Vietnam’s Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Thanh Son (L) meets US Representative Joseph Cao Quang Anh

The first Vietnamese-American elected to the US House of Representatives has returned to Vietnam in what he called a bid to increase understanding between the Vietnamese community in the US and Vietnamese back home.

Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Nguyen Thanh Son said Vietnam wanted to build a bridge with the Vietnamese overseas community, many of whom have made significant contributions to US society, such as congressman Cao.

The deputy minister mentioned the possibility of sending a mission from the State Committee for Overseas Vietnamese to meet with members of the Vietnamese community in the US who still “do not possess a full and clear picture” about Vietnam.

Cao, who left Vietnam in 1975 at the age of eight, now represents a district in New Orleans that has traditionally voted democratic. Cao was the first republican elected in the district since 1890 and is the first and only Vietnamese American to serve in Congress.

He began his political career helping Vietnamese-American victims of hurricane Katrina after an embarrassingly inadequate response by the country’s Federal Emergency Management Agency.

Source: Reuters