VOICES

President Clinton’s decision to lift the trade embargo against Vietnam hit home with Vietnam war veterans, business leaders and members of Orange County’s Vietnamese community. The news brought anger, jubilation and hopeful talk of future cooperation. On Thursday, several people offered their thoughts on the decision.

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The Rev. Joseph Son Nguyen, 30, is a priest at St. Boniface Church in Anaheim. He often works as a youth counselor in the Vietnamese community.

“Right now, emotionally, I feel down, so I sympathize with all those who are disappointed. The situation in Vietnam is not the best for my people.

“And emotionally, it will negatively affect those who had hope that the trade embargo would not be lifted unless a new government is in place. But this will be a uniting factor for our community because now we don’t have that point of argument anymore.

“We don’t have to argue if the trade embargo should be lifted or not. Now, we will have to discuss how we can best work with the trade embargo.

“I think this is a great opportunity for us to give more thoughts to our ultimate goals and not get caught up in the political or economic issue of the day.

“Those who are against it now must accept it and they must accept the reality that it is a done deal. What we must discuss is how we must take the best advantage of the present situation--which I’d like to add is not irreversible.

“For many of us our main concern is not to see Vietnam get rich or American businessmen get rich. It’s beyond that. We have two concerns, the moral state and the state of human rights.

“This is only one step in the normalization of relationship with Vietnam. I think we can flood Vietnam with new ideas. We can use this freedom of trade and through the back door, influence it so that it could become freedom of thought.

“We can imprint on every one of the packages that we send there messages of freedom. I’m telling everyone: Don’t give up hope; have more hope.

“We must, given the reality that the trade embargo has been lifted, now use trade on the bargaining table for democracy. We must use it to continue to work, to fight and to ask that dignity be given back to the people of Vietnam, not just money.

“Even if complete normalization should happen, we should still continue to work toward that goal--that human rights be restored to the Vietnamese.”