UPDATE 1-Pompeo wraps up Asia tour in Vietnam following prisoner release

(Updates with Pompeo tweet on South China Sea in paragraph 14)
By James Pearson
HANOI, Oct 30 (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo wound up a visit to Asia in Vietnam on Friday after a
tour marked by his repeated calls for help for the United States
in confronting security threats posed by China.
Vietnam, which also shares concern about an increasingly
assertive China, was a late addition to the trip that included
Sri Lanka, India, the Maldives and Indonesia.
"We look forward to continuing to work together to build on
our relationship and to make the region — throughout Southeast
Asia, Asia and the Indo-Pacific — safe and peaceful and
prosperous," said Pompeo, who greeted Vietnamese Prime Minister
Nguyen Xuan Phuc with an elbow bump before their meeting.
Phuc said he sought "sincere cooperation" in support of a
peaceful region and progress in trade and investment ties.
While there was no public mention of China on Friday, Pompeo
has urged Southeast Asian countries to stand up to its bullying
and to reassess business deals with its state firms.
While in Sri Lanka on Wednesday, Pompeo said the Chinese
Communist Party was operating as a "predator". In India the day
before, he called for cooperation in confronting what he called
Chinese threats to security and freedom in the region.
China has said the United States should stop its unprovoked
accusations and attacks.
The main concern in Vietnam is China's claims in the South
China Sea.
China's U-shaped "nine-dash line" on its maps marks a vast
expanse of the sea it claims, including swathes of Vietnam's
continental shelf where it has awarded oil concessions and where
Chinese and Vietnamese ships have in recent years been embroiled
in months-long standoffs.
Pompeo's trip came as Vietnam and the United States mark the
25th anniversary of the normalising of diplomatic ties. But it
also came a week after Hanoi released a Vietnamese-born U.S.
citizen sentenced to 12 years in jail for "attempting to
overthrow the state".
Hours before Pompeo's arrival, Vietnam's foreign ministry
released a statement saying the man, Michael Nguyen, who
returned to his home in California last week, was released for
humanitarian reasons. The statement made no reference to Nguyen's account of his
arrest and interrogation, including his claim in a news
conference on Wednesday that he had been kidnapped. Pompeo on Friday met Vietnam's Minister of Public Security
To Lam, whose office is in charge of domestic security and
tracking dissidents in the communist-ruled country.
After the meeting, Pompeo said in a tweet that he and To Lam
had discussed the South China Sea and Mekong region.
Bitter enemies during the U.S.-Vietnam War, Hanoi and
Washington have enjoyed significantly warmer relations in recent
years.
But there have some trade tensions of late, with the U.S.
Trade Representative confirming in August that it was
investigating whether Vietnam had been undervaluing its dong
currency and harming U.S. commerce.
Prime Minister Phuc this week called on President Donald
Trump to have "a more objective assessment of the reality in
Vietnam" with regards to the trade imbalance.