Vietnamese Gov't continues to pound on it's minorities..
Wednesday April 10, 3:05 PM
Vietnam to send more settlers to restive highlands
A new wave of ethnic Vietnamese settlers is to be sent to the central highlands,
despite protests from local hilltribes there, as the communist authorities seek to
ease population pressure in the Red River delta.
The settlers are to be sent from the delta province of Thai Binh to develop new economic zones and state
farms in the highland provinces of Dak Lak and Kontum, provincial officials said Wednesday.
From now to 2005, Thai Binh plans to resettle 10,000 migrants a year to relieve immense pressure on land in
the province which houses 1.8 million people in an area of just 1,580 square kilometres (632 square miles),
the head of the province's labour and migration department, Bui Dinh Khang, told AFP.
"Some of the migrants will be sent in household groups to establish new economic zones; others will be
single people sent to work for state farms or defence agencies," Khang said.
The provincial authorities have just reached agreement with their counterparts in Kontum on the settlement of
a new economic zone in the highland province, he said.
Dak Lak province already took 100 families from Thai Binh last year and more are due to follow this year.
The central highlands are not the only region in Vietnam to receive settlers from Thai Binh -- migrants have
also been moved to the southern province of Ken Giang, which has a large Khmer minority, and the
northeastern province of Quang Ninh on the Chinese border.
But the scale of migration to the highlands has sparked anger among the region's indigenous hilltribes which
boiled over into a wave of violent protests in February last year, sparking an army crackdown and an exodus
of refugees to Cambodia.
During a foreign ministry tour of the region last year, provincial officials told journalists they would prefer
not to receive any more ethnic Vietnamese settlers, given the delicacy of relations between the two
communities.
Well over a million ethnic Vietnamese settlers have been moved to the central highlands since the end of the
Vietnam War in 1975 as the communist authorities have cleared the region's forests to grow commodity
crops, particularly coffee.
The region's indigenous hilltribes, who have a long history of opposition to the communist authorities, are
now in a minority in all of the highlands' four provinces. |
