THE United States had a secret MIA office in Hong Kong until this weekend, the Sunday Morning Post has learned.
The office, responsible for interviewing witnesses in the Vietnamese camps, has been relocated to Bangkok.
The move comes despite the territory's Vietnamese having proved a valuable source of information leading to the identification and return of a number of remains to their families.
The northern Vietnamese are regarded as a better source of knowledge because most planes were shot down there and the people seem to have better memories - perhaps because they suffered more.
Some of the camp people were children at the time and can remember watching their fathers and villagers shooting at aircraft from the jungle.
Amazingly, they can recall exactly where the planes fell and have provided detailed directions 20 or 30 years later.