VIETNAM REVIEW

News

Commentary

Research paper

For the U.S. Congress - Professional Staff and Legislative Assistants for Foreign Policies and Concerned Citizens

Date: September 1, 2004

1. Vietnam To Suspend Migration To Central Highlands     

2. Vietnam’s Socio-Political Stability Keeps Foreign Investors

3. U.S. grants asylum to 69 Vietnamese refugees; 22 to leave Wednesday

4. Vietnam  High Cost Of Lifelong Commitment To Human Rights

5. Distress, Harassment Continue for Vietnam’s Montagnards

6. Vietnamese Asylum-Seekers Rescued From Cambodian Jungle

7. Vietnam Adopts International Copyright Laws

8. Deadly Spectre Of Bird Flu Returns With Three Deaths In Vietnam

9. In Vietnam Today

10. Vietnam Urged to Liberate Its Press in Anti-Corruption Fight

11. USCIRF Press Release:Commission Calls for Prompt CPC Designations             

12. Vietnam Repression Continues

13. Vietnam To Set Up Special Force To Police Internet

14. Health: Little Spending on Healthcare in Vietnam

15. Vietnam Expands Economic Ties To ASEAN Members

16. Years Of Persecution For Their Difference

17. Thousands Show Support For Agent Orange Victims

18. Outcry At Jailing Of Vietnamese Dissident

19. Last Vietnamese Montagnard Refugees Airlifted Into Cambodian Capital                 

20. Vietnam: Elderly Dissidents Convicted

21. Vietnam Jails Veteran Dissident

22. Vietnam, Laos Share Corruption Concern

23. Vietnam - High-ranking VCP Veteran denounces powers of Hanoi’s secret  services

24. U.S. And Vietnam Strengthen Economic And Military Ties

25. Testimony Before The East Asian And Pacific Affairs Subcommittee Of  The Senate Foreign Relations Committee

 Vietnamese American Concerned Citizens (VACC)

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                    Contact: Khai Q. Nguyen

Vietnam To Suspend Migration To Central Highlands

Dow Jones Newswires

August 20, 2004 5:05 a.m.

HANOI (AP)--Vietnam will suspend government-sponsored resettlement in the Central Highlands following massive uprisings by ethnic minority groups protesting the confiscation of their ancestral lands, state-controlled media reported Friday.

Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung said the government will temporarily stop sending people to resettle in new economic zones in the Central Highlands, and will work to slow free migrations to the area rich in coffee plantations, the Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper said.

The Central Highlands - mostly populated by ethnic minorities who are collectively called Montagnards - has witnessed a mass migration of lowland Vietnamese to the area since the end of the Vietnam War in 1975.

Thousands of Montagnards, many of them Christians, took to the streets in Daklak and Gia Lai provinces over Easter weekend to protest government restrictions on their Protestant faith and land rights.

International rights groups allege at least 10 protesters were killed in clashes with police, but Hanoi said only two died after being pelted with rocks from other demonstrators.

In February 2001, tens of thousands of Montagnards held similar protests. About 1,000 were resettled in the U.S. after fleeing to Cambodia.

At the two-day meeting in the Central Highlands resort town of Dalat, the deputy prime minister also instructed provincial government leaders to help provide the Montagnards with farm land and housing along with job training, the newspaper said.

Vietnam’s Socio-Political Stability Keeps Foreign Investors

HANOI, Aug 19 Asia Pulse –

One of the concerns of foreign investors in Vietnam is the socio-political situation, which Vietnam has kept stable over the past years, said Low Sin Leng, Chairman of the Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park.

Low spoke with reporters about the success of Vietnam-Singapore cooperation on the sidelines of the two-day forum, "Investing in Vietnam: Insights, Strategies and Prospects" which opened in Hanoi on Tuesday.

She said Vietnamese leaders are supportive of foreign investors and are determined to solve their problems.

"Having invested in Vietnam for almost eight years, our Vietnam-Singapore IP is a successful one in Binh Duong province. One of our key jobs is international marketing, which means, persuading investors to come and invest in our park. By doing so, we have contributed to the investment environment in Binh Duong province and Vietnam as a whole."

Low said investors in her park appreciate Vietnam's competitiveness, including low labour cost and efficient and productive workers.

"Vietnam's labour cost is low compared to other emerging economies but more should be done in terms of professional upgrading, which I think, the Vietnamese government is well aware of."

"The costs of infrastructure, however, including power, water supply and waste treatment, will decide the total logistical costs of production, which is an important consideration. So, Vietnam should continue to be proactive in making it easier for investors to come and invest in Vietnam given the global competition, in which investors are wooed by many countries."

Low's comments on Vietnam's labour market were echoed by Wong Chee Choy, General Manager of Keppel Communications, a subsidiary of Keppel Corporation - the forum's main sponsor. He added, "Vietnam's labour is of a good quality. Vietnam is an open market for investors like us, a communications service provider."

"Having listened to Prime Minister Phan Van Khai's presentation today, I think the Vietnamese government is determined to open the market and level the playing field," said Wong, whose company has a project in Ho Chi Minh City.

Unlike Low and Wong, Aikhong Tan, visited Vietnam for the first time, attending the forum as part of his attempts to look for business opportunities here.

"Before coming to Vietnam, I studied Vietnam's investment environment very carefully. I think there are positive signs for business here. It seems there are a lot of attractions in Vietnam."

"From the forum, I heard about business opportunities in Vietnam and I think investors are optimistic about the country's future," Tan said.

Tan's Rendezvous hotel chain has branches in Singapore, China and Australia. He interpreted the investor’s positive attitude towards the investment environment as an opportunity for his group to put stakes in Vietnam.

"There will be more business travelers to the country as your country is developing. Therefore, we want to work with Vietnamese partners to build hotels in Hanoi or HCM City.

"Singapore has experience in tourism because we have developed it for many years. I hope to see our cooperation in this respect so that when Western visitors come to one place they will come to others in the region.

"I also see in Vietnam a high quality service industry, the people are very friendly."

U.S. grants asylum to 69 Vietnamese refugees; 22 to leave Wednesday

Associated Press

August 18, 2004 Wednesday 9:21 AM Eastern Time

Byline: Miranda Leitsinger; Associated Press Writer

Dateline: Phnom Penh, Cambodia

Twenty-two Vietnamese who took shelter in neighboring Cambodia after a government crackdown were to fly to the United States later Wednesday after being granted asylum there, a U.N. official said.

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security in June granted asylum to 69 hilltribe people, collectively known as Montagnards, an official at the U.S. Embassy in Bangkok said Wednesday on condition of anonymity. A total of 41 were scheduled to leave this month.

It was not immediately clear if any of the remaining 28 had already traveled to the United States, or if they remained, when they would go.

Cathy Shin, a protection officer for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, said the 22 would leave Cambodia on Wednesday night. Many will go to the state of North Carolina.

Many Montagnards fled Vietnam's Central Highlands for Cambodia following mass demonstrations in April against religious repression and land confiscation during which security forces clashed with protesters.

Human rights groups say at least 10 people were killed and dozens wounded in the violence. Authorities maintain two died.

The 22 Vietnamese refugees going to the United States on Wednesday arrived independently at U.N. offices in the capital, Phnom Penh, where they have been for several months, Shin said.

Cambodia's government described the Montagnards earlier this year as economic migrants and reportedly has deported more than 100 of them.

But following criticism from human rights groups, Prime Minister Hun Sen said last month he would let the UNHCR reopen its offices in two border provinces to Montagnards seeking asylum.

Many Montagnards were U.S. allies against the communists during the Vietnam War and a number were resettled in the United States after the war ended in 1975.

More than 1,000 Montagnards, mainly members of the Protestant Christian denominations distrusted by Vietnam, fled the highlands in 2001 following a massive crackdown on their protests over the same issues. About 900 were resettled in the United States.

Many Montagnards are Christian, while Vietnam is predominantly Buddhist.

Vietnam  High Cost Of Lifelong Commitment To Human Rights

Amnesty International

press release, 08/18/2004

Dr Nguyen Dan Que, a distinguished medical doctor and long-time human rights activist, was sentenced to two and a half years' imprisonment on 29 July 2004. This is the third time he has been imprisoned for his beliefs. Since the 1970s, he has courageously and persistently exercised his fundamental rights to freedom of expression and has paid a terrible price, spending more than 19 of the last 26 years in prison.

This has not only been a tragedy for himself and his family, but also for those advocating respect for human rights who have tried to engage in open discussion on political and social issues in Viet Nam. Dr Nguyen Dan Que's concern for human rights in Viet Nam predates the end of the Viet Nam War, beginning in the 1970s before the reunification of North and South Viet Nam in 1975 and the current government coming to power. He spoke out, together with other leading intellectuals about conditions of detention in the then South Viet Nam.

Dr Nguyen Dan Que was born in April 1942 in northern Viet Nam, then occupied by the Japanese army, who, for the duration of the Second World War, replaced the French -- the colonial power in the region. He studied medicine at Saigon (Ho Chi Minh City) University, graduating at age 22, when he joined the teaching staff of the university medical school. He was awarded United Nations scholarships for in-service training in Europe in the late 1960s and early '70s.

He returned to Viet Nam in 1974 to join the teaching staff of the Saigon University Faculty of Medicine as Assistant Professor of Endocrinology. He is a specialist in radiotherapy. After the end of the Viet Nam war in 1975, he became Director of Cho-Ray Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City. He openly expressed criticisms of the new government’s healthcare policies, which led to his dismissal in 1976 from the hospital.

After his dismissal, Dr Que formed an organization called the National Front for Progress and is reported to have published two underground newspapers concerning human rights, social welfare and healthcare. This led to his arrest on 18 February 1978 on charges of "rebelling against the regime" and forming a "reactionary" organization.

The Vietnamese authorities have never tolerated the founding of independent organizations and media, especially those critical of government policies. Dr Que was detained without trial until his release 10 years later in 1988.

Undaunted by 10 years imprisonment, he was determined to continue advocating for human rights. In January 1990, he became an international member of Amnesty International, campaigning for the release of prisoners of conscience outside his own country. He wrote thoughtful letters to the governments of Cuba, Greece and Indonesia.

Later that year, Dr Nguyen Dan Que founded a political movement in Viet Nam called the High Tide of Humanism Movement (Cao Tran Nhan Ban). This movement was based on calls for peaceful political change. A manifesto of the movement issued on 11 May 1990 called on people in Viet Nam and abroad to sign a petition demanding non-violent political, social and economic change for Viet Nam. Dr Que was arrested again on 14 June 1990 because of this, and was detained for almost 18 months before being brought to trial on 29 November 1991.

