Trump-Kim détente talks give Hanoi couple hope

A handkerchief, illicit letters and secret visits – the first three decades of love between a Vietnamese man and his North Korean sweetheart were counted out in stolen moments and small tokens of devotion. But now this love story is being lauded as an example of the two countries’ amity in the lead-up to this month’s much anticipated second summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Hanoi.

Vietnam is thrilled to be hosting the high-profile event in Hanoi. But for the couple, their hopes for peace on the Korean peninsula also carry personal motivations.

“I wish we can go back for visits more easily,” 69-year-old Vietnamese Pham Van Canh told AFP.

He first met his future wife Ri Yong Hui in 1971 at a Pyongyang fertiliser factory, where she was working. Canh was one of hundreds of Vietnamese sent to fellow communist nation North Korea to study how their country could rebuild after the devastating war with the US.

His first token of affection was a handkerchief. When Canh had to return to Vietnam in 1973, the couple correspended secretly.

“We were in love and she had even told me to die together, to commit suicide. But I told her, ‘We are in love, why die? Wait for me and I will come back’.”

As the years ticked by, he kept an eye on the two countries’ relationship, as Vietnam’s economy outpaced North Korea. He also appealed to Vietnam’s Foreign Ministry, who brought the couple up in bilateral talks to their North Korean counterparts as “a humanitarian matter”, he said.

Then in 2002, he was allowed to return to Pyongyang to hold a small wedding ceremony and take Ri back to Hanoi on the condition she remained a North Korean citizen.

Today, 70-year-old Ri says she has a good life in Hanoi where she lives with Canh in a modest apartment. But the couple have managed to visit Pyongyang only three times because of its isolation.

“I always have my homeland on my mind,” she said.

I told her, ‘we are in love, why die? Wait for me and I will come back’