Americans Southeast Asia

A Senate committee investigating the fate of soldiers missing from the Vietnam War received a closed-door briefing from intelligence officials Friday on a covert mission into Laos that the CIA sponsored in 1981 to search for American POWs. More than a decade later, the CIA still refuses to acknowledge publicly any connection with the mission, whose details remain classified. But former National Security Adviser Richard V.

Eighteen foreign activists, including six Americans, were ordered deported Friday after being sentenced to five years of hard labor for handing out pro-democracy leaflets. Moments after a judge sentenced the activists to hard labor, an official from the Ministry of Home Affairs read an order suspending the sentences and saying the activists would be deported today from Myanmar, formerly Burma.

On a desolate beach buffeted by winds from the South China Sea, a team of American experts in surfer shorts and Vietnamese workers in straw hats struggled to remove the powdery brown sand from an immense hole. Sweating profusely, the Americans heaved spadefuls of the talcum-like sand into buckets, which were passed along a line of chanting Vietnamese. A gust of wind blew without warning, sending an eddy of sand back into the hole despite a retaining wall improvised from wooden planks.

A court here Thursday rejected an American teen-ager's appeal against a sentence of flogging for spray-painting cars, saying he had pursued a "calculated course of criminal conduct." Without a trace of emotion, Michael Fay, 18, of Dayton, Ohio, was led from the high court by police to begin serving a four-month jail term in the case, which has attracted worldwide attention because of the flogging. Marco Chan, Fay's stepfather, left the court without comment.

American MIA activists dropped into the Mekong River dozens of packets of cash stamped with an offer of $2.4 million for anyone bringing a U.S. prisoner of war safely out of Laos. Earlier, two of the activists were arrested in Laos. About 540 American servicemen are listed as missing in action in Laos after the Vietnam War. U.S. officials say they have no proof that any of the nearly 2,400 Americans missing in Indochina, including those in Laos, are still alive.

Two photos purporting to show an American soldier being held prisoner in Southeast Asia were turned over Friday to the Defense Intelligence Agency by a local Vietnam veterans group that earlier this summer unearthed similar photos of alleged prisoners of war. Bob Kukak, spokesman for the 15-member Vietnam War Veterans of Southern California, said he is skeptical of the latest pictures, which were passed to his group through a network originating in Thailand.

A group of Americans announced a plan to pay $1 million to citizens of Vietnam, Laos or Cambodia for the return of any living U.S. serviceman listed as missing in action after the Vietnam War. The POW Policy Center of the American Defense Institute announced the plan in Charlotte, N.C. The reward will be paid only to a citizen of those countries "who frees an American POW and returns him to a U.S. official at a U.S.

After her son's plane was shot down over Laos on Valentine's Day in 1969, Gladys Fleckenstein began a search that would take her to Paris, Geneva and Laos. Her quest ended Thursday in a Senate hearing room before members of the Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs. "This is the end of my journey for my son.

The Department of Defense acknowledged Friday that a set of bones said by the Vietnamese government to be remains of Air Force Col. John L. Robertson were "non-human mammal remains." But as he confirmed statements made by Robertson's Santa Ana family Friday, Cmdr. Ned Lundquist, a Pentagon spokesman who specializes in POW-MIA affairs, also said military researchers still believe the flier was killed when his F-4C crashed nearly 25 years ago in North Vietnam.

Given new hope by a photograph they claim proves he is still alive, the family of an American pilot presumed killed during the Vietnam War on Thursday disputed Vietnamese claims that his remains had been returned to U.S. authorities in April, 1990. The daughter of long-missing Air Force Col. John L.

A Senate committee investigating the fate of soldiers missing from the Vietnam War received a closed-door briefing from intelligence officials Friday on a covert mission into Laos that the CIA sponsored in 1981 to search for American POWs. More than a decade later, the CIA still refuses to acknowledge publicly any connection with the mission, whose details remain classified. But former National Security Adviser Richard V.

Soldiers who deserted during the Vietnam War may account for a number of sightings of Americans in Indochina after prisoners of war were returned in 1973, a U.S. senator said Sunday. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said at a news conference that there was evidence of "a significant enough number" of deserters to take into account when evaluating reports of sightings.

On a desolate beach buffeted by winds from the South China Sea, a team of American experts in surfer shorts and Vietnamese workers in straw hats struggled to remove the powdery brown sand from an immense hole. Sweating profusely, the Americans heaved spadefuls of the talcum-like sand into buckets, which were passed along a line of chanting Vietnamese. A gust of wind blew without warning, sending an eddy of sand back into the hole despite a retaining wall improvised from wooden planks.

After her son's plane was shot down over Laos on Valentine's Day in 1969, Gladys Fleckenstein began a search that would take her to Paris, Geneva and Laos. Her quest ended Thursday in a Senate hearing room before members of the Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs. "This is the end of my journey for my son.

Two photos purporting to show an American soldier being held prisoner in Southeast Asia were turned over Friday to the Defense Intelligence Agency by a local Vietnam veterans group that earlier this summer unearthed similar photos of alleged prisoners of war. Bob Kukak, spokesman for the 15-member Vietnam War Veterans of Southern California, said he is skeptical of the latest pictures, which were passed to his group through a network originating in Thailand.

The Department of Defense acknowledged Friday that a set of bones said by the Vietnamese government to be remains of Air Force Col. John L. Robertson were "non-human mammal remains." But as he confirmed statements made by Robertson's Santa Ana family Friday, Cmdr. Ned Lundquist, a Pentagon spokesman who specializes in POW-MIA affairs, also said military researchers still believe the flier was killed when his F-4C crashed nearly 25 years ago in North Vietnam.

Soldiers who deserted during the Vietnam War may account for a number of sightings of Americans in Indochina after prisoners of war were returned in 1973, a U.S. senator said Sunday. Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) said at a news conference that there was evidence of "a significant enough number" of deserters to take into account when evaluating reports of sightings.

In the trade, the potent marijuana produced here is called 'Thai stick," but it could be labeled "Made in the U.S.A." "American marijuana dealers come over to Thailand, provide money, provide seeds, provide fertilizer and induce Thai farmers to produce marijuana," said a Western narcotics official. "They provide modern, efficient packing materials, including plastic wrapping and presses. They guarantee the farmer a market."

Given new hope by a photograph they claim proves he is still alive, the family of an American pilot presumed killed during the Vietnam War on Thursday disputed Vietnamese claims that his remains had been returned to U.S. authorities in April, 1990. The daughter of long-missing Air Force Col. John L.

American MIA activists dropped into the Mekong River dozens of packets of cash stamped with an offer of $2.4 million for anyone bringing a U.S. prisoner of war safely out of Laos. Earlier, two of the activists were arrested in Laos. About 540 American servicemen are listed as missing in action in Laos after the Vietnam War. U.S. officials say they have no proof that any of the nearly 2,400 Americans missing in Indochina, including those in Laos, are still alive.