Socialist Republic of Vietnam

HCM CITY — Twenty-one children who departed Viet Nam on the US’s Operation Babylift flights thirty years ago completed their long journeys yesterday when they returned to visit Viet Nam.

Yesterday aftenoon at Tan Son Nhat Airport, Randy Martinez, present World Air Holdings CEO, said that his company was "completing the Operation Babylift story with the return of these special people to their homeland."

Calling this trip Operation Babylift – Homeward Bound, Martinez said that even though these children were raised in America, they were born in Viet Nam and this country "holds a special place in their hearts."

Thirty-year-old Tiana Mykkeltvedt, who previously returned to Viet Nam in 1997 to study in Ha Noi, said that this trip would be more meaningful.

"This time I get to share it with the other adoptees and all the peple who made it possible for me to be here," she said.

Today, the group including some of the crewmembers who flew the Operation Babylift plane, will tour the city, visit the Christina Noble Foundation, which is supporting and sponsoring disadvantaged children, and the Phu My Orphanage. The group will depart again for the US on Friday.

In April 1975, before the impending fall of the Sai Gon Administration, World Airways chief executive officer and founder Edward Daly, who died in 1984, used his company’s and his own planes, which had been used to haul soldiers and weapons to Viet Nam, to bring 57 Vietnamese orphans from Tan Son Nhat Airport to America to be adopted.

World Airways briefly faced sanctions, according to reports in the San Francisco Chronicle, but humanitarian groups working with orphans in Viet Nam were advocating that the American government undertake an emergency evacuation.

Then-US President Gerald Ford announced on April 3, 1975, that Operation Babylift would fly some of the estimated 70,000 orphans out of Viet Nam with US$2 million from a special foreign aid children’s fund.

Thirty flights were planned to evacuate the babies and children, and, eventually about 4,000 Vietnamese children were flown out.

Numbers vary, but it appears that at least 2,000 children were flown to the US and approximately 1,300 children were flown to Canada, Europe and Australia.

Tragically, one of the first official flights of Operation Babylift was struck down by disaster. A C-5A Galaxy plane, at that time the largest airplane in the world, departed with more than 300 children and accompanying adults.

An explosion blew off the rear doors of the giant craft 40 miles out of Sai Gon and 23,000 feet up. Decompression filled the plane with fog and a whirlwind of debris.

Few could get to oxygen masks as the overcrowded aircraft had been prepared for 100 children rather than the 300 passengers who had ultimately boarded update.

Adoption agreement

An agreement was initialed yesterday between the governments of Viet Nam and the United States regarding adoption of children, paving the way for a formal signing next week in Washington, DC.

In the agreement, the two countries agree to facilitate the adoption of orphaned children on humanitarian grounds and for the purposes of child protection.

The agreement also will provide that appropriate measures be taken under the laws of both nations to prevent and deal with instances of abuse involving exploitation of children and infringements on a child’s lawful rights and interests.

Mutual recognition of each country’s laws regarding licensing and oversight of adoption service providers will also be addressed by the agreement.

The agreement reflects both countries’ commitment to the welfare and well-being of children and parents, as well as to a transparent and effective adoption system.

Vu Duc Long, head of Department for International Adoptions in the Ministry of Justice, said the agreement will be officially signed during the upcoming visit to the US of Prime Minister Phan Van Khai.

Viet Nam News, June 16, 2005