The cover of the book (Photo: The Gioi Publishing House)Hanoi (VNA) - The The Gioi (World) Publishing House has recently released a book in French,featuring memoirs of Vo Van Sung, a former Vietnamese ambassador in France, andimages of Paris during Vietnam’s struggle for the reunification of the country in1975.
The book,titled “La Campagne Ho Chi Minhau cœur de Paris" (The Ho Chi Minh Campaign in the Heart of Paris)by translator Nguyen Dac Nhu Mai, is part of the celebration of the 45thanniversary of Vietnam’s independence and national reunification.
Its content is basedon the original text of the memoir by former Vietnamese Ambassador VoVan Sung first published in Vietnamese in 2005 on the occasion ofthe 30th anniversary of the Ho Chi Minh Campaign which liberated the southof Vietnam, paving the way for the country’s independence and unity after 20years of being separated.
Its author – theveteran diplomat Vo Van Sung (1928-2018) – was a member of the Vietnamese delegation in the secret negotiation between general Le Duc Tho and Americanpolitician Henry Kissinger, which resulted in the Paris Peace Accords. He was also the first ambassador of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam in France atthat time.
Not only a witness tohistory and one of the leading Vietnamese experts knowledgeable in modernVietnam-France relations, Sung is also a key figure contributing to cause thewave from April to May 1975 in Paris and across Europe in responding tothe Ho Chi Minh Campaign and congratulating Vietnam for the country’s victory.
According to theformer ambassador, the name of the book is a tribute to thecreative, vibrant and responsible activities of Vietnamese diplomaticrepresentatives and of the overseas Vietnamese in France that havesignificantly contributed to the independence and unity of the nation. Hecalled it the diplomatic front, which coordinated with the political andmilitary fronts in Vietnam to become the three factors constituting therighteous power of Vietnam’s resistance.
“La Campagne Ho Chi Minh au cœur de Paris” is also atribute to international friends for their perseverance and enthusiasm in supportingthe struggle of the Vietnamese people.
Among them arethe French Communist Party as the loyal friend of Nguyen Ai Quoc-Ho Chi Minh;French friends of various backgrounds, political views, and politiciansfollowing French General De Gaulle's policy of opposing the American war inIndochina as well as many international friends in Western Europe and Americawho have been wholeheartedly and silently supporting Vietnam in the specialhistoric turning point.
With a condensed andstraightforward writing style, the memoir is not only a rare historicaldocument about Vietnamese people, the movements of overseas Vietnamese inFrance and international friends after the signing of the Paris Peace Accordsfrom 1973 to 1975 but also the record of the feelings of overseas Vietnamesepeople and the sincere friendship between international friends and Vietnam.
The memoirs werefirst published by the Quan doiNhan Dan (People's Army) Publishing House in 2005 in commemoratingthe 30th anniversary of Ho Chi Minh Campaign's victory, and then reprintedtwice in 2012 and 2015./.
VNA
