Vietnam's communist government is still clashing with a minority group, a group that opposed it during the long war against the United States. Ethnic Montagnards supported US troops and afterwards some resettled in the US, but most stayed in Vietnam. And Montagnard demonstrators battled police in the country's central highlands last April. Human rights groups say at least 10 people were killed, though the central government put the death toll at two. NPR's Michael Sullivan has now visited the area, accompanied by Vietnamese officials.

(Soundbite from a National Day celebration in Vietnam)

MICHAEL SULLIVAN reporting:

National Day celebrations earlier this month, in a small ethnic Montagnard village just outside Pleiku. Pleiku is a name familiar to many US veterans, a staging area for US forces during the war and for their ethnic Montagnard allies recruited to help fight the communists.

(Sound bite from a National Day celebration in Vietnam)

SULLIVAN: Ethnic Montagnards in blue and red tribal dress perform for local officials and a small foreign delegation brought to see a Montagnard village up close. Most of those interviewed, mindful of the plainclothes police in the crowd, are careful to say they are doing well. But not everyone is on message. `I don't have enough money to live,' says one sullen young man, `and neither do many of my neighbors, because those people came and took our land.' Those people are the king, the ethnic majority in Vietnam, most brought to the highlands by a government eager to exploit this fertile and sparsely populated land.

(Soundbite of movement through a field of crops)

SULLIVAN: Coffee is a major crop here and coffee exports a rich source of foreign exchange. At the 7,000-acre state-run Yasow(ph) coffee plantation, a woman named Bow(ph) stoops to clear weeds from the base of a coffee plant.

BOW (Pla! ntation Worker): (Vietnamese spoken)

SULLIVAN: `I came here a lmost 20 years ago,' she says, `because there's more opportunity here. It's easier to make a living here than in my native province Thai Binh. Tum Tadzong(ph) is the chairman of the Gai Lai Province People's Committee.

Mr. TUM TADZONG (Chairman, Gai Lai Province People's Committee): (Through Translator) With a potential here in the mountain land, we need between one and a half or two million people to use the land effectively. We tried to make sure that the minority people here have enough land for cultivation. Then for the remaining land, we migrate people from other areas, which like land to come here.

SULLIVAN: But many Montagnards, like the young man in the village, see the migrants' success coming at the minority Montagnards' expense. Land is one contentious issue here. Religion is another.

(Soundbite of people singing)

SULLIVAN: Many Montagnards are Christians, their religion brought here by French and Portuguese missionaries in the 16th century. This Catholic church just outside Pleiku is government-approved. But those who attend churches that are not government-sanctioned are subject to harassment or sometimes far worse by local authorities. Protestants fare worse than Catholics, and even those churches sanctioned by the government are tightly controlled, their numbers limited. Influential exiled groups in the US, like the North Carolina-based Montagnard Foundation, accused the government of a deliberate policy of religious and political persecution. Others say the problem is more complex.

Mr. FRANK JANNUZI (East Asia Staffer, US Senate Foreign Relations Committee): You have, in the highlands, a really volatile combination, almost a perfect storm.

SULLIVAN: Frank Jannuzi is East Asia staffer for the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee. The Vietnamese government organized his recent trip to Pleiku.

Mr. JANNUZI: You have the fact that the Montagnards practice a faith that many Vietnamese find suspicious and to be foreign-influenced. You have the fact that the Montagnards inhabit a land that is underpopulated by Vietnamese standards and therefore rich for exploitation. You have the fact that the Montagnard do not have the same educational background and experience, all of which make for a very difficult relationship between the native population and the migrating Vietnamese population.

SULLIVAN: Even before the April violence, the government knew it had a problem, a problem that outside forces like the Montagnard Foundation undoubtedly exploit, but one those forces did not create. Winn Viha(ph) is vice chairman of the Central Highlands Development Committee. He says the government is trying to close the gap between the indigenous Montagnards and the migrants by reallocating some of the land previously given to state-owned plantations and factories. But that, he says, is only a temporary solution.

Mr. WINN VIHA (Vice Chairman, Central Highlands Development Committee): (Through Translator) Even if they're provided enough land to cultivate now, if they have several children and those children, if inheriting a portion of the land, soon they will lack sufficient land once again. So basically, we need to resolve the employment problem from minority people. We need to help them to move into our industries, not just in our country.

SULLIVAN: But many Montagnards are reluctant to abandon their traditional way of life, and even those who are willing face obstacles. The Hoang Anh Company is Pleiku's largest private employer. Its furniture and granite factories employ more than 3,000 people, and business is so good that its owner, Dwon Winn Dook(ph), has bankrolled Vietnam's most successful soccer team, which practices on a well-manicured field behind one of the factories. Of his 3,000 employees, fewer than 500 are Montagnards, Dook says, even though the government offers him some incentives to make minority hires.

Mr. DWON WINN DOOK (Owner, Hoang Anh Company): (Through Translator) If we hire minority people, then the provincial government pays for their training. Minority people's ability is not as good as the ethnic people. But in our factories, we have many jobs that do not require skilled laborers, so we offer the minorities these jobs.

SULLIVAN: Perceptions like these help fuel ethnic prejudice. And as long as the Montagnards remain an underclass without access to better jobs or a stake in the highlands economic development, the tension between them and the ethnic Vietnamese majority will remain, as will the potential for another violent confrontation like the one in April. Senate Foreign Relations Committee staffer Frank Jannuzi.

Mr. JANNUZI: The fact that the people of the highlands are experiencing persecution and discrimination is undeniable. And involvement of outside forces in helping to spark the unrest of April should not be used to hide the fact that the Vietnamese government really does face a very important development challenge in the highlands.

SULLIVAN: Jannuzi says he's encouraged by what he sees as a new sincere commitment on the part of the leadership in Hanoi to allow more economic and political space for the Montagnards, though it's unclear whether that commitment will be reflected at the local level. Such a move would be welcome not only by the Montagnards but by foreign governments and human rights groups critical of Hanoi's handling of the highlands. It would also encourage more foreign investment in the region and the country as a whole, a fact not lost on the government in Hanoi.

Michael Sullivan, NPR News.

INSKEEP: It's 29 minutes past the hour.

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