great 
concerns over the attempts by a number of US domestic shrimp 
producers seeking unfair protection by abusing the US 
safeguard measures and anti-dumping laws to restrict shrimp 
imports from Vietnam and other countries.  I would like to 
take this opportunity to reaffirm that Vietnam does not dump 
either shrimps or frozen Basa and Tra fish (catfish) filets 
into the US market.  I would like, therefore, to 
respectfully ask you, in your high capacity, to handle the 
issues in a fair and just manner, to avoid any negative 
implication for the on-going fine development of the overall 
trade relations between the two countries against the 
backdrop of our historic BTA. 
 
Regarding the DOC's ongoing investigation of the petition 
against certain frozen fish fillets from Vietnam, I would 
like to draw your attention to the active and constructive 
cooperation from the Vietnamese exporters concerned in 
providing fully and promptly within a short period of time 
all the information that the DOC has requested.  They have 
made such enormous efforts with a strong belief that the DOC 
shall undertake a careful and accurate analysis and come at 
an impartial and fair conclusion of the case as the 
officials from your High Department have more than once 
assured to the Vietnamese government and businesses. 
Whereas we always highly appreciate these commitments, I 
would like to reiterate our hope to see those assurances in 
the Department's deeds.  While we do not share the DOC's 
conclusion of NME status of Vietnam, I would like to restate 
our request that the DOC accept Bangladesh as the surrogate 
country should the DOC consider using a third country's data 
to estimate comparable production costs. 
 
On the other hand, the Ministry of Trade of Vietnam has been 
informed of the US Department of Commerce's suggestion to 
consider a Suspension Agreement (SA), which was briefed to 
us by Mr. Joseph Spetrini, Deputy Assistant Secretary for 
Import Administration during his official trip to Hanoi in 
the week of 17th December, 2002.  I would like to stress, 
however, that the Vietnamese government and businesses 
involved would be in a position to consider this option only 
on the basis of a fair and accurate preliminary 
determination by the DOC to be made on 24th January, 2003. 
An unreasonably high tariff rate would be detrimental to the 
bilateral trade relations between our two countries in 
general and to the interests of both producers and consumers 
in particular, and therefore would be unacceptable to us. 
(EMBASSY NOTE:  We checked this rather confusing translation 
but unfortunately, this paragraph was no clearer in the 
original Vietnamese and so we can offer no further 
clarification. END NOTE.) 
 
It is my hope that my concerns will receive your kind 
consideration on the basis of constructive cooperation to 
the further development of Vietnam - US trade relations. 
 
Looking forward to your positive respond, I would like to 
take this opportunity to renew to you, Mr. Secretary, the 
assurances of my highest consideration. 
 
Sincerely yours, 
 
Truong Dinh Tuyen 
Minister of Trade of Vietnam 
 
End Text. 
PORTER