He was sentenced to 20 years' imprisonment under national security legislation for "activities aimed at overthrowing the people's government." The accusations against him included the circulation of documents, and recruiting members for an organization that was alleged to have called for the abolition of socialism in Viet Nam and which criticized the government in the international community. He was also accused of using his membership with Amnesty International for political activities against the government.

Dr Que was released early from prison in September 1998, along with 12 other prisoners of conscience, under a special amnesty marking National Day on 2 September. These releases were unprecedented in Viet Nam's history of using the judicial system to criminalise peaceful political dissent and raised hopes that the authorities' policy on freedom of expression and association was undergoing a fundamental change.

These hopes were not realized as imprisonment, or detention under house arrest, of political and religious dissidents continued. Dr Que has increasingly received international recognition for his lonely struggle. He has been the recipient of numerous international human rights awards and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in successive years in the early 1990s.

Following his release in 1998, the authorities asked Dr Que and his family to leave Viet Nam and resettle in the USA. They declined to do so and Dr Que took up advocacy on human rights once more, issuing statements that were published abroad, despite his being under surveillance and facing harassment by the authorities. Dr Que was rearrested on 17 March 2003 outside his home and on his way to an Internet café, just four days after he had issued a statement via the Internet asserting that there was no freedom of information in Viet Nam. This statement was published abroad.

This year, the authorities have announced that a series of large prisoner amnesties would take place, with the initial release of as many as 10,000 prisoners. The first amnesty will, as in 1998, mark Viet Nam's National Day on 2 September and will be followed in 2005 with amnesties in February, May and September. Dr Que should never have been imprisoned simply for peacefully exercising his right to freedom of expression. Notwithstanding, Amnesty International calls on the Vietnamese authorities to make Dr Nguyen Dan Que a beneficiary of this amnesty.

Distress, Harassment Continue for Vietnam’s Montagnards U.N. relief workers airlift 198 refugees to Cambodian capital.

Christianity Today, Week of August 16

By Compass Direct | posted 08/18/2004 9:30 a.m.

Government authorities continue to apply unrelenting pressure on tribal Christians in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, while trying to convince the international community that all is back to normal in the troubled region.

The most recent outbreak in the long-standing tension commenced in April 2004, when thousands of Montagnards joined protests against the confiscation of tribal lands and the severe repression of the Christian faith that many of them profess.

Police and soldiers-many disguised as local farmers-were sent in to break up the demonstrations, resulting in deaths and injuries among the Montagnards. Due to a press blackout and intense measures taken by the government to cover up events of the April 10 and 11 clash, the full extent of what happened that Easter weekend and in the days immediately following may never be known.

Christian leaders in Vietnam close to the situation believe the number of deaths almost certainly exceeds the estimates given by some human rights organizations. Human Rights Watch, for example, initially reported only 10 deaths.

However, reports have recently surfaced of mysterious excavations at a military base near Buonmathuot following the April demonstrations. Some fear the bodies of people killed during the protests may have been buried here.

Montagnard sources told Compass that the people of the highlands desperately want their side of the story to be heard; they have supplied the names and addresses of three men in Dak Lak province who have offered to testify before any foreign investigators, regardless of the consequences to themselves.

Also provided to Compass were several lists totaling 123 names of people affected by the crackdown. The lists include dozens of highlanders sentenced to long prison terms. Others are in hiding, and still others have disappeared without a trace.

Time magazine's Asia edition of August 2 carried an article entitled "Vietnam's Tribal Injustice." Time reporter Phil Zabriski is believed to be one of the first Westerners who managed to evade government minders and talk directly with some Montagnard sources.

Vietnam has clearly broken its promise to diplomats that it would only punish a handful of the leaders involved in the Easter protests. In early May, the Vietnamese government also promised to send a special "peace corps" to help raise the living standards of poverty-stricken tribal minorities. However, Montagnards report that the main function of this unit is to serve as "spies and guards" and to intercept all traffic and communication.

In Buon Poc, Dak Lak province, where people were active in the demonstrations, eight men were arrested and severely beaten before being allowed to return home. Between 2 and 12 members of the "peace corps" were subsequently assigned to watch over each of the men's families, camping near their homes to watch and control all movement. Visitors are treated with suspicion.

Church sources report that in late June and early July eight men were killed in Plei B'Lang, Gia Lai province. Four died of gunshots and four were beaten to death. The body of one of the men beaten to death was returned to his home and hung from a rope. Officials then proclaimed he had hung himself. Exceptionally tight security has hindered attempts to verify this report.

On July 19, Christians in Plei Trap, Gia Lai province, were subjected to public humiliation and intense pressure to renounce their faith.

Vietnamese Christians familiar with the situation in the highlands say authorities have conveniently singled out Christianity as the scapegoat for serious social problems there. The greatest problem is the illegal seizure of tribal lands for use by ethnic Vietnamese. The government appropriates land for the newcomers ostensibly to alleviate land shortages elsewhere in Vietnam. But sources in the Central Highlands say the land grab is largely driven by the allure of lucrative cash crops.

Montagnard Christians who object to the loss of their lands are accused of supporting the Dega Protestant movement, which has sometimes promoted self-determination. In reality, the vast majority of Montagnards, both Christians and others, simply want equal access to development opportunities and the return of their tribal homes and lands.

Veteran Vietnam watchers say the authorities exaggerate the security threat of rapidly growing Christianity to keep attention away from their own misdeeds. The official propaganda campaigns against Christians helps divert attention from human rights crimes, which are the underlying cause of the dissatisfaction of Vietnam's minority peoples.

The government has also refused to grant official status to many of the highland churches it has tried to disband in recent years. In Gia Lai province only 15,000 of the estimated 80,000 local Christians belong to the 11 government-sanctioned churches. Other churches remain unregistered and their members are still subjected to constant harassment to renounce their faith.

The crisis caught international attention again in July, when 198 Montagnard refugees were airlifted from the Cambodian border province of Ratanakiri to the capital, Phnom Penh. Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen had initially allowed forced repatriation of the refugees to Vietnam. However, he relented before international pressure to allow the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) to rescue refugees from the malaria-infested jungles near the border and airlift them to Phnom Penh.

According to an August 9 report by Agence France Presse, Cambodia has authorized a second such rescue mission. In addition, 91 Montagnard refugees have found their own way to UNHCR safe houses in Phnom Penh. The majority of the exiles are Christian.

One Vietnamese source told Compass that he believed the successful rescue of Montagnards from the border region could encourage others to flee Vietnam.

"It's hard to describe the desperation people are feeling," he said. "Some of it comes from the lack of concern and action from the international community. Vietnamese authorities tell everyone that the highlands are a place of peace, happiness and ethnic equality.

"But in reality they make it a hell for the Montagnards."

Vietnamese Aslylum-Seekers Rescued From Cambodian Jungle

Associated Press

August 13, 2004, Friday, BC cycle

BYLINE: By MIRANDA LEITSINGER, Associated Press Writer

DATELINE: KORNG VILLAGE, Cambodia

The Vietnamese hill tribespeople filed out of Cambodia's rain-soaked jungle in torn flip flops and dirty clothes, carrying the few possessions they took after fleeing persecution in their homeland.

The 21 Montagnards, as various hilltribe groups are collectively known, were among some 200 rescued by U.N. refugee workers and Cambodian authorities in mid-July after spending months hiding in the country's remote, mountainous northeast.

"I decided to flee ... because life in Vietnam is so bad," a rice farmer said as he tended to his sick daughter at a hospital in the border province of Ratannakiri. "We do not have land. We are under pressure because we are minorities." Like others he asked that his name not be used for fear of reprisals.

Many Montagnards fled Vietnam's Central Highlands in April, following mass demonstrations against religious repression and land confiscation during which security forces clashed with protesters. Human rights groups say at least 10 people were killed and dozens wounded; authorities maintain two died.

A father of five from Vietnam's Gia Lai province said he joined 2,000 people in the protests after the government denied him work on a rubber plantation.

"During the demonstration, the authorities shot four of us. We were so scared when we heard the sound of shooting," the 32-year-old said. Afterward, "They came looking for us at our home. Then we ran away."

The rice farmer, also from Gia Lai, participated in those protests and similar ones in 2001 - which led to an exodus of more than 1,000 Montagnards to Cambodia after a government crackdown.

He acted after his land was taken by the government in 1997 and he was pressured to work on a rubber plantation earning a wage so low he couldn't support his family.

Problems in the Central Highlands date back decades.

Many Montagnards, mainly members of Protestant Christian denominations distrusted by Vietnam, were U.S. allies during the Vietnam War. A number were resettled in the United States at war's end in 1975.

Since then, the government has moved in tens of thousands of Vietnamese lowlanders to the area to run coffee and rubber plantations, forcing Montagnards off their ancestral land.

Some of the 200 rescued Montagnards had been hiding in Cambodia's jungle before the April protests - at least one for up to two years, said Cathy Shin, a U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees officer.

"It was quite moving to actually see ... the desperation of people coming out of the forest," Shin said.

Sara Colm, senior researcher for Human Rights Watch, said they'd been documenting abuses in the Highlands going back to the 2001 protests and before.

Hanoi has accused the U.S.-based Montagnard Foundation with instigating the unrest. The group's head is a former guerrilla leader allied with the U.S. during the Vietnam War.

Some of the 200 Montagnards hiding in the Cambodian jungle got help from members of related minorities living in Ratannakiri who alerted human rights groups to the refugees' plight.

Rescuing the Montagnards was complicated by the position of the Cambodian government, which had described them as economic migrants. It has reportedly deported more than 100 Montagnards since April.

Following criticism, Prime Minister Hun Sen said he would let the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees reopen offices in two border provinces to Montagnard asylum-seekers.

The 200 rescued from the jungle will be assessed for possible resettlement - many of the 1,000 refugees from the 2001 protests were sent to the United States. They're now staying at a U.N. shelter in Phnom Penh.

"I want the international community to help our Montagnards to find liberty. We really want liberty," the rice farmer said.

Vietnam Adopts International Copyright Laws

copyright 2004 Toan Viet Limited Co

Vietnam News Briefs

August 13, 2004

Vietnam on October 26 will officially become a member of the international treaty on copyright law, otherwise known as the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works.

Vietnam will become the 156th full-member of the treaty, according to an announcement made by the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO).

Under the treaty, Vietnam will grant copyright protection in the fields of literature, arts and science to citizens of countries that are signatories to the treaty. Vietnamese authors will also be protected.

Many state-owned offices, including the Copyright Department, the Economic Police Department and the Market Management Department, will be involved in the management of the treaty's regulations.

