Dear Editor:

I am delighted at the news that Hun Sen's government has

agreed to a US Government humanitarian offer to accept some 900 Montagnard

refugees from Vietnam who had crossed the border into Cambodia, but whose

voluntary repatriation into Vietnam the UNHCR had subsequently refused to

facilitate, accusing both the Vietnamese and Cambodian Governments of violating

their accords with UNHCR on this matter. (By the way, I wish that Australia had

offered to take some of these Montagnard refugees). But am I being paranoid, or

was this-before the US Government's timely humanitarian decision - another

example of the UN system trying to wrong-foot Cambodia and to leave it in a

situation in which it would again be accused by the world of violating human

rights (and, for good measure, acting at the behest of Vietnam) ?

If this

is becoming a pattern of UN and UN agency behaviour towards Cambodia under Kofi

Annan, when is someone going to call Annan's bluff? Does the UN have nothing

better to do than to bully Cambodia?

- Tony Kevin, Canberra, Australia