Vietnam: Human Rights
Development
A year of diplomatic break-through did nothing to improve
Vietnam's human rights record; indeed, the country increasing integration
into the world community appeared to trigger a nervous reaction; at
home, with fresh arrests and prosecutions of dissidents and the tightest
security situation in several years. In contrast to previous years when the
government amnestied numerous political dissidents on the occasion of
national holidays, only one political prisoner was known to have been
freed in a year when Vietnam celebrated the twentieth anniversary of the
reunification of the country and the fiftieth anniversary of its declaration
of independence.
Vietnam was formally admitted to the ASEA standing committee as
an observer on January 26 and joined ASEA as its seventh member on
July 28. On July 11, the United States announced normal diplomatic
relations with Vietnam. Then, on July 17, the European Union signed an
economic cooperation accord with Vietnam that had been in
negotiation for two years, much of the disagreement centering on a
standard human rights clause.
At the same time, as the developments unfolded, the Vietnamese
government moved to imprison and prosecute internal critics. On January
4, Thich Quang Do, the second-highest leader of the Unified Buddhist
Church, was because of his role in organizing flood relief in the name of
the church and his protest of the arrest of five other Buddhists who had
participated in the charitable effort. The sixty-eight-year-old Venerable
Quang Do had the previous year written a long essay alleging that the
Vietnam Communist Party had persecuted, and in same cases caused the
deaths of, senior figures in the church. He sent this essay to party leader Do
Muoi asking why the country was officially mourning the death of Korean
dictator Kim II Sung, but not commemorating the death of Buddhist
martyrs. On April 14, Venerable Quang Do and the five other Buddhists
were convicted of national security offenses for their flood relief activities;
the senior monk was sentenced to five years of imprisonment, and the
others to terms of four to two and one half years. One laywoman who
asked for clemency at trial was released. Dozens of adherents of the
Unified Buddhist Church remained imprisoned, although one monk, Thich
Hai Chanh, was the only political! prisoner to ee freed in an amnesty cf
prisoners to celebrate the April! 38 anniiversary of the reunification of the
North and the south parts of the country.
On December 29,1994, in an effort to cut him off completely from all
followers, security police moved the head of the church, Thich Huyen
Quang, from the Hoi Phuc Pagoda in Quang Ngai province where he was
confined under house arrest to a one-room structure they built and
guarded at the tiny Quang Phuc shrine in Nghia Hanh district. On August
16, a Voice of Vietnam broadcast called for Thich Huyen Quang and
another monk under house arrest, Thich Long Tri, to be put on trial as well,
but as of this writing no trial has gone forward. Thich Huyen Quang is
seventy seven years old and in poor heath; since his confinement the
authorities have denied him visitors, doctors and medicine for his high
blood pressure.
Protestants also faced arrest in 1995, particularly in highland regions;
for preaching or holding house church services. Human Rights Watch/Asia
received information on arrest and confiscation of property from
Protestants in Song Be, Long An, Quang Ngai and Lam Dong provinces
who had distributed religious material or held illegal prayer meetings.
Relations with the Catholic church continue to show tension, with the
government in April rejecting all candidates the Vatican nominated for
clerical positions, including the candidate who was to assume the
administrative duties for the elderly and ailing archbishop of Ho Chi Minh
City; the archbishop died later in the year, leaving the administrator-
designate's status uncertain.
On April 11-12, a Vietnamese court convicted Nguyen Dinh Huy
and eight other members of the self-proclaimed "Movement to Unite the
People and Buiild Democracy." This group, whose stated goals were to
promote peaceful political change leading to free elections, had
attempted to organize a conference on development and democracy in
November 1994 that the government abruptly canceled, arresting them.
Nguyen Dinh Huy was sentenced to fifteen years of imprisonment for
"attempting to overthrow the government", others received sentences of
four to fourteen years; including two American citizens, Nguyen Tan Tri and
Tran Quang Liem. A US consular officer was allowed to observe the trial,
and on November 5, the two Americans were deported from Vietnam.
On June 14, the government took into custody two prominent
communist dissidents, Do Trung Hieu in Ho Chi Minh City and Tran Ngoc:
Nhiem known by his alias, Hoang Minh Chinh, in Hanoi. Do Trung Hieu was
formerly the Communist Party cadre in charge of religious affairs in Ho Chi
Minh City; he had written and circulated an autobiographical essay
describing the party's efforts to dismantle the Unified Buddhist Church
after the war. Hoang Minh Chinh, a well-known and now elderly
communist intellectual; had been imprisoned twice before for advocating
"revisionist" lines, in 1967 and 1981 respectively;. He had sent petitions to
the highest levels of the Party demanding that his name be cleared from
his previous jailing. The two eases are related, possibly because Do Trung
Hieu had asked Hoang Minh Chinh to circulate a letter the former had
written to Vietnam's leadership. Both men were put on trial in Hanoi on
November 8 and sentenced to fifteen months and twelve months
respectively.