In joining the convention, Vietnam expects to receive better foreign works for readers to enjoy, said Deputy Minister of Culture and Information Tran Chien Thang. However, he warned that publishers would have to be careful in reproducing any foreign publications as it now requires the authors' approval plus the payment of royalties.

Costs and profits will force publishers to only print best-sellers, he said.

Meanwhile, local writers will have the chance to receive funds from foreign publishers if their works are reproduced abroad in any of the member countries, Thang said. This would encourage authors to devote their time and energy to creating high-quality works, he said.

Vu Manh Chu, head of the Culture and Arts Copyright Department, Vu Manh Chi, voiced his concern about a possible sharp fall in the volume of translated books when the convention comes into life, as many local publishers are unable to approach foreign writers or pay the royalties.

Since 1999 Vietnam has translated between 500-700 foreign books per year, including republications, according to statistics of the Ministry of Culture and Information.

The Berne Convention was passed by the international community in Switzerland in 1886. Under the convention, copyright takes effect automatically without asking authors to register or make any notices of the right. Authors will have their copyrights protected for life plus an additional 50 posthumous years.

(VNA Aug 13, Sports & Culture Aug 13 p37, Vietnam Panorama)

Deadly Spectre Of Bird Flu Returns With Three Deaths InVietnam

Agence France Presse

August 13, 2004 Friday

BYLINE: BEN ROWSE

DATELINE: HANOI, Aug 13

The deadly spectre of bird flu has returned to Asia, with Vietnam confirming Friday that three people have become the latest victims of the disease that claimed 24 lives across the region earlier this year.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said further tests were needed to see if three other people who have died over the past fortnight in the communist nation from a similar illness had also been infected with avian influenza.

An official from Ministry of Health, requesting anonymity, said two more individuals were being treated in hospital for acute respiratory infections and they were also suspected of having contracted the disease.

The latest confirmed deaths take the number of Vietnamese bird flu victims this year to 19, according to the ministry. Prior to this, the last confirmed death was a 12-year-old boy who passed away on March 15.

Eight people have also died in Thailand but the last death in the kingdom occurred on March 12.

Hans Troedsson, the WHO's representative in Vietnam, said the health ministry had informed him preliminary tests showed the presence of the lethal H5N1 strain of bird flu in one of the victims.

So far the two others have only been tested for the H5 virus. H5N1 is the only strain known to pass from infected poultry and cause illness in humans.

The UN health agency described their deaths as a worrying development that "confirmed the continuing ability of the virus to transmit to humans".

"Every human case raises the risk of avian and human viruses mingling, and the development of a pandemic strain," Peter Cordingley, spokesman for the WHO's Western Pacific Office in Manila, told AFP.

"Outbreaks in poultry are not under control. The virus is widespread in the environment and will take concentrated efforts over a long period to remove it."

Vietnam was widely criticised for acting prematurely and recklessly when it announced on March 30 that the country was free of the disease.

The WHO urged all Asian governments to exercise maximum caution and surveillance.

"As long as the virus is in the environment, there is a real risk of a return to the situation seen earlier this year, where we faced multi-country outbreaks with a serious threat to public health," Cordingley said.

Thailand, Indonesia and China have all recently reported new cases following the worst of the H5N1 outbreaks earlier this year that crippled poultry industries and resulted in the deaths or culling of almost two million birds.

South Africa is currently tackling the milder H5N2 strain.

Vietnam's Ministry of Health said one of the three latest victims, a four-year-old boy from the northern province of Ha Tay, had died on August 2 in Hanoi's Central Pediatric Hospital one week after being admitted.

The second, a baby girl less than one-year-old and also from Ha Tay, died on August 4, two days after being admitted.

The third victim, a 23-year-old woman from the southern province of Hau Giang, southwest of Ho Chi Minh City, was admitted to hospital in neighbouring Can Tho province on July 31.

She died on August 2 and a throat swab sample taken from her tested positive for H5N1 at the Ho Chi Minh City-based Pasteur Institute.

The woman was one of four people from Hau Giang who died between July 29 and August 2, but none of the others was tested, raising the possibility they -- one of whom was her sister -- had also died from bird flu.

"It certainly has yet to be ruled out," the WHO's Troedsson said.

"I do not know why they didn't take samples from the other three and I will be asking the minister of health in a meeting later today for the reason."

Meanwhile, a health ministry official said a 19-year-old woman from Hau Giang and another person from nearby Tra Vinh province were being treated at a hospital in Ho Chi Minh City for suspected bird flu.

Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai has ordered a nationwide alert and the culling of all poultry in areas where the virus is detected.

In Vietnam Today

Jeff Jacoby

©2004 Boston Globe

August 8, 2004

With the presidential race generating so much talk of John Kerry's Vietnam record, one could almost forget that "Vietnam" is not just the name of a war that ended 30 years ago. It is also the name of a country of 82 million human beings -- men, women, and children who live under one of the most repressive dictatorships on Earth. Whatever political value there may be in recalling the Vietnam of years gone by, it is the people of Vietnam today who desperately need our attention.

"Vietnam is one of the most tightly controlled societies in the world," reports Freedom House, the well-known human rights monitor. "The regime jails or harasses most dissidents, controls all media, sharply restricts religious freedom, and prevents Vietnamese from setting up independent political, labor, or religious groups." Late last month, for example, the regime sentenced Nguyen Dan Que, a 62-year-old physician, to 30 months in prison for the crime of "abusing democratic freedoms." Translation: He wrote essays condemning government censorship and posted them on the internet. This wasn't Que's first encounter with communist justice. He was arrested in 1990 after publicly calling for free elections and multiparty democracy. The government charged him with sedition and sentenced him to 20 years imprisonment. In 1998, after being released as part of a general amnesty, he was invited to leave the country. When he refused to go into exile, he was placed under house arrest, deprived of his telephone and computer, and barred from resuming his medical work. But Que would not be intimidated, and continued to speak out for freedom. Now he is behind bars again.

Prodemocracy activists are not the only victims of Vietnam's one-party dictatorship. For years the regime has persecuted the indigenous highland tribes known as Montagnards, singling them out for religious repression -- most are devout Christians -- and confiscating their ancestral lands. In April, when some Montagnards staged a peaceful protest to demand religious freedom, the government reacted with a violent crackdown. Hundreds of Montagnards were beaten by police and by ethnic Vietnamese armed with clubs and metal rods. "They beat the demonstrators, including children," one eyewitness told Human Rights Watch. "People's arms and legs were broken, their skulls cracked. Children were separated from their parents. Near Ea Knir bridge, two people were killed. . . . Fire trucks came. . .

They pushed the tractors in the river, even with people still riding on them." Other witnesses told of protesters being blinded with tear gas, then handcuffed, taken away, and never seen again. Some Montagnards were tortured. Human Rights Watch mentions two who were tied up and hung over a fire until their limbs were scorched. Few Americans have made an issue of Vietnam's harsh denial of political and religious liberty. One who has is Representative Chris Smith of New Jersey, an outspoken defender of human rights worldwide and author of a bill linking growth in US aid to Vietnam to "substantial progress" in Vietnam's human rights record. Smith's bill, the Vietnam Human Rights Act, passed the House by an overwhelming 410-1 vote in 2001. But it never got a hearing or a vote in the Senate, where it was blocked by the then-chairman of the East Asian and Pacific Affairs subcommittee -- John Kerry.

Last month the House again passed Smith's bill, this time by a vote of 323 to 45. As in 2001, says Smith, the message of the bill is that "human rights are central -- they are at the core of our relationship with governments and the people they purport to represent."

Predictably, the vote sent Hanoi into high dudgeon, and it denounced Smith's legislation as "a gross interference into Vietnam's internal affairs." In truth, the bill would amount to little more than a slap on the wrist. It would have no effect on the roughly $40 million in foreign aid currently going to Vietnam every year. Only *increases* in that aid would be blocked, and only if they were earmarked for non-humanitarian purposes.

Opponents of the bill, like Kerry and Senator John McCain of Arizona, insist that the carrot of "engagement" will do more to nurture human rights in Vietnam than the stick of sanctions.

But that claim has been proven false by the experience of the last three years, Smith argues. Vietnam's treatment of dissidents and religious minorities has gotten worse, not better, since diplomatic and trade relations with the United States were normalized in 2001. The Vietnam Human Rights Act "would be law right now if it hadn't been for Kerry," Smith says, "and some of those dissidents would be out of prison." By blocking the sanctions bill three years ago, Kerry ensured only that Hanoi's repression would continue unabated. Will he block it again this year? The Kerry campaign hadn't replied to an inquiry as of late Friday, and Smith claims no inside knowledge. "But I know this much," he said the other day. "The best and brightest and bravest people in Vietnam are in prison, persecuted by the government for their opinions or their faith. And you don't do people who are suffering immeasurable cruelty any kindness by aiding a dictatorship."

Vietnam Urged to Liberate Its Press in Anti-Corruption Fight

6 August 2004

Vietnam News Brief Service

(c) 2004 Toan Viet Limited Company. All rights reserved.

Vietnam should learn from China in giving the press circle more autonomy in order to raise their role in the fight against corruption, according to a conference held on August 5 in Hanoi.

The first ever publication of a call for more independent newspaper agencies in Vietnam was made during the conference "The role of the press in fighting corruption and furthering healthy development of the private economic sector: China's experiences," which was jointly held by Vietnam's Institute of Central Economic Management Research and Ministry of Planning and Investment, and the UNDP on August 5-6 in Hanoi.

Vietnamese and Chinese attendants at the conference appreciated the achievements that the Chinese press had made in its anti-corruption fight, stressing that the success was the result of changes made by Chinese leaders to create a more open environment for the press to perform their monitoring tasks.

The greater role of the press in China have helped the anti-corruption fight and have thus improved the competitiveness of the country's economy and made the country more attractive to foreign investors, acknowledged Dr. Le Dang Doanh, former director of the Institute of Central Economic Management Research in Vietnam.

Doanh and other Vietnamese leading experts attending the conference called for the Vietnamese leaders to learn from their Chinese counterparts to cut State subsidies for the local news agencies and reduce State interference in their operations, letting them gradually become more independent.

Dr. Nguyen Quang A also urged for approval for the foreign and private sector to operate in the field, citing the Chinese experiment in diversifying its press media ownership as a "breakthrough."

The present control of the press in Vietnam is sometimes too tight and consequently constrains the role of the Vietnamese press in monitoring and denouncing corruption cases, according to Dr. A.

Some representatives from Vietnam's research agencies also agreed that more "open" policies of the government could help the media sharpen their position as the supervisory body of authorities' agencies.

