VIETNAM - The government will release 10 thousand prisoners. A Bishop: "One
thinks of those who struggle for freedom, Justice, Democracy"
Agenzia Fides
08/29/2011
Hanoi
- The President of Vietnam, Truong Tan Sang, has ordered the release of 10,000
prisoners on the basis of an amnesty, granted annually on the occasion of
National Independence Day, which is celebrated on September 2. According to
preliminary information, these people were put in prison for common crimes, and
no high-ranking dissident politicians are among those who will be released.
There are, however, some representatives who belong to ethnic minorities from
the central Highlands of Vietnam. In that area there are, the so-called "Montagnard"
(mountain people), who are mainly Christians, and have always been repressed and
marginalized by the Vietnamese government and fight for religious freedom and
respect for human rights.
Among the 10,535 prisoners who will be released, 11 are foreigners, serving
sentences for having committed common crimes. The release of prisoners is a
custom on the occasion of Independence Day: 17 thousand of them were released
last year, 5,000 in 2009.
Mgr. Paul Nguyen Thai Hop, OP, Bishop of Vinh, and Chairman of the Commission
"Justice and Peace" of the Episcopal Conference of Vietnam, commented to Fides:
"The amnesty is a measure that is repeated every year and is often for prisoners
held for crimes regarding security and not for people who are in prison for
reasons of conscience. We have not yet the official list of people who will be
released. What people are asking us to remember, on this occasion, are those who
are imprisoned for political and conscience reasons, people who struggle for
freedom, rights, justice, democracy. It is, however, good news that some members
of ethnic minorities of the Central Highlands are released". The Justice and
Peace Commission of Bishops, he concludes, "is following the situation on human
rights, peace and justice in Vietnam with great attention, even in comparison
with non-Catholic intellectuals and members of the Communist Party".
The Vietnamese Criminal Code applies the penalty of imprisonment to those who
criticize the government publicly. The Vietnamese justice has punished Christian
representatives and political groups not recognized by the government with long
prison sentences. According to the Commission for Human Rights in Vietnam there
are at least 258 political prisoners of conscience in the Vietnamese prisons,
detained solely for their ideas.