Proclamation 4261—National MIA Awareness Day

Over 1,200 Americans are still missing and unaccounted for in Southeast Asia. The bodies of more than 1,100 men who were killed in the same area have never been recovered.

Although the Vietnam Agreement of January 27, 1973, obligates North Vietnam and its allies to account for the missing and to return the remains of those who died, communist authorities have failed to account for our missing, or to return the remains of our dead in the year that has elapsed since the Vietnam Agreement was signed. As a result, the families of our missing men continue to live with the anguish of uncertainty about the fate of their loved ones.

Now, Therefore, I, Richard M. Nixon, President of the United States of America do hereby designate Sunday, January 27, 1974, as National MIA Awareness Day, a day dedicated to the many Americans who remain missing and unaccounted for in Indochina, and to their families. I call upon all Americans to join on this occasion in expressing the clear, continuing commitment of the American people and their Government to seek the fullest possible accounting for Americans missing in Southeast Asia and the return of the remains of those who died. I also call upon State and local officials and private organizations to observe this day with appropriate ceremonies and activities.

In Witness Whereof, I have hereunto set my hand this twenty-fifth day of January, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred seventy-four, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred ninety-eighth.

RICHARD NIXON