As in China, the local press would gradually learn to stand on its own two feet and would no longer only focus on reporting "government-friendly" news, they said. After a press agency discovered and thoroughly investigated a corruption case, it could either report the case in its newspaper or send the report to responsible agencies or leaders as an "internal report," they explained.

However, press agencies must be determined to eradicate corruption within their own organization too, the researchers stressed.

A few people in Vietnam are pursuing a career in journalism for their own personal interest, similar to the situation in China. Tempted by money, some journalists could write incorrect or overly biased reports, covering up corrupt officials and their wrongdoings, the representatives explained.

Many insiders, however, are concerned about the unrealistic side of the issue as dealing with corrupted cadres should not lie in the hand of newspapers but should be part of the State apparatus. Newspapers have helped bring to light many corrupt senior government officials in Vietnam in recent times but the limited punishment for them often disappoints the public, they said.

The press circle in Vietnam is tightly controlled by the Communist-led government and State and mainly survives on State monies. At present, Vietnam has 157 printed newspapers, 283 magazines, three e-newspapers and 18 other information providers. Of them, two printed newspapers and 14 magazines are published in foreign languages.

Vietnam, meanwhile, has high levels of corruption, which has adversely affected the country's competitiveness for a long time. In October last year, Vietnam ranked 100th out of 133 nations (the lower the ranking the greater the corruption) in the global corruption survey undertaken by Transparency International. The country received a corruption perception rating of 2.4, where 10 equals little or no corruption and zero represents a highly corrupt country.

USCIRF Press Release: Commission Calls for Prompt CPC Designations

Contact: Anne Johnson, Communications Director, (202) 523-3240, ext. 27

August 5, 2004

WASHINGTON, DC, The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) calls on the Secretary of State to issue without further delay his designation of "countries of particular concern" (CPCs). The International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 (IRFA) specifically directs the Secretary of State, delegated by the President, to designate as CPCs countries in which the government has engaged in or tolerated "particularly severe violations of religious freedom." CPC designation can happen at any time throughout the year; however, designations have not been made since March 2003. The State Department's Annual Report on International Religious Freedom, required by statute to be issued in September of each year, was delayed by several months during 2003.

In addition to the designation of countries of particular concern, IRFA requires the U.S. government to take active steps with regard to CPC countries to oppose religious freedom violations and to promote freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief. However, since the passage of IRFA, for every country named a CPC in previous years, the U.S. administration has only invoked already existing sanctions rather than taking any additional action pursuant to IRFA. What is more, the State Department has not once submitted to the Congress the required evaluation of the effectiveness of prior actions against CPCs. "This disregard of IRFA requirements represents a serious failure in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy according to law," said Commissioner Chair Preeta D. Bansal.

"The CPC designations and subsequent actions are vital to advance U.S. protection against severe violations of religious freedom," Bansal said. A new annual cycle of the IRFA process is set to begin next month. "Ensuring global respect for freedom of thought, conscience, and religion or belief and related human rights through the statutorily designated CPC process will further the U.S. Administration's campaign against terrorism and its goal of promoting democratic reform," Bansal said.

In February of this year, as a result of the IRFA-mandated review process, the Commission recommended to Secretary of State Colin L. Powell that he name as CPCs the following countries that have not yet been designated: Eritrea, India*, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Turkmenistan, and Vietnam. The State Department's 2003 CPC designations were Burma, Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea), Iran, Iraq, the People's Republic of China, and Sudan.

* Commissioners Bansal, Chaput, Gaer, and Young dissent from the Commission's recommendation that India be designated a country of particular concern (CPC). The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom was created by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998 to monitor the status of religious freedom abroad as defined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and related international instruments and to give independent policy recommendations to the President, Secretary of State, and Congress.

Visit our Web site at www.uscirf.gov

Preeta D. Bansal, Chair

Felice D. Gaer, Vice Chair

Nina Shea, Vice Chair

Patti Chang, Archbishop Charles J. Chaput, Khaled Abou El Fadl, Richard Land, Bishop Ricardo Ramirez, Michael K. Young, Commissioners

Ambassador John V. Hanford III, Ex-Officio

Joseph R. Crapa, Executive Director

800 North Capitol Street, NW Suite 790 Washington, DC 20002. 202-523-3240;

202-523-5020 (Fax)

Vietnam Repression Continues

Voice of America, 8/5/04

The following is an editorial reflecting the views of the United States Government:

On July 29, 2004, a court in Ho Chi Minh City sentenced long-time political activist Dr. Nguyen Dan Que to thirty months imprisonment. Dr. Que had been detained without trial since March 17th, 2003, when he was arrested on his way to an internet cafi in Ho Chi Minh City. Counting time served in pre-trial detention, Dr. Que would be eligible for release in September 2005. Two other prominent writers and dissidents, Tran Khue and Pham Que Duong, were also convicted in July and sentenced to nineteen-month imprisonment. Because of time served, they were released on July 30th.

Dr. Que has been imprisoned twice before for a total of eighteen years for protesting Vietnam's violations of human rights. The state hopes to cling to power by brainwashing the Vietnamese people through stringent censorship and through its absolutist control over what information the public can receive," he wrote. "[Dr.] Que has already spent sixteen months in prison for doing nothing more than exercising his constitutional right of free expression," said Ann Cooper, Director of the Committee to Protect Journalists.

Nguyen Dan Que's brother, Dr. Quan Nguyen, is chairman of a Vietnamese human rights organization. He says the trial of Dr. Que was a mockery of justice. Dr. Que was denied legal counsel and prevented from knowing the charges against him until the day of trial. The trial was closed to the public, says Quan Nguyen, and his brother was prevented from calling witnesses in his defense:

"My brother has committed no crime by exercising the universal right to freedom of expression and speech. Since he should not have been in prison in the first place, he deserved to be released immediately and unconditionally. Instead, the Vietnamese government brought him to a kangaroo [phony] trial. This proves there is no freedom and democracy in Vietnam."

The U.S. State Department documents many human rights abuses by the Vietnamese government in its latest annual human rights report. These include arbitrary detention, denial of fair trial, and abridgement of freedom of religion, speech, expression, press, and assembly. Vietnamese citizens are also denied the right to change their government. Nguyen Dan Que and other prisoners of conscience have raised their voices against these abuses. And they are being heard around the world.

Vietnam To Set Up Special Force To Police Internet

Copyright Agence France-Presse,

HANOI, Aug 3 (AFP)

A special police taskforce will begin operations next month to fight cyber-crime in Vietnam, the Ministry of Public Security said Tuesday.

The new unit is aimed at combating the growing number of Internet hackers operating in the communist nation, as well as preventing criminal gangs using the web to traffic people or drugs.

"Firstly we will punish those who develop or intentionally transmit viruses to sabotage the computer network in Vietnam," said an official from the ministry's economic crimes department, under whose control the force will come.

The maximum penalty for such offenders is seven years in prison.

"We will also attempt to prevent other criminal activities from being conducted over the Internet and will try to block pornographic websites," he added, requesting anonymity.

Only around four million people out of a population of 81 million people regularly surf the Internet in Vietnam, mainly through cyber-cafes.

The official declined to reveal any further details about the taskforce, but insisted that its mandate does not include monitoring the activities of political and religious dissidents.

"That is not in our remit, but if we discover any such wrongdoings we will pass on the information to other police services," he said.

The government is determined to prevent pro-democracy advocates and other disaffected individuals from using the Internet to communicate and voice their opposition to the communist regime.

This year it has unveiled a series of measures to prevent "bad and poisonous information" being circulated online and has promised heavy punishment for offenders.

Last week an elderly human rights activist was sentenced to 30 months in prison for "abusing democratic rights" to undermine the state. He was the third cyber-dissident to be convicted of this charges in July.

International human rights groups have accused the government of using national security as a pretext to silence all dissent.

Health: Little Spending on Healthcare in Vietnam

2 August 2004
Vietnam News Brief Service
(c) 2004 Toan Viet Limited Company. All rights reserved.

The Vietnamese government spends $5 per person on medical care each year, according to a new report from the Ministry of Health (MoH).

The expenditure is the lowest among other Asian countries, the ministry admitted. The figure is $7 in Indonesia, $8 in Laos, $44 in Thailand and $63 in Malaysia, the MoH said, adding that the sum climbs to $2,000 in developed countries.

State spending on medical services is declining in Vietnam, the report revealed. Before 1991, the government's investment in education was 2.18 times higher than on healthcare but the gap has now increased to fourfold.

Worse still, the State budget's disbursement on the sector is ineffective. Forty one percent of the capital is used for medicine purchases while just 15% is spent on salary and allowances for health workers. The proportions are 15-30% and 50-70% respectively, in other countries in the world.

A Vietnamese person finances an annual VND217,000 ($14) on healthcare treatment, according to the first complete national healthcare survey implemented between 2001 and 2002 by the Ministry of Health and General Statistics Office (GSO), revealed last September.

The rich spend 3.6 times more than the poor. Residents in the southeastern region spend the most at VND307,000 ($19.8) while their counterparts in northwestern mountainous provinces spend just VND91,000 ($5.9).

Most of the spending is, however, on the private healthcare sector, including the purchasing of medicines at private pharmacies.

Vietnam Expands Economic Ties To ASEAN Members

Copyright 2004 Asia Pulse Pte Limited

Hanoi, August 2, 2004 Monday 3:11 PM Eastern Time

Since its admission to (Association of South-East Asian Nations) ASEAN in 1995, Vietnam has rapidly expanded economic ties with its member countries, enabling the country's integration into the global economy, the Ministry of Planning and Investment said.

As of June 2004, Vietnam had attracted 611 investment projects from ASEAN countries. With a total capital of US$10.8 billion, they have accounted for 25 per cent of the country's total foreign investment.

ASEAN countries have implemented US$4.88 billion in capital, representing 19 per cent of the country's total implemented foreign investment in the past nine years.

Singapore has been the largest ASEAN investor, followed by Thailand and Malaysia.

The ASEAN countries have invested in gas and oil exploration; heavy and light industries; food processing; agro-forestry; fisheries; tourism; banking and finance; real estate; urban areas; and industrial parks projects in Vietnam.

Singapore leads in construction, food, tourism, and property development projects while Malaysia tops the list in gas and oil exploration and exploitation projects.

Thai and Indonesian investors have engaged mainly in agricultural production and banking respectively with the Philippines focusing on automobile production.

About 300 ASEAN projects are already operating in Vietnam, employing tens of thousands of workers.

Many Vietnamese businesses in recent years have also been eager to invest in Laos, Cambodia, Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia.

Vietnamese investment projects, although small, have helped develop a multi-faceted relationship with the ASEAN community.

