U.S.-Russia Panel on Vietnam, Korea MIAs Being Formed
Russia said Thursday that it is setting up a joint parliamentary commission with the United States to seek information on Americans missing in the Korean and Vietnam wars.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Vitaly Churkin said both sides are eager to set up such a commission in the near future but that there are no guarantees that new information will emerge.
“Please don’t get up expectations too much. It’s not that we’re about to pull out of our sleeve some new information, because we don’t have it,” he told reporters after a news briefing.
“But since it is a very acute humanitarian issue, we feel we should do everything we can in order to leave no ambiguities in this matter.”
The commission would be made up of U.S. Congress members and Russian members of Parliament. Churkin indicated that intelligence experts on both sides would also take part.
The move, discussed at a meeting Thursday between U.S. Ambassador Robert S. Strauss and Russian Foreign Minister Andrei Kozyrev, follows reported sightings of an American POW in the Central Asian republic of Kazakhstan, formerly part of the Soviet Union.
A total of 2,267 Americans are still listed as missing in Southeast Asia.
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