07/31/2006, 00.00
VIETNAM - LEBANON
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Lebanon: Hanoi's diplomatic appeal to allow workers to return

by JB Vu

There are 147 Vietnamese working in Lebanon. Poverty forced them to migrate and now they cannot return home. Vietnam has sent a diplomatic appeal to 12 nations, including the US and Germany.

Hanoi (AsiaNews) – The Vietnamese government has sent a diplomatic message to its embassies in 12 countries – including the United States, Canada and Germany – asking them "with urgency to help Vietnamese workers to leave Beirut".

There are 147 Vietnamese workers blocked in Lebanon by clashes between Hezbollah and the Israeli army: most of them work for foreign companies but they have left their families back home.

Their families are very worried because they keep hearing tales of war coming from the Lebanese capital. "I am very afraid because last night, military planes bombed an area very close to my house," Miss Uyen told her relatives by phone. Also from Beirut, a young woman called her family without managing to talk through her tears of terror: she lives there with her 12-year-old son.

A man from Thai Binh province told AsiaNews: "My wife left years ago for Libya to try to earn some money. Some time ago, she moved to Lebanon to work for a family there: with her salary, I am trying to build a house here."

He added: "On the other hand, we had no choice. Here we cannot manage to earn enough to live, let alone to raise a family. I am very worried, but I hope for the best: all the others who have left are like her."

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