Trade ties between Vietnam and the ASEAN community has also developed strongly. The ASEAN market now accounts for 20 per cent of Vietnam's total export value and 25 per cent of its total import.

ASEAN countries have become the largest importer of Vietnamese agricultural products, chiefly rice and have sold machinery, equipment, and petroleum products to Vietnam.

Over the last nine years, the two-way trade value between Vietnam and ASEAN has grown significantly.

ASEAN countries, particularly Malaysia, also hire many Vietnamese labourers. Tens of thousands of Vietnamese labourers travel to ASEAN countries to work in the garment and construction sectors.

Co-operation has also broadened exchanges in science and technology, environmental protection, health, education and culture, arts, and sports over recent years.

The ministry said Vietnam's accession into the ASEAN community was a good pretext to help the country become an Asia Pacific Economic Corporation (APEC) forum member.

Vietnam is now appealing for ASEAN support to become a WTO member by 2005. The Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM 5), to be held in Hanoi next October, is the result of Vietnam's integration into ASEAN.

The ministry has also urged Vietnamese businesses to raise their competitiveness in the world market to effectively strengthen trade ties and investment co-operation with the ASEAN bloc.

Years Of Persecution For Their Difference

Copyright 2004 The Irish Times

August 2, 2004

The plight of Vietnam's Montagnard people came to international attention last week when 17 of them were detained in Cambodia. Held with them was Irish journalist Kevin Doyle. He tells their story

When the first 160 hungry and exhausted Montagnards from Vietnam emerged from the Cambodian jungle in 2001 word reached them that Vietnamese troops had crossed the Cambodian frontier and were descending on the remote town where they were camped waiting for the United Nations.

Fleeing Vietnam they had hidden for weeks in Cambodia's rain-soaked jungles with little food or clean water, constantly fearing capture by both Vietnamese and Cambodian security forces.

Rather than run in panic to evade the reported advancing soldiers, the small legion of frightened men, women and young children assembled in small groups and knelt and prayed. In the darkness they could be heard praying for their Christian God to save them.

The Vietnamese troops never arrived. However, a small convoy of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) trucks eventually did and the group of 160 asylum-seekers went on to form, much to the ire of the Hanoi government and their close allies in Phnom Penh, the first Montagnard refugee camp in Cambodia.

The Montagnards, a French word for "mountain dwellers", are the indigenous ethnic minorities who inhabit the mountainous Central Highlands region of Vietnam and comprise more than a dozen tribes with their own languages and culture. They are culturally and ethnically distinct from the lowland Vietnamese who form the majority population of modern Vietnam.

Fiercely independent, Montagnard tribes fought alongside the French colonial administration against Ho Chi Minh's communist Vietminh in the 1940s and 1950s. Their loyalty was repaid with a level of political autonomy in their ancestral homelands until the French defeat at the battle of Dien Bien Phu and its withdrawal as a colonial power from then Indochina in 1954.

When the US entered the war in Vietnam in the 1960s, the Montagnards were sought out by the US Special Forces for their expertise in jungle warfare in the strategic Central Highlands, which formed a buffer zone between Vietnam's warring north and south. The US not only brought weapons and the aspiration of tribal independence, it also brought Christian preachers.

One of those first asylum-seekers was Y Bion, a soft-spoken man in his mid-30s and a member of the Jarai ethnic minority. He told of the retribution exacted by Hanoi against the Montagnards, many of whom had converted to a form of Protestantism, after its 1975 victory. Churches were closed, bibles confiscated and the Montagnards' religious ceremonies were mostly conducted in secret, if at all, said Bion, who was baptised secretly at night in 1988. Vast swathes of the highlands had been taken by the state and turned over to cash crops and lowland migrants, rendering the Montagnards landless and forcing them into further poverty, he said.

Bion fled to the Cambodian jungle with his family after he and tens of thousands of other Montagnards held peaceful demonstrations in the capital cities of the Central Highland provinces. The Vietnamese government crackdown on the protests was brutal, and the ensuing repression has been well documented by such groups as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International.

In the aftermath of the demonstrations, Phnom Penh was forced by international pressure to concede to the establishment of two UN refugee camps which eventually gave shelter to 1,000 Montagnard asylum-seekers from Vietnam.

Washington later agreed to resettle the asylum-seekers. To appease Hanoi, Phnom Penh moved quickly to close both camps - one was symbolically torched just minutes after the UN departed - and vowed that all Montagnards would from then on be treated as illegal immigrants and summarily deported back to Vietnam.

Over the Easter weekend this year, an estimated 10,000 Montagnards again took to the streets to protest for the return of their ancestral lands and freedom to practise their religion. Vietnamese security forces backed up by cudgel-wielding Vietnamese civilians crushed the demonstrations and mass arrests of Montagnards have since followed, according to human rights groups and asylum-seekers.

Cambodian security forces were prepared for the expected Montagnard influx after the Easter demonstrations. Human rights groups reported scores of asylum-seekers being deported by police, acts that were in flagrant breach of the Cambodian government's responsibilities as a signatory to the UN Refugee Convention.

The Cambodian government denied such activities were taking place and also branded as lies the first photographic evidence and published interviews in June of Montagnards appealing for UN intervention. They were languishing in dire conditions in Cambodia's remote rain-soaked, malarial jungles at the time. The UNHCR was barred from investigating the reports and the Cambodian Red Cross said it could not act unless asked to do so by the government.

But the weight of evidence emerging from the jungle from interviews and photographs: mothers and their infants, the young and elderly, in hiding with little food or water and hunted by the police and military, forced the government to allow the UN to investigate.

Since the UNHCR's arrival in Cambodia's north-eastern Ratanakkiri province in mid-July, 1998, Montagnard asylum-seekers have abandoned their jungle hiding places and have been granted UN protection. But Cambodia is still unwilling to anger Hanoi and the UNHCR has not been allowed to open an office on the Cambodian border. All the asylum-seekers are being airlifted to Phnom Penh.

Although the Cambodian government was forced to concede and allow the UN to assist the Montagnards, the sentiments of authorities was best revealed in the military detention of the last known group of asylum-seekers to leave the jungle.

The 11 frightened men and six women were held from Sunday night until Tuesday morning at a remote jungle military post as the top brass decided their fate. Detained also was a Cambodian human rights worker, who was escorting the group to UN care, and two journalists - myself included - covering the story.

As the detention dragged on, reports emerged that the government had accused the reporters and human rights worker of human trafficking for assisting illegal immigrants to cross the Cambodian border. The public outcry in Cambodia over the military's actions was unprecedented and the group was eventually freed, a little disheveled but very relieved.

Since the Easter demonstrations the Vietnamese government has maintained that the Central Highlands are a bastion of peace, happiness and ethnic equality. It has blamed the UNHCR and other elements for luring Montagnards to leave their homes.

However, Montagnards interviewed in Cambodia tell of hundreds more asylum-seekers who are currently trying to cross the border from Vietnam. When asked why so many were fleeing their homes in Vietnam, they said they would rather perish in the jungles of Cambodia than remain in Vietnam without religious freedom, cultural autonomy and land rights.

"It is better to die here than in Vietnam," said an asylum-seeker while in hiding last month in the Cambodian jungle.

- Kevin Doyle is editor in chief at the Cambodia Daily

Thousands Show Support For Agent Orange Victims

Copyright 2004 Financial Times Information

Global News Wire - Asia Africa Intelligence Wire

Vietnam News Briefs

August 2, 2004

A total of 25,845 people have added their names on a webpage to support Vietnamese victims of Agent Orange sprayed by the US army during the American war, said Len Aldis, Secretary of the Britain-Vietnam Friendship Society (BVFS) on July 31.

Aldis said that apart from his online site at:

http:/ /www.petitiononline.com/AOVN/petition.html, his friends in France also translated his appeal into four other languages and have made them available on the website at www.aafv.org.

The move is considered to consist of two parts. The first concentrates on the lawsuit of Vietnamese Agent Orange victims against US toxic chemicals companies, and the second aims to take the issue outside the courtroom to bring it to people's attention around the world, he said.

The online petition has, within just a few days of being on line, gained the support of thousands of people from many countries. Over 1,000 have already signed the petition, which will end on 31st December. "The petition will be sent to the President of the United States, the Leader of the Senate and the chemical companies who are being sued. In addition, we are considering sending it to the Secretary General of the United Nations," Aldis revealed.

He believed that by signing the petition, people around the world will give and show their support of all Agent Orange victims, demonstrating that they are not alone in their suffering.

On January 30, three Vietnamese Agent Orange victims lodged a complaint against 20 US chemical firms to ask for compensation for the damage caused by the defoliants to their health. The court is scheduled to open in September in New York.

According to Vietnam's statistics, five million people in the country suffer from Agent Orange-related diseases.

Outcry At Jailing Of Vietnamese Dissident

Financial Times (London, England)

August 2, 2004 Monday

Byline: By Amy Kazmin

Dateline: Bangkok

Vietnam's decision to jail an ailing, 62-year-old dissident for 2 1/2 years has provoked an outcry from international human rights groups, which say Hanoi should stop persecuting citizens who peacefully advocate political reforms.

Nguyen Dan Que, a doctor who has already spent nearly 20 years in jail for advocating democracy in the Communist-ruled country, was sentenced last week to spend 30 months in jail, after being convicted of "abusing democratic freedoms".

The endocrinologist was arrested 16 months ago in Ho Chi Minh City, the country's thriving business centre, after he wrote an article about Vietnam's strict control over information and the media, and posted the article on the internet.

Amnesty International, the London-based human rights group, said it was "appalled" at the harsh sentence imposed on Dr Que after a closed-door trial in which he apparently had no legal representation.

Dr Que's trial follows the recent convictions of two elderly Communist party members, who were arrested in December 2002 after they and other respected party figures proposed establishing an anti-corruption commission.

Pham Que Duong, 73, a retired army colonel and military historian, and Tran Khue, 69, a professor of Vietnamese and Chinese literature, had also signed a petition to Vietnam's National Assembly demanding democratic reforms.

They were found guilty in July of "abusing democratic freedoms to infringe on the interests of the state", and sentenced to 19 months in jail - or essentially, time served - which means they could be released soon, rights groups say.

But Sam Zarifi, deputy director of the Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said in a statement that none of the three elderly men should have been arrested.

"The Vietnamese government must cease its heavy-handed attempts to silence its critics."

Vietnam's Communist rulers are currently relaxing state controls over the economy, one of the fastest growing in Asia. However, economic change has not been matched by political reforms, and unaccountable Communist party functionaries still exercise total control, giving rise to widespread corruption.