A third well-known communist figure, NguyenHo, was visited by
police on June 23; who attempted to take him into custody. Nguyen Ho
had been detained twice previously; once for his role in leading an
unofficial association of war veterans and another time for circulating an
autobiographical essay that exposed and criticized abuses committed by
the party. In one of his essays; he noted the "unprecedented speed" with
which the party had move to reconcile with its former enemies, such as
the United States, France; Japan, South Korea, Asean and China. He
asked, "Why can't the Vietnam Communist party reconcile with its own
Vietnamese brothers whom it has oppressed and victimized? Are dollars
the condition for reconciliation?" Nguyen Ho handed copies of this essay
to the police and informed them he would prefer to take his life than to be
imprisoned again. Although he was not arrested; he has been kept under
close surveillance, which has tightened progressively since September.
The government's insistence that political and religious dissidents
were being punished not for their opinions but because they had broken
the law rang hollow, given that Vietnam's legal system criminalized acts
that are unambiguously protected by international guarantees of civil and
political rights. National security offenses, for example, included peaceful
expression deemed "counterrevolutionary propaganda" and activities
that can be construed as "causing divisions" between the party and
various social sectors; likewise, charges of "attempting to overthrow the
government" were often based on no more than acts of peaceful
expression or association. The justice system in these sensitive cases
remained politicized, and it was net possible for dissidents to receive trials
that met minimum standards of procedural fairness.
The death penalty continued to be applied in Vietnam. On March 5 ,
the government executed Nguyen Tung Duong; a policeman convicted
in October 1994 of robbing and shooting a young man he had pulled over
for a traffic violation. The case became a cause celebre in Hanoi when
the defendant was initially given an extremely light sentence; popular
outrage caused the authorities to rehear the case and go to the other
extreme by sentencing him to death. Also executed in June was a Hong
Kong-born British citizen who had been convicted of trying to smuggle
heroin into country.
Press censorship also continued, with the government confiscating
what it considered what it considered subversive newspapers and tapes
mailed into the country, and even travel guidebooks. The Ministry of
culture shut down the weekly Ngoi Ha Noi (people of Hanoi ) for publishing
an article criticizing the government's decision to ban fireworks at New
Year, and recalled an issue of the monthly magazine of the Casting and
Metallurgy Association for containing too many sensational stories that
were unrelated to metal works. Both dissident intellectuals and foreign
correspondents reported heightened surveillance following the decision to normalize
relations, reflecting an
overall tightening of security.
In April, the Ministry of labor, War invalids, and Social action banned
the employment of children under the age of sixteen in conditions
"injurious to health and spirit." A foreign expert at a conference held by
UNICEF and Ho Chi Minh City Communist Youth Union at beginning of i 995
estimated that child prostitution had risen steadily during the past five
years and accounted for between a quarter and a third of all urban
prostitutes.
There were further labor strikes in 1995; particularly at foreign-
invested enterprises; Vietnam's law requires all unions in to belong to the
state controlled Vietnam Confederation of Labor. A new labor code
passed in 1994 also recognizes the right to strike, but not for enterprises
that provides "public services" or those "essential to the national economy
or national defense." Nor is a strike legal if it "exceeds the scope of the
enterprise, "compromising the ability of workers to engage in sympathy
strikes. Vietnam has not ratified the International Labor Organization
convention that guarantees freedom of association and the right to
organize freely.
The Right to Monitor
The government does not allow the people of Vietnam to form human
rights associations or to engage in human righrs monitoring, and it is highly
resistant to foreign examination of its human rights record. The government
denied permission for Human Rights Watch/Asia to conduct an official visit
to Vietnam in 1995.
In 1994, the government allowed the UN Working Group on Arbitrary
Detention to visit three labor camps under controlled conditions. The
Working Group reported in February 1995 that the government refused to
release statistical! information on the number of prisoners or the dimensions
of the penal system, that it banned the delegation from visiting pre-trial
detention centers, and that lower-level officials were not always
cooperative. The delegation regretted these shortcomings ,while
acknowledging the historic nature of the visit and the need to build trust
and further cooperative; It also recommended that the twentieth
anniversary of the reunification of the country would be an appropriate
time "to grant amnesty to persons still detained in camps for offenses
relating to the preceding period," a recommendation that was apparently
ignored. The Foreign Ministry condemned media coverage of the report,
stating that the delegation did not investigate human rights but merely
studied the legal system.
