Vice President Kamala Harris pushed ahead with a visit to Vietnam on Tuesday after delaying the visit over concerns thanks to a health incident potentially associated with the mysterious Havana syndrome.
Harris arrived within the Southeast Asian country’s capital after a three-hour delay in Singapore that the US Government blamed on reports that somebody in Hanoi may are targeted by the Havana syndrome, a condition of unknown origin with symptoms including dizziness, nausea, migraines and memory lapses.
The incident upstaged a bid by President Joe Biden’s top deputy to woo the allies Washington hopes will help it challenge China’s assertive policy within the region.
Beijing, meanwhile, attempted to stage its own diplomatic coup with a surprise meeting in Vietnam and a donation of two million COVID-19 vaccines to the country.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the Havana syndrome case was reported in Vietnam before Harris’ departure but not confirmed. a security assessment was done before sending Harris to the country, she said.
“The Vice President’s office was made alert to a report of a recent possible anomalous health incident in Hanoi,” the local US Embassy said.
Some 200 US officials and family, including CIA officers, are sickened by “Havana syndrome,” CIA Director William Burns has said.
A US National Academy of Sciences panel in December found that a plausible theory is that “directed energy” beams caused the syndrome, which is so named because it first was reported by American officials based within the U.S. embassy in Cuba in 2016.
The CIA sees a “very strong possibility” that the syndrome is intentionally caused, which Russia may well be responsible, but is withholding definitive conclusions pending further investigation. Moscow denies involvement.
Vietnam Says It Picks No Sides
The incident came as Washington faces icy relations with another global competitor, China.
As Harris’s trip to Vietnam was delayed, Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh held the unannounced meeting with Chinese Ambassador Xiong Bo, during which Chinh said Vietnam doesn’t align itself with one country against the other.
Earlier on Tuesday, Harris had accused Beijing of coercion and intimidation to back claims within the South China Sea, her most pointed comments on China during a visit to geographic region, a vicinity she said is critical to US security.
“The Prime Minister affirmed that Vietnam adheres to an independent, self-reliant, multilateral, and diverse policy and may be a responsible member of the international community,” the Vietnamese government said in an exceedingly statement.
“Vietnam doesn’t align itself with one country against another,” it said.
Territorial disputes within the South China Sea should be settled in step with law of nations and “high-level sense,” it said.
The US administration has called rivalry with China “the biggest geopolitical test” of the century.
“The undeniable fact that China’s ambassador insisted on a gathering with the Vietnamese prime minister shortly before Harris landed shows how anxious Beijing is that its communist neighbor may tilt toward the US,” said Murray Hiebert, a geographical region expert at Washington’s Center for Strategic and International Studies.
During the meeting, Chinh thanked the ambassador for the vaccine donation. it had been not immediately clear which vaccine China had donated.
Vietnam had successfully contained the coronavirus for many of last year but since April has been coping with an oversized COVID-19 outbreak in Ho Chi Minh City, driven by the highly contagious Delta variant of the virus. just below 2% of its 98 million people are fully vaccinated.
