US citizens to go on trial Nov 10 in Vietnam

HANOI, Nov 7 (Reuters) Three Vietnamese-born US citizens charged with plotting against the communist government will go on trial on Friday, days before Hanoi hosts its biggest international event and US President George W Bush.

The official Vietnam News Agency said yesterday night that the trial in Ho Chi Minh City People's Court would include an Orlando, Florida resident whose detention has complicated the US Congress passing a bill to grant Vietnam permanent normal trade relations status.

A total of seven people -- three US citizens, one US resident and three Vietnamese living in Vietnam -- were charged last week with ''terrorist activities'' against the one-party Vietnam government.

An official statement linked the seven to a Vietnamese-born resident of the United States, Nguyen Huu Chanh, who has been suspected in recent years of plotting to bomb Vietnamese embassies. He is detained in South Korea while Hanoi pursues his extradition.

Vietnam hosts the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum leaders' week November 12-19, including presidents and prime ministers from APEC's 21 members. Separately, Bush and the leaders of China, Japan, Russia and Chile are scheduled to make state visits.

One of the defendants, Nguyen Thuong Cuc, 58, who goes by the name of Thuong Nguyen Foshee in the United States, has close ties with Bush's Republican Party in Florida.

US Sen. Mel Martinez, a Florida Republican, has linked her release to passage of a bill granting Vietnam permanent normal trade relations status. Foshee's daughter Liz McCausland said that while her mother was a pro-democracy activist, Foshee was not plotting against the government.

A State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Washington was working closely with Hanoi on the case. The U.S. Embassy in Hanoi said consular officials had visited all three U.S.

citizens, who are detained in Ho Chi Minh City.

Washington and Hanoi signed a trade deal on May 31 that helped Vietnam toward accession to the World Trade Organization, expected later today in Geneva.

Vietnam is the fastest-growing market for US goods in Asia and the two countries have built a friendship mainly through business ties since restoring diplomatic relations in 1995, 20 years after the end of the US war in Vietnam.

REUTERS BDP HS0955