VUFO President Nguyen Phuong Nga posthumously presents the “For peace and friendship among nations” insignia to late American peace activist Rennie Davis (Photo: VNA) Born on March 23, 1940 in Michigan’s Langsing city, Rennie was one of the leaders of the anti-war movement in the US in the 1960s and 1970s.
In the 1960s, he was one of the founders and leaders of the Students for a Democratic Society and a coordinator and director of the National Mobilization Committee to End War in Vietnam.
He visited the north of Vietnam during the war. In particular, in 1969, as a representative of the peace and students’ movement of America, he arrived in Paris to meet Foreign Minister Nguyen Thi Binh, head of the negotiation delegation of the Provisional Revolutionary Government of Vietnam at the Paris Conference on Vietnam, to introduce an initiative from American students on a Peace Treaty between Vietnam and the American people, which was then signed in late 1970 and announced in January 1971.
He made significant contributions to the friendship and solidarity between the Vietnamese and American people. He passed away on February 2, 2021, at the age of 80.
Addressing the ceremony, Bui Van Nghi, head of the America Department of the VUFO and Secretary General of the Vietnam-US Society, highlighted the imprint that Rennie has left in the minds of people in Vietnam and around the world.
Through the Vietnam-US Society, former Vice President Binh, who could not attend the commemorative ceremony for health reasons, conveyed her sympathies to Rennie’s family. She described him as an excellent leader and organiser of American peace and anti-war movements and a great, loyal, and close friend of the Vietnamese people.
“The sentiments and heritage left by Rennie Davis will be an eternal flame enlightening the trust in the friendly relationship and mutual understanding and respect for peace, cooperation, and development between the people of Vietnam and the US in the present and future,” Binh wrote in a letter sent to the ceremony./.
VNA
