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GV: Vietnamese Embassy in Paris and sign (2 shots)
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LV INTERIOR: Vietnamese Ambassador Vo Van Sung at Press Conference.
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CU: photographs of dead Vietnamese on display (4 shots)
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CU: Ambassador Sung speaking in French Stands and points to map then returns to seat as newsmen take photographs (3 shots)
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According to Reuter News agency, Vietnam has won its border war with Cambodia, Quoting diplomatic sources in Singapore, Reuter said that the Vietnamese with a force superior in men and equipment had virtually wiped out Cambodian forces along the border. Cambodia has accused Hanoi of seeking to force it into a Vietnam dominated Indochina Federation.




Initials RH/1725



Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: The Ambassador of Vietnam in France, Mr Vo Van Sung appealed on Friday (13 January) to all friendly countries to help solve the current border dispute between Cambodia and Vietnam which led to the breaking of diplomatic relations between the two Indo-Chinese countries. Cambodia has said it will not negotiate until all Vietnamese troops withdraw from its territory.

SYNOPSIS: On Friday, Mr Vo Van Sung gave a news conference in Paris to put his country's position to newsmen. The news conference was told that when full scale fighting between the two countries broke out three weeks earlier, Cambodian troops attacked the village of Tan Lap 15 kilometres inside Vietnam and killed its 463 inhabitants-more than half of whom were women and children.

Mr Sung declined to give a direct answer on whether Vietnamese troops were in Cambodia but said Vietnam was not occupying Cambodian territory. He maintained that the Vietnamese Armed forces had not occupied one inch of Cambodian Territory. He did not have any information regarding the preceding few days but it was known, he said, that Cambodian units at battalion level were still in Vietnamese territory on January the 7th. Vietnam had asked, and were still asking for Cambodia to immediately withdraw its units still in Vietnam.

Mr Sung said Vietnam was calling on the people of Cambodia, and to the authorities of Cambodia, to start immediate negotiations at any level to solve the frontier problem and restore neighbourly relations between the two peoples. Negotiations were needed to restore also the brotherly solidarity established by the two peoples during the long years of struggle for the freedom and independence of both countries.