The Role of the International Community
On July 11, President Clinton announced normalization of diplomatic
relations in a speech that progress in relations, such as providing MFN
Trading status or OPIC, would involve certifications regarding human right
and labor rights. He also d2ciared that the United States would pursue its
bilateral dialogue on human rights, "especially issues regarding religious
freedom." On August 5 and 5, Warren Christopher visited Vietnam, the first
US secretary of state to do so in twenty five years. Secretary Christopher
spoke at a top foreign policy school, emphasizing the importance of
accelerated economic reform, courts that provide due access,
newspaper that are free to expose corruption, and business people who
have free access to information. He told students, "When you hear
American talk about freedom and human rights, this is what we mean.
Each of you ought to have the right to help shape your country's destiny,
as well as your own." Both speeches were the clearest and most high-level
statements on human rights to date from the administration, and both
drew criticism from the official Vietnamese press. Nevertheless, the United
States also publicly criticized Vietnam far continuing political detentions,
particularly the sentencing of two Vietnamese Americans in August, as
unhelpful to progress in advancing trade relations: The United States
pursued talks with Vietnamese officials on human rights issues in May and
October. During the May visit, a State Department official called for the
release of al! political prisoners, and characterized the talks as "positive"
while warning that results would be a long way off. Australia also sent a
delegation to Vietnam to discuss human rights issues of concern in April.
Congress was divided over the decision to normalize relations, but
united in concern for human rights abuses, with numerous members writing
letters, and making personal communications on behalf of political! and
religious prisoners. In late June-early July, senators Tom Harkin and Frank
Lautenberg traveled to Vietnam, revisiting the infamous "tiger cages" and
also raising contemporary human rights concerns. In the immediate wake
of their visits. the Vietnamese government issued passports to two
dissidents whom it had obstructed in their efforts to apply for emigration
through the Orderly Departure Program.
Japan became Vietnam's most generous donor, but generally
remained silent on human rights concerns. In April, Communist Party leader
Do Muoi visited Japan, winning pledges of a $700 million loan and $36
million grant, in addition to a $480 million package of infrastructure loans
approved earlier in January. Prime Minister Tomiichi Murayama only raised
human rights privately and in very general terms.
In July, the European Union signed a cooperation agreement that
included as Article 1 a clause stating "Respect for human rights and
democratic principles is the basis for the cooperation between the
Contracting Parties and the provisions of this Agreement." the European
Parliament had yet to endorse the agreement as of November. earlier this
year, the Parliament had expressed concern over Vietnam's imprisonment
of religious figures. Since signing the cooperation agreement, the
European Commission stated an intention to increase significantly its
economic and development cooperation activities in Vietnam both
bilaterally and within the context of European Union-ASEAN cooperation.
The Work of Human Rights Watch/Asia
Human Rights Watch/Asia continued to engage the Vietnamese
government in a dialogue on issues of concern while publicizing instances
of abuse to the international community. Human Rights Watch/Asia was
twice forced to cancel plans to visit Vietnam to look at the formation and
regulation of private associations when the government refused to issue
visas because of "inconvenience." Nevertheiess, the organization followed
events closely, issuing press releases criticizing the detention of political
and religious prisoners throughout the year, and a report on law and
dissident in August. "Human Rights in a Season of Transition"
recommended that the international community press the government of
Vietnam to release religious and political prisoners, ratify and implement
the International Labor Organization conventions guaranteeing freedom
of association, and improve the neutrality and transparency of the legal
system. The report was translated into Japanese and widely distributed in
Tokyo to members of the Japanese government and others. Human Rights
Watch/Asia testified on human rights conditions in Vietnam in March before the House of
Representatives and again in August. Human Rights watch/Asia also provided briefings
throughout the year on human rights issues to members of Congress, US State
Department, foreign embassies, and to the Japanese Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Contents
[Hope and Prosperity Home Page]
[Vietnam: Land of Hope and Prosperity]
[Human Rights Development in Vietnam]
[Vietnam War: Not yet over for Vietnamese]
[Human Rights Workshop:
Burma, China, Tibet and
Vietnam]
[Vietnamese Web Sites]
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