US & Vietnam Sign Trade Pact

An article in the New York Times on Wednesday, May 31 stated that the two countries have decided to knock down trade barriers that remained. This new trade agreement would allow for American companies to gain greater access to Southeast Asia's market; it also allows for Vietnam to become part of the global trading body before the country hosts the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Hanoi in November 2006, which President George W. Bush is supposed to attend.

The agreement's ceremony was held at the Reunification Palace. Thirty years prior to the creation of the new trade pact, Communist tanks barreled through the Reunification Palace in order to successfully end the Vietnam War. Now, rather than a symbol of war, the Reunification Palace has become a symbol of peace.