Vietnamese Factions Protest Trade Ban’s End : O.C. rallies: In a show of unity in Little Saigon, marchers assail Clinton, call for human rights in Vietnam.

About 600 demonstrators from rival Vietnamese factions set aside political differences Saturday, uniting to protest President Clinton’s decision to lift the trade embargo against their native land.

Two separate rallies merged in Little Saigon as Vietnamese exiles, young and old, carried banners calling for human rights in Vietnam. Among them were about a dozen veterans of the Vietnam War and relatives of missing U.S. servicemen. All chanted their animosity toward Clinton for what they termed a betrayal of their cause against communism.

“Now is not the time to be frustrated or to give up,” Diem Do, a rally organizer, told the protesters who punctuated his every word with claps and cheers. “The Vietnamese people will carry on with our struggle to restore democracy and human rights to Vietnam. Only in a free and democratic Vietnam can the fate of our missing servicemen be determined.”

Do and about 400 others had gathered in the Vietnamese commercial district on Bolsa Avenue Saturday morning in the exile community’s first collective show of opposition to the end of the trade embargo.

The demonstrators later were joined by 200 others who attended the swearing-in ceremony at the Westminster Civic Center for Ban Binh Bui, the new president of the Vietnamese Community of Southern California.

In his acceptance speech, Bui encouraged the crowd to put aside political differences to continue the fight against communism in their homeland.

His group is an umbrella organization that represents more than 300,000 Vietnamese residents from San Diego to Santa Barbara. Of the 5,000 people who voted in a January election in the organization, 2,273 cast ballots for Bui.

As Bui spoke Saturday, supporters passed around petitions that ask Clinton to demand improved human rights from the Hanoi government before moving toward full diplomatic relations with Vietnam.

Bui extended the olive branch toward his opponents, who had accused him of winning by fraud, and invited them to be on an advisory committee to draft a battle plan against Hanoi.

“We need to attack them instead of reacting to their attacks,” said Bui, a resident of Irvine. “Let’s pull together our knowledge of the Communists to continue our fight.”

He urged those gathered not to think of the lifting of the 19-year-old trade ban as a victory for the Communist nation, but merely as a routine decision by the U.S. government.

He also became the first Vietnamese leader in the community to concede in an official speech that the opening of Vietnam’s trade might benefit its citizens. Previously, leaders have branded as Communist anyone who says the lifting the trade ban would bring a higher standard of living to Vietnam.

“Communist nations that have gone through economic changes also go through political changes,” Bui said. “Their thinking will have to retreat little by little until democracy flourishes in Vietnam.”

In another first in the history of Southern California’s exiled Vietnamese, the new president acknowledged that there are shades of opinions in the community.

Though there is some bickering among expatriates, Bui said, “no one has beat his chest to say that he is a Communist. We are all against communism, but we just have varying views.”

Across town, Bui’s rival in the election, Huu Dinh Vo, had also called for reconciliation as he stood in front the 400 protesters on Bolsa Avenue.

“We need to work together; we need to support each other. For too long, some of us have been unnecessarily fighting among each other,” said Vo, president of the Pomona Vietnamese community and a co-chairman of the Vietnamese Community of the United States.

“It is time for us, the Vietnamese, to work together because we all have the same hope, and that is that one day, our people in Vietnam will be free once more,” he said. “And when that day comes, we will be able to return to our homeland and help rebuild it.”

When the two rallies came together at noon in a peaceful union, traffic on Bolsa Avenue came to a standstill.

People marching on the street carried flags of the former Republic of Vietnam--three red stripes on a yellow background. Others held black flags representing U.S. prisoners of war and those missing in action. Still others carried banners calling for more human rights in Vietnam.

All chanted their anger over the lifting of the embargo. They shouted: “Freedom for Vietnam! Democracy for Vietnam! Human Rights for Vietnam! Freedom! Democracy! Human Rights!”

Motorists honked and waved to the demonstrators. Two American veterans of the Vietnam War, one on crutches, stood at a corner and shook hands with the marchers, who in turn patted the veterans on their backs.

“I can’t believe the world watched Pepsi pass out their cans on the streets of Vietnam right after the embargo was lifted,” said Stewart Resmer of Santa Monica, holding a Coke can as he stood supported by his crutches. “I find that very offensive, totally absurd.”

One marcher, holding a “Clinton Betrayed Us” sign, invited passersby to join the rally.

“We’re on an important mission,” he said. “The Vietnamese need to join each other and fight because we won’t win if we don’t work together.”

Some of the bystanders joined and picked up the chant.

During the Bolsa rally, a parade of speakers bitterly assailed Clinton as a traitor to their cause.

They also encouraged each other not to give up their fight to restore democracy in Vietnam and to have all unanswered POW/MIA questions resolved.

“The lifting of the embargo simply means that we will have to adjust our tactics in a new environment,” said organizer Do.

He and other speakers asked people to boycott “businesses that blatantly ignore the misery of the Vietnamese people and the pain of the MIAs’ families.”

Representatives of POW/MIA groups clasped hands with Vietnamese Americans at the rally, sealing a promise both groups made to work together and do everything possible to prevent the United States from establishing full diplomatic ties with Vietnam.

“Hanoi needs to listen to Americans, and we’re all Americans here,” said Fran Masterson, 60, of Upland. Masterson’s husband was declared missing in action in 1968 in Laos. “We need to tell them: ‘No more lies.’ ”