Vietnam: President’s Visit to Washington Puts Rights in Spotlight
Obama Needs to Address Worsening Crackdown on Dissidents
Human Rights Watch
Washington, DC, July 23, 2013
Vietnam’s intensifying crackdown on free expression should be a top agenda item
during Vietnam President Truong Tan Sang’s summit with President Barack Obama
this week, Human Rights Watch said today. Sang will be in the United States from
July 24 to 26 and Obama will host him at the White House on Thursday, July 25,
2013.
Vietnam’s previous president Nguyen Minh Triet visited Washington in June
2007, and Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung visited in June 2008. Since those
visits, a growing number of dissidents, bloggers, and religious leaders have
been jailed in Vietnam. Convictions in the first half of 2013 have overtook the
total of those convicted in 2012, which in turn exceeds the number in 2011 and
2010.
Under Vietnam’s harsh penal code, authorities routinely arrest dissidents
for crimes such as “conducting propaganda,” “subversion of the people’s
administration,” “disrupting the unity of the state,” or “abusing democratic
freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the State or [its] citizens.”
Vietnamese dissidents are often held incommunicado for lengthy periods, without
access to counsel or family visits, often subjected to torture or other
mistreatment, and prosecuted in politically controlled courts, which are
increasingly handing out lengthy sentences.
“If criticizing the Vietnamese government is a crime, President Obama should
show solidarity with dissidents by committing the crime himself,” said
John Sifton, Asia advocacy director at Human Rights Watch. “President Sang
cannot publicly justify his government’s crackdown and should use this occasion
to repudiate it.”
Human Rights Watch urged the Obama administration to speak publicly about
particular dissident cases, such as convicted
dissident Cu Huy Ha Vu, blogger
Nguyen Van Hai (Dieu Cay), and lawyer
Le Quoc Quan, who is awaiting trial on spurious “tax evasion” charges.
Obama has previously mentioned Nguyen Van Hai in a statement on World Press
Freedom Day in May 2012, praising his courage amid a “mass crackdown on citizen
journalism in Vietnam.” Several US senators, including John McCain, have
denounced the arrest of Le Quoc Quan, a persistent government critic who has
been repeatedly arrested by the Vietnamese government.
Obama should also raise concerns about the case of imprisoned religious
leader
Father Nguyen Van Ly, and the growing trend of arrests and persecution of
bloggers and young dissidents, like
Nguyen Phuong Uyen, Dinh Nguyen Kha, Dinh Nhat Uy, Nguyen Hoang Vi, and
Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh (a.k.a. Mother Mushroom), who were variously targeted for
distributing leaflets critical of the government, holding “human
rights picnics,” attending protests, or handing
out pamphlets or copies of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Human Rights Watch urged the United States to suspend its defense and trade
negotiations with Vietnam until the government ends its crackdown and pledges to
repeal legal provisions criminalizing dissent.
“Governments that persecute citizens for holding picnics and handing out
pamphlets should not be rewarded with better ties and preferential trade
agreements,” Sifton said. “Obama should use this occasion to call this behavior
what it is: authoritarianism.”
Worsening harassment of critics
Human Right Watch called particular attention to the worsening treatment of
dissidents Cu Huy Ha Vu and Nguyen Van Hai, who have not been allowed to receive
visits from international monitors or fellow Vietnamese concerned about their
fate. Both men, having refused to admit their “guilt,” have been subjected to
particular punitive measures by authorities.
Under Vietnam’s penal system, prison authorities conduct periodic reviews of
prisoners and classify them under the terms “good,” “decent,” “average” or
“poor.” Typically political prisoners in Vietnam only receive a classification
of “good” or “decent” by admitting guilt.
Authorities continue to persecute
Nguyen Van Hai, who is only three years into a 12-year sentence for his
latest conviction on September 2012 for conducting propaganda against the state
according to article 88 of the penal code. His last appeal was turned down on
December 27, 2012, and authorities have repeatedly transferred him from one
prison to another, to the total of 9 prisons since his arrest in April 2008 –
apparently a punitive measure to make it difficult for his family to visit him.
Recently, the harassment has grown worse. On February 1, 2013, police
transferred Nguyen Van Hai to a prison in Ba Ria-Vung Tau province, without
informing his family, who thereafter were granted two very brief visits. Prison
authorities forced Nguyen Van Hai to give up all personal belongings that he had
been keeping with him in the last five years – including newspapers, books,
notebooks and pens – and locked him in isolation from other prisoners for more
than two months. On April 27, Nguyen Van Hai was again transferred to a prison
in Nghe An province and is being kept again in solitary confinement. According
to other prisoners and his family members, he began a hunger strike
approximately one month ago as a protest against the prison’s punishments.
Cu Huy Ha Vu, who is currently serving a seven year prison sentence, is also
being subjected to punitive measures, which prison authorities have admitted
they have imposed because of his refusal to admit guilt. In one legal document,
authorities wrote that because Cu Huy Ha Vu will not “admit the sins that he
caused; therefore during periodical reviews of the sentence serving, he has been
placed in poor improvement category….”
Cu Huy Ha Vu has been stripped of several rights that other prisoners are
allowed, including the rights to send mail, work with his legal case documents,
and meet his wife in private once a month. Like other prisoners, his cell is
poorly heated in winter and unvented in summer, subjecting prisoners to extreme
cold and heat depending on the season. Dr.Vu, who has a congenital heart
problem, now reportedly suffers from high blood pressure and high cholesterol.
Since being imprisoned, he often has severe headache on the left side, gout and
itchy sores; the precise nature of his new health problems is not clear.
Human Rights Watch called on the Vietnamese government to release all
political prisoners and prisoners of conscience – and at least consider
releasing
prisoners who are advanced in age or in poor health, such as Nguyen Van Hai
and Cu Huy Ha Vu noted above, as well as Nguyen Huu Cau, Mai Thi Dung, Father
Nguyen Van Ly, and others.
Vietnam is seeking a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, which
will require a vote in the UN General Assembly later
this year. Human Rights Watch called on the United States and other nations to
pressure Vietnam, in conjunction with this effort, to meet its international
legal obligations.
“If Vietnam wants to stand on the world stage, its government should
repudiate its crackdown on dissidents and embrace reform,” Sifton said. “The arc
of history may be long, but it certainly bends away from authoritarian
retrenchment.”
For more Human Rights Watch reporting on Vietnam, please visit:
https://www.hrw.org/asia/vietnam
For more information, please contact:
In San
Francisco, Brad Adams (English): +1-510-926-8443 (mobile); or
adamsb@hrw.org
In Washington, DC, John Sifton (English): +1-646-479-2499 (mobile); or
siftonj@hrw.org
In Bangkok, Phil Robertson (English, Thai):
+66-85-060-8406 (mobile); or
robertp@hrw.org