Fourth. The bombing is clearly the most compelling reason for moving. A second refugee report. apparently taken about the same time covered 97 refugees from Luang Prabang and Sam Neua Provinces. A complete copy of that report is found at pp. 1634316344 of the The second report showed a lesser percentage of people who had been bombed. 69 percent said they had seen bombs dropped frequently. 25 percent had seen people killed by bombing. 32 of the 97 people interviewed said the bombing made life very difficult for them80 percent of this group saying they could not eke out more than a bare subsistence living after the attacks started. Thus far. then. the evidence from two Government reports. plus the testimony of an exAID officer confirms that bombing of civilians occurred in at least six of the provinces of Northern Laos. The statements of the 16 refugees from seven villages in Xieng Khouang Province interviewed by Congressman WALDIE and myself last April admittedly does little more than confirm the accuracy of the USIS report about one province. Xieng Khouang. Nevertheless. that testimony squarely contradicts Ambassador Sullivans statement on April 21. 1971. thatTheir villages were hit both by ground operations and then. later on. when they were out of them. apparently their villages were damaged by bombing. The refugees with who Congressman WALDIE and I talked were unanimous in stating that their villages were destroyed before they left the area. They showed us wounds from cluster bombCBUshrapnel and white phosphorous. In all but one of the seven villages. people had been killed. In all of the villages. every house had been destroyed. The State Departments own report of the Xieng Khouang province refugees confirms that the villages were bombed when the villagers still lived in them. The first interview appended to the report quotes Thao Vilay. a 25yearold from the village of Kan Phoun. He was quoted as follows: I saw planes come to attack my village in 1965 for the first time. the village come under attack many times in 196869. resulting in 5 killed and 3 wounded.
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refugee refugees