While authorities still control the media, many Vietnamese intellectuals and writers have turned to the internet as a forum to advocate for peaceful change. But over the past two years Hanoi has cracked down on reform advocates and other critics with ferocity.

On December 31, Hanoi sentenced a writer for the Communist party journal to seven years in prison for criticising a border delineation deal between Vietnam and China.

 Last Vietnamese Montagnard Refugees Airlifted Into Cambodian Capital

Agence France Presse – English

Phnom Penh, July 31, 2004 Saturday

The last of nearly 200 Montagnards fleeing from repression in Vietnam Saturday were airlifted to the Cambodian capital for the United Nations to assess their asylum claims, a UN official said.

The UN refugee agency wrapped up its move of the ethnic minority Montagnards from remote northeastern Ratanakiri province with the arrival here of the final 31 of the ethnic minority Montagnards, the official said.

"The total number of 198 asylum-seekers have arrived in the UN's safe house in Phnom Penh," UN High Commissioner for Refugees protection and field officer Cathy Shin told AFP, adding many were suffering from malaria and intestinal ailments.

The airlifts of the Christian Montagnards, who emerged from the jungles of the border region in the past few weeks after the Cambodian government finally allowed the UNHCR access to the region, began on Monday.

Shin said the agency started interviewing them on Wednesday.

The Montagnards trekked to Cambodian in the wake of Vietnamese authorities brutally dispersing their protests over land confiscation and religious repression in April this year.

Ten were killed during the unrest, according to New York-based group Human Rights Watch, but the Vietnamese government says only two died.

The Cambodian government, accused by critics of acting slowly to appease its more powerful neighbour Vietnam, had warned if a third country could not be found for the refugees within a month they would be forcibly returned. It later softened its stance.

Vietnam insists they have left the communist nation illegally and blames UNHCR for luring them into Cambodia.

Vietnam: Elderly Dissidents Convicted Three Writers Punished for Peacefully Voicing Views

Human Rights Watch, New York, July 30, 2004

The Vietnamese government should immediately release Dr. Nguyen Dan Que, a 62-year-old physician who was sentenced to two and a half years’ imprisonment for “abusing democratic freedoms,” Human Rights Watch said today. Dr. Que is one of three dissidents, all winners of the prestigious Hellman/Hammett award for persecuted writers, convicted this month solely for exercising their rights to freedom of expression.

On Thursday, Dr. Que, a longtime human rights advocate who was convicted for writing an essay, distributed over the Internet, about state censorship of information and the media. Since his arrest in March 2003, he has been held in incommunicado detention.

Two other elderly dissidents were also convicted in July. Pham Que Duong, 73, a prominent military historian and former army colonel, was tried on July 9. Tran Khue, 68, a sociologist and professor at the University of Ho Chi Minh City, was tried on July 14. Both were convicted and sentenced to 19 months’ imprisonment. Because of time served, they are expected to be released within a week. The men had faced official pressure since they proposed establishing an independent anticorruption organization in 2001, and after signing a petition along with 21 other dissidents in 2002 to Vietnam’s National Assembly calling for democratic reforms.

All three men were convicted under Vietnam’s Criminal Code for “abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the state.”

“None of these men should have been imprisoned in the first place,” said Sam Zarifi, deputy director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. “The Vietnamese government must cease its heavy-handed attempts to silence its critics.”

While Pham Que Duong and Tran Khue were essentially sentenced to time served, Nguyen Dan Que—who has already spent nearly 20 years in prison because of his public appeals for a multiparty political system and an end to censorship in Vietnam—will not be released until September 2005. He suffers from poor health, including hypertension, a peptic duodenal ulcer and kidney stones.

Nguyen Dan Que has received numerous awards for his writing and his human rights activism, including the prestigious Hellman/Hammett award for persecuted writers and the Robert F. Kennedy human rights award. Literature professor Tran Khue and military historian Pham Que Duong are also recipients of the Hellman/Hammett award.

Human Rights Watch administers the Hellman/Hammett awards for writers around the world who have been victims of political persecution and are in financial need. The grants are financed by the estate of the playwright Lillian Hellman in funds set up in her name and that of her longtime companion, the novelist Dashiell Hammett, both of whom were targeted in anticommunist “witch hunts” in the United States during the 1950s.

“It’s outrageous that the Vietnamese government continues to persecute distinguished writers and intellectuals, simply because they have issued public appeals for Vietnam to improve its human rights record and implement democratic reforms,” said Zarifi.

This month’s trials are the latest in a series of convictions in recent months of prominent intellectuals, writers and former Communist Party stalwarts who have been charged with criminal offenses after issuing public statements criticizing the government of using the Internet to disseminate proposals for reform.

For more information, please contact:

In New York, Sam Zarifi: +1-212-216-1213

In London, Urmi Shah: +44-207-713-2788

In Brussels, Vanessa Saenen: +32-2-732-2009

Jo-Anne Prud'homme

Asia Division Associate

Human Rights Watch

Vietnam Jails Veteran Dissident

BBC News, Thursday, 29 July, 2004, 08:03 GMT 09:03 UK

A court in Vietnam has sentenced a veteran pro-democracy activist to more than two years in prison for undermining the communist system.

Dr Nguyen Dan Que is the third Vietnamese dissident to be convicted this month for using the internet to swap information and criticise Hanoi.

He was detained in March last year while on his way to an internet cafe.

Vietnam curbs access to the internet through firewalls and blocks sites it deems inappropriate.

Dr Que was jailed for 30 months, although a court official told the French news agency AFP that he was due to be released in September 2005 due to time already served.

He was found guilty by the Ho Chi Minh People's Court of "abusing democratic rights to jeopardise the interests of the state, and the legitimate rights and interests of social organisations and citizens".

He was arrested last March, a few days after writing an essay about Vietnam's control over the media which was posted on the internet, human rights groups said.

Others convicted

His conviction follows the sentencing earlier this month of two other dissidents in Vietnam - Pham Que Duong, 73, and Tran Khue, 68. Both are due to be released at the end of this month on account of time already served.

Dr Que, 61, has already spent more than 18 years in prison for advocating improvements in democracy and human rights in Vietnam.

Dr Que, an endocrinologist, was detained without trial between 1978 and 1988, after he criticised national health care policy.

After his release he set up a democratic rights movement, but was arrested in 1990 and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment.

Vietnam, Laos Share Corruption Concern

Copyright 2004 Financial Times Information

Global News Wire - Asia Africa Intelligence Wire

July 29, 2004

Vietnam and Laos should promote measures to fight against corruption and other wrongdoings, particularly in the field of economics, said the secretary of Vietnam's Party Central Committee, who is also Chairman of the committee's Commission for Inspection, Chairman Nguyen Van Chi.

Chi made the statement when talking with several Laotian senior officials including Politburo member and Secretary of Vientiane municipal party committee Thongsing Thamavong and Chairman of the Lao Central Control Board Vongphet Saykeyyachongtoua yesterday in Laos.

Despite repeated promises made by Vietnamese leaders, many people are concerned that rising corruption in the country will not be curbed without strong measures, especially when it seems to be a common vice among members of the communist Party and government officials at all levels.

In October last year, Vietnam ranked 100th out of 133 nations (the lower the ranking the greater the corruption) in the global corruption survey undertaken by Transparency International receiving a corruption perception rating of 2.4, where 10 equals little or no corruption and zero represents  a highly corrupt country. In 1999, the country was ranked 75th out of 99 nations, with a rating of 2.6.

(The People Jul 29 p1)

Vietnam - High-ranking VCP Veteran denounces powers of Hanoi’s secret services

Quê Me : Action for Democracy in Vietnam / Quê Me : Action pour la Démocratie au Vietnam Vietnam Committee on Human Rights / Comité Vietnam pour la Défense des Droits de l'Homme BP 63 - 94472 Boissy Saint Léger cedex - France Tel : +33 1 45 98 30 85 - Fax : +33 1 45 98 32 61 E-mail : queme@free.fr - Web : http://www.queme.net

For Immediate release

Paris, 29 July 2004

In preparation for the VCP Central Control Committee's 10th Session in July:

High-ranking Communist Party veteran denounces excessive powers of Hanoi's military intelligence and reveals schisms within the Party leadership

The Vietnam Committee on Human Rights has obtained a copy of a letter sent by a high-ranking military veteran to the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) leadership which sheds new light on the inner workings of the VCP's military intelligence services, and exposes deep schisms within the leadership of the VCP. The revelations in this letter are particularly significant since it's author, retired Major-General Nguyen Nam Khanh, former member of the VCP's Central Committee and the Central Military Party Committee, has held many key posts within the VCP and the People's Army. A native of Quang Ngai, Nguyen Nam Khanh was formerly Deputy Head of the VCP's Propaganda and Training Department, Political Commander of Military Region Five, Deputy head and Secretary-general of the General Political Department of the People's Army.

Major-General Khanh addressed his letter (dated 17 June 2004) to VCP Secretary-general Nong Duc Manh, the Politburo and the VCP Central Control Committee, urging that these "extremely serious issues" be raised at the Central Control Committee's 10th Session in Hanoi in July 2004. Grave power abuse within the military intelligence is well known to the Politburo, he said, but "the crimes have never been elucidated and certain top Party leaders have never been sanctioned... This situation is causing great concern amongst Party members regarding the transparency of our Party".

Hanoi's Security Police received strict orders to prevent Nguyen Nam Khanh's letter from being leaked to the general public or overseas. On 10 July, Security Police raided the home of Le Hong Ha at 62 Ngo Quyen Street, Hanoi for over four hours, but found nothing. Le Hong Ha, 78, who was former head of the VCP's all-powerful security apparatus and has been a Party member for over 60 years, became a vocal critic of the VCP in the late 1980s and has been subjected to Police surveillance ever since. Another Hanoi veteran, Tran Dai Son, Party member for 54 years, denounced the Police raid on Le Hong Ha's home in a letter to the leadership on 20 July 2004. Despite these stringent Police controls, the letter was nevertheless smuggled out of the country.

The 13-page letter denounces the unbridled powers of the "General Department No. 2" (GD2), the VCP's military intelligence department which include "slandering, intimidation, torture, political assassination" - and the devastating effects of its activities on the VCP leadership. According to Major- General Khanh, the GD2 uses its powers to support or overthrow different factions within the Communist Party, and circulates "News Bulletins" which insinuate links between the CIA and top party officials such as Vo Nguyen Giap, Mai Chi Tho, Vo Van Kiet, Phan Van Khai, Le Kha Phieu etc.. and accuse others of corruption and connivance with the mafia (e.g. Nong Duc Manh).

The GD2 "wields excessive powers and unlimited controls, it sabotages democracy, undermines internal unity, and creates deep divisions and factions within the Party. GD2 can slander or sanction anyone they want, infiltrate their agents anywhere, mount countless business ventures, pretext so-called "intelligence" operations to go on spending sprees, set up bogus "special intelligence units" as a pretext to obtain funds". For example, he said, at least $US 81,000 were paid out to a "special agent" named T4, allegedly infiltrated into the CIA, who was later discovered to be a total fabrication of GD2.

How is it possible that a military intelligence agency, a subsidiary body in the Ministry of Defence, has such powers to act with total impunity ? According to Nguyen Nam Khanh, it is because the GD2 is "covered" by state legislation which empowers it to conduct subversive actions in complete legality.

He explains that GD2 (initially known simply as "Department No. 2), has exercised vast de facto powers for at least two decades, but in 1996-1997, the Communist authorities "legalized" its powers by adopting an Ordinance on Intelligence Services, signed by Nong Duc Manh, then President of the National Assembly on 14.12.1996, and Decree 96/CP on Defence Intelligence signed by Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet on 11.9.1997. These new laws made GD2 so powerful that Premier Vo Van Kiet later told Nguyen Nam Khanh : "I thought it over for 6 months before finally accepting to sign the decree".

This "codification of repression" is common practice in Vietnam. The letter affirms that these laws were devised by the military intelligence services themselves, not by the State's legislative organs. "In our country, everyone knows that laws are not drafted by the National Assembly, and the Prime Minister's Decrees are not drafted by the PM's office. No, they are drafted by the "concerned bodies" themselves, to provide a legal protection for their activities".

These two laws place the GD2 "under the exclusive and direct control of the Vietnamese Communist Party in every domain, responsible directly to the President" (Article 2, Chapter 1 of the Ordinance on Intelligence) ; it is empowered to "be active in the fields of politics, defence, security, foreign relations, economics, science and technology, industry and the environment, society and culture" (Article 1, Chapter 1, Decree 96/CP). "The object and goal of the Defence Ministry's intelligence forces is to collect news and documents related to the Socialist Republic of Vietnam. It must pay special attention to all countries, organizations and individuals, at home and abroad, who plot or engage in activities aimed to threaten or oppose the Communist Party or the Social Republic of Vietnam" (Article 11, Chapter 2, Decree 96/CP). Thus, the GD2 is not accountable to the government or the National Assembly, but exclusively to the President

and the Communist Party leadership.

In his letter, Nguyen Nam Khanh gives many concrete examples of the GD2's power abuse over the past 20 years, notably the 1983 "Seam Reap Affair" in Cambodia. Following the Vietnamese invasion of Cambodia in 1978, the GD2 (then known as Department No. 2), used incredible violence against high-ranking Cambodian communists in order to maintain Vietnamese domination (1) : "they made fake documents, fabricated evidence, falsely accused innocent comrades (i.e. Cambodian Communist cadres), then used intimidation and torture to extract confessions of crimes they had never committed. These [Cambodian communist cadres] were subjected to such atrocious psychological and physical sufferings that many subsequently committed suicide". General Le Duc Anh, the military commander in Cambodia was linked to this affair ;

- The "Sau Su Affair" in 1991: Before the VCP 7th Party Congress, there was a power struggle within the VCP, and a faction led by Vo Nguyen Giap was gaining favour over the orthodox line. In order to undermine this, GD2 recorded the fabricated testimonies of an agent named "Sau Su" calumniating Vo Nguyen Giap, Tran Van Tra and other top cadres in his group. These documents were so realistic that "they deceived the Politburo, the VCP Secretary-general and the Central Committee and many other faithful Party members... This grave slander affair led to deep schisms within the Party and the military leadership which still bear a significant damaging influence today".

- The T4 Affair: T4 was the name of a fictitious secret agent created by GD2, who was supposedly infiltrated into the CIA. This "agent" filed "hundreds of written and oral reports. The aim was to slander Party cadres and government officials by providing so-called "inside information" from the CIA on cadres who were allegedly being manipulated, or said to have links or affiliations with the CIA. Those accused included Vo Nguyen Giap, Vo Van Kiet, Phan Van Khai, Le Kha Phieu, Mai Chi Tho, Truong Tan Sang" and many others.

Nguyen Nam Khanh's letter cites extracts from the GD2's "News Bulletins" on various top-level cadres, e.g. :

   a.. "Re Vo Nguyen Giap : After the 8th VCP Congress, the CIA ordered "group Z" (the group led by Giap) to mobilize support for their views and ideas. They were to use "Ho Chi Minh thought" in order to reject Marxism-Leninism, separate the two ideologies and use Ho Chi Minh thought as a basis to launch a movement for "people's democracy" (News bulletin 49/96TR, 7.7.1996) ;

   b.. "Re Mai Chi Tho (aka Nam Xuan, former Minister of the Interior, brother of Le Duc Tho, note by the VCHR) : "Charles Ray, the US Consulate in Ho Chi Minh City, visited Nam Xuan at his home. This is abnormal. We do not know the contents of this meeting..." (News bulletin 5.10.1999). Also on Mai Chi Tho, during the "Sau Su Affair", the GD2 reported : "Warning - Mai Chi Tho and his clique are about to stage a coup d'état".

   c.. "Re Nong Duc Manh : We are informed that Nong Duc Manh is working in connivance with Minh Phung (a firm involved in one of Vietnam's largest graft scandals, note by the VCHR). Tang Minh Phung had done a lot of favours for comrade Manh, who was very displeased when Minh Phung was arrested" (News bulletin No 351/97/TR, 17.12.1997).

Nguyen Nam Khanh affirms that the GD2's agents are infiltrated everywhere, and they use all means of communication, including the Internet, to foment divisions within Party ranks and protect their own political protégés. They do not hesitate to entertain relations with the criminal underworld, "providing intelligence service passes to members of the Nam Cam criminal gang, and working closely with them".

It is uncertain whether these issues were indeed discussed at the Central Control Committee's 10th Session in July. Previous efforts to "reform the Party from within" by veterans such as Nguyen Van Khanh, the late Nguyen Van Tran and others have rarely been taken into account, and indeed have often led to expulsion from the Party or arrest, as in the cases of the late Lt.-General Tran Do or military historian Pham Que Duong.

Commenting on this document, VCHR President Vo Van Ai said : "Nguyen Nam Khan's letter reveals the existence of a veritable State within the State, exposing a situation far worse than we imagined. Those who think there is an on-going "democratic" debate within the VCP should think again after reading this... The Party's ubiquitous secret services have no qualms about using slander, torture and political assassinations to control the Party and State leadership, and serve the interests of a covert group of individuals..."

For Mr. Ai, "the existence of this powerful secret service has grave implications, not only for VCP leaders but especially for the ordinary men and women of Vietnam, the workers, intellectuals, independent religious leaders, political dissidents and critics from all walks of life... As long as Vietnam is ruled by secret and omnipotent forces like the GD2, there can be no hope of progress towards the rule of law. The millions of dollars provided by the World Bank, UNDP, IMF and the international community to finance Vietnam's Legal System Development Strategy (LSDS) and other "pro-democracy" programs will be wasted unless the reign of impunity of the VCP and its secret services is brought to an end".

(1) Many high-level Cambodian Communists had begun to resent being maintained under Vietnamese tutelage. Pen Sovan, Defence Minister and Secretary-general of the Kampuchean People's Revolutionary Party, who was handpicked by the Vietnamese, had to be summarily dismissed for his defiant attitude towards Hanoi in 1981. He was sent to Vietnam and placed under house arrest for the next 10 years.

U.S. And Vietnam Strengthen Economic And Military Ties

Michael Sullivan, NPR News, Hanoi.

July 28, 2004 Wednesday

Anchors: Renee Montagne

The House of Representatives voted last week to restrict non-humanitarian aid to Vietnam if Hanoi fails to improve its human rights record. The resolution, which nows goes to the Senate, comes amid growing economic and military ties between the US and Vietnam. As NPR's Michael Sullivan reports, Vietnam is also facing criticism from international human rights groups over its treatment of dissidents and ethnic minorities.

Michael Sullivan reporting:

Earlier this month, a small crowd gathered outside Hanoi's people's court. Inside, 73-year-old Colonel Pham Que Duong was on trial for jeopardizing the interests of the state. Duong, a former party member and military historian, was arrested nearly two years ago along with another dissident, 68-year-old Professor Tran Khue. Both were accused by authorities of sending messages critical of the government to groups overseas. Outside the court, plainclothes police and uniformed cops discourage loitering. Friends and family members, journalists and diplomats waited anyway. One of those outside was 75-year-old Tran Dung Tien, a former bodyguard of Communist Vietnam's most revered leader, Ho Chi Minh.

Mr. TRAN DUNG TIEN (Vietnam): (Foreign language spoken)

SULLIVAN: 'Uncle Ho,' the veteran said, 'would not be happy if he saw what was happening here.' Pham Que Duong's trial lasted just a few hours. He was found guilty and sentenced to 19 months, essentially time already served. In a separate trail, his associate, Professor Tran Khue, received a similar sentence. Daniel Alberman of Amnesty International.

Mr. DANIEL ALBERMAN (Amnesty International): We're relieved that these elderly and in many cases ill old men are being released. But on the other hand, we're talking about a small number of well-known people. And for every one of these people, there's an unknown number of individuals who are just not known in the outside world who are--having been given long sentences in prisons in Vietnam for just the same thing.

SULLIVAN: Vietnam is also facing continued international criticism following this spring's violent demonstrations in the central highlands where security forces clashed with disaffected ethnic minorities known as Montagnards. Vietnam says the protests were the work of outside agitators. Authorities say three people died in those clashes. Human rights groups say many more were killed or injured. Many Montagnards have now fled, either hiding in the dense jungle or making their way across the border into neighboring Cambodia. A few days ago, Human Rights Watch researcher Sarah Colm accompanied a UN convoy to the border area.

Ms. SARAH COLM (Researcher, Human Rights Watch): There's still heavy security presence in the highlands. There are roadblocks in front of almost every village. People need written permission to leave their villages, even to go to their farm fields. Many people are missing. Many people never came back after the demonstrations.

SULLIVAN: Vietnam says those who fled to Cambodia left the country illegally and insists the situation in the central highlands is now peaceful. And Vietnam's Foreign Ministry spokesman, Le Dung, bluntly dismissed last week's US House bill promoting freedom and democracy in Vietnam, calling it a gross interference in the country's internal affairs.

Mr. LE DUNG (Vietnam Foreign Ministry Spokesman): (Through Translator) First, America has no right to judge the human rights record of any other country. In addition, we reject the allegations made in the resolution.

SULLIVAN: While quick to dismiss foreign criticism, some in the government do worry about Vietnam's image abroad as it strives to improve and expand economic and political ties with the West. And despite the criticism, many diplomats and human rights workers agree that the Vietnamese government deserves credit for a number of achievements--reducing poverty, improving literacy and making the Internet widely available, though heavily regulated. 'Is there freedom of speech, freedom of religion, a free press,' asked one diplomat rhetorically. No, but most people are doing better now than they were a decade ago. As long as the economy continues to grow and people have some personal freedoms and some economic freedom,  another diplomat said, not many will be willing to push the regime too hard.

Testimony Before The East Asian And Pacific Affairs Subcommittee Of The Senate Foreign Relations Committee

February 12, 2004

Michael Young, Chair

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom

Protecting Religious Freedom In Vietnam: Balancing Interests And Principles

Introduction

Mr. Chairman, distinguished members of the Senate, I want to commend you for holding this hearing on an important subject that deserves serious attention from Congress.

The Commission on International Religious Freedom has followed events in Vietnam closely for the past several years. In its travels to Vietnam, the Commissioners and staff have found that over the last two years, already poor human rights conditions in Vietnam have deteriorated. Key dissidents were imprisoned or placed under house arrest. Churches have been closed and some destroyed. In addition, the government of Vietnam has intensified its crackdowns on religious and ethnic minorities in the northwestern provinces and the Central Highlands-including ongoing campaigns of forced renunciations of faith.

These actions underscore a deep imbalance in U.S.-Vietnamese relations. Since normalization of relations in 1995, U.S.-Vietnamese defense and trade relationships are moving forward at a dramatic pace. In these areas, we are building partnerships based on mutual interests.

But beyond these partnerships lie principles. President Bush has eloquently stated that American foreign policy should "stand firm for the non-negotiable demands of human dignity-the rule of law, freedom of worship, free speech…religious and ethnic tolerance…and equal justice."

Such principles are central to maintaining strong and long-lasting partnerships. They are central to American interests abroad. When it comes to Vietnam, the U.S. should adopt creative policies that support both our interests and our principles.

The Commission hopes that a strong and consistent message can be sent to the Vietnamese government. Our relationships cannot be built solely on economic ties or security cooperation. Continued violations of religious freedom and related human rights will slow down the expansion of U.S.-Vietnamese relations.

LITTLE SUBSTANTIVE CHANGE SINCE THE BTA

When the Bilateral Trade Act (BTA) was passed, there was hope that expanded economic ties would lead to improvements in Vietnam's human rights situation. Sadly, this has not happened. A recent estimate predicts that trade between the U.S and Vietnam will top $6 billion dollars by the end of this year. The U.S. is already Vietnam's largest trading partner.

While our economic relationship has taken several large steps forward, in the area of human rights our relations have become stagnant, and even deteriorated.

The Commission is not alone in its assessment. The European Union has also been very critical of Vietnam's human rights practices. And, the State Department, in a report to Congress last year, admitted to being "disappointed" by the lack of "concrete results" in the U.S.-Vietnam bilateral human rights dialogue. They cited failure of the Vietnamese government to respond to U.S. concerns in several key areas, including religious freedom as reason why they canceled the Fall, 2003 dialogue.

Increased trade has not led to progress in the area of protecting human rights and basic liberties. More dollars have not lead to democratization. And quiet diplomacy alone has not produced tangible results.

Since the passage of the BTA, there is incontrovertible evidence that the Vietnamese government has initiated crackdowns on religious leaders, free speech advocates, political reformers, and those peacefully championing the rights of ethnic minorities. Let me briefly give you some very recent examples that fit into the larger pattern of human rights abuses since the passage of the BTA in 2001:

• In the last month, the government in Hanoi has pursued a severe crackdown on the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV). Currently, 26 of its newly elected leaders are under arrest and founders Thich Huyen Quang and Thich Quang Do, both Nobel Peace Prize nominees, face trumped up charges of espionage. The arrests came despite Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Van Khai's admission that past crackdowns on the UBCV were "mistakes."
• Trying to investigate the current situation, Commission staff had meetings with UBCV monks disrupted by security forces, phone conversations cut-off, and was physically barred from visiting UBCV leader Thich Quang Do and Thich Tu Sy.
• Fr. Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly, a leading religious freedom and democracy advocate, was sentenced to 15 years in prison and 5 years house arrest for submitting testimony to the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom. Though Fr. Ly's sentence was recently reduced by five years, his nephews remain in prison for alerting human rights groups to their uncle's arrest.
• The Venerable Thich Tri Luc of the UBCV is facing charges of "immigration with intent to oppose the regime" which carries with it a sentence of between 3 years and life imprisonment. The Venerable "disappeared" from a UNHCR transit house in Phnom Penh in June of 2002. He was forcibly repatriated to Vietnam and his whereabouts were unknown until July of 2003. He is in prison. His trial is pending.
• According to smuggled documents recently obtained by Freedom House in June and December of 2003, government officials with the Ministry of Public Security have entered places of worship, denounced believers, and forced them to sign "confessions" where they renounced their faith and promised to return to traditional animist rituals. We know that at least two religious leaders have died in the past two years because of beatings they received for refusing to renounce their faith.

These are only a sample. Given Vietnamese actions over the past year, the Commission believes the U.S. government must use its leverage with the government of Vietnam to produce real and meaningful improvements in human rights and religious freedom.

CPC AS FLEXIBLE DIPLOMATIC TOOL

Mr. Chairman, the Commission has recommended to the Secretary of State that Vietnam be designated as a "country of particular concern" (CPC) for the past two years. We believe that Vietnam's abuses of religious freedom meet the criteria set down in the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998.

The CPC designation is a flexible diplomatic tool. It provides the President with a range of specific options to take to address serious abuses of religious freedom. It does not automatically entail sanctions, but requires that the Secretary of State enter direct consultations with a country to find ways to improve the religious freedom situation. To avoid economic sanctions, countries can enter into a binding agreement with the U.S. that spells out specific actions they will take in the future.

Mr. Chairman, the CPC designation has to be used in order for it to be more than a toothless gesture of moralpolitique. Despite Commission recommendations, the State Department has not yet designated Vietnam as a CPC.

When used properly the CPC designation:

• Sends the clear signal that U.S. interests include concern for human rights.
• Starts a dialogue where specific benchmarks on progress are agreed upon in order to avoid economic sanctions.
• Allows the President, or the Secretary of State, to employ or use the threat of multiple and ongoing sanctions to address egregious abuses of religious freedom.
• Allows the President to waive any specific actions if progress is being made toward addressing serious religious freedom abuses.

In the last year, international scrutiny has forced the government of Vietnam to try to staunch growing criticisms of its human rights record. The Vietnamese government released several prominent religious dissidents, reduced the sentences of others, and in a dramatic gesture, allowed you, Chairman Brownback, to meet with long-time democracy and religious freedom advocate Fr. Nguyen Van Ly.

Mr. Chairman, these actions should be seen for what they are, goodwill gestures that do not promise any substantive or systematic improvement. In fact, the religious dissidents released earlier this year were recently re-arrested (Thich Quang Do and Thich Huyen Quang).

The Vietnamese government has badly underestimated the depth of disappointment that exists in the Congress and U.S. Government concerning its human rights record. The blatant disregard of the most basic human rights, and the recent and ongoing crackdowns on religious adherents, makes clear why Vietnam should be immediately designated a "country of particular concern" (CPC).

OTHER POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS

In our current report the Commission included several policy recommendations for the Congress's consideration:

1) Passage of Vietnam Human Rights Act: The Commission has supported the Vietnam Human Rights Act, many of the Commission's past recommendations have been incorporated into that Act. The act would cap non-humanitarian aid at 2003 levels (not cut it off as some critics contend) and provide increased funding for public diplomacy and immigration programs. We believe that a cap of non-humanitarian aid will send the signal that the U.S-Vietnamese relationship cannot expand unless meaningful and systematic changes occur. The language of the Vietnam Human Rights Act was placed in the Foreign Relations Authorization Act (HR 1950). The Commission hopes that the original language will stay intact when the bill emerges from conference.

2) Overcome Jamming of Radio Free Asia (RFA): The Commission recommends that steps be taken to overcome jamming of Radio Free Asia broadcasts, ensure that RFA Internet site is accessible and free, and allow RFA personnel into Vietnam. While RFA broadcasts face active interference, Vietnam state television and radio programs are transmitted unhindered to the United States via Cuba and Canada. The same broadcast courtesy should be given to RFA broadcasts.

3) Target Exchange Programs to Advance Human Rights: The Commission also recommends that foreign assistance and exchange programs go to support individuals in Vietnam who advocate human rights, the rule of law, and legal reform. We should, for example, target cultural and education opportunities for the Montagnard and Hmong peoples of Vietnam. We should also seek to hold regular dialogues and exchanges (both in Hanoi and in Washington) between international experts on religion and law and appropriate representatives of Vietnam's government, academia, and clergy. This is particularly critical at this time because the Vietnamese National Assembly is planning a new "Law on Religion" in the near future.

4) Re-evaluate the Eligibility Criteria for Millennium Challenge Account (MCA): The Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) is an ambitious and farsighted program that has the potential to revolutionize the way the United States promotes democracy and development abroad. But there is something wrong with the eligibility criteria when Vietnam can receive funds in the very first year. We hope the Congress will weigh in to make sure that money does not go to Vietnam without significant progress being made in the areas of human rights and religious freedom. Or, that changes can be made to the eligibility criteria so that abuses and restrictions of human rights, including religious freedom, are weighed more heavily when determining eligibility.

Mr. Chairman, these important policy steps support both U.S. interests and values. They are also steps that will demonstrate our government's seriousness about the protection and promotion of international human rights standards.

CONCLUSION

History has entwined our two countries in sometimes-tragic ways. But we only compound that tragedy if we focus narrowly on economic or security relations at the expense of human rights. As we learned with the Helsinki Process during the Cold War, the three must move forward together for effective change to occur.

Advancing free speech, free press, and freedom of religion represents not only core American values but also international standards of human rights-standards that the Vietnamese have already acceded to in various international treaties and covenants. Working to protect and promote these basic freedoms furthers the interests of both the United States and the people of Vietnam.

Mr. Chairman, the Commission believes that by taking the steps outlined above, U.S.-Vietnam relations will improve for the long term and become the basis for a strong and healthy relationship built on mutual interests and the rule of law.

Thank you Mr. Chairman and I welcome your questions.♣