HRW: Vietnam Should Immediately Free Democracy
Activist Vi Duc Hoi
(New
York, April 23, 2011) – Vietnam’s government should immediately release
the writer Vi Duc Hoi, who was sentenced to eight years in prison in January
2011 for “conducting propaganda” against the government,
Human Rights Watch said today. The appeals court
in Lang Son Province will hear the appeal for
his conviction on April 26.
The conviction of Vi Duc Hoi, a former member of the
Vietnamese Communist Party, by the Lang Son People’s Court was based on
the grounds that his articles and internet postings advocating human rights and
democratic reforms constituted a national security crime under article 88 of the
penal code.
“It is outrageous that Vi Duc Hoi is in prison today for simply publishing his
views on human rights and democracy,” said Phil
Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “The government
makes a mockery of rule of law when it imprisons former officials and party
members for nothing more than their constructive criticism.”
By criminalizing peaceful dissent, Vietnam is in
violation of its obligations as a state party to the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Vietnam’s own
constitution, which both guarantee freedom of expression.
Human Rights Watch also said that the court’s order during Vi Duc Hoi’s January
2011 trial that he turn over 56,000,000 VND (US$2,800) that it said he
“illegally received” from overseas human rights groups
and activists was without any legal basis. The sum included the 2009
Hellman/Hammett grant, an annual writers’ prize awarded by Human Rights Watch to
persecuted writers around the world.
“Vi Duc Hoi received the Hellman/Hammett award
in recognition of his courage as a writer despite harassment and repression by
the government,” Robertson said. “The government compounds its abuse when it
tries to rob someone of funds given in recognition of the persecution he has
suffered at the hands of that same government.”
There is no provision for levying a monetary fine attached to article 88 of the
penal code.
Vi Duc Hoi, 56, is a writer and blogger from the remote province of Lang Son
in northern Vietnam near the China border. He is
an ethnic Tay, the largest minority group in Vietnam. His essays on democracy,
pluralism, and human rights and his memoir,
Facing Reality, My Path to Joining the
Democratic Movement (Doi Mat: Duong di
den voi phong trao dan chu), have been widely circulated on the Internet.
Vi Duc Hoi quietly started supporting calls for respect of human rights and
greater democracy in 2006, while still holding important positions in the party
and government apparatus in Lang Son. He was the head of the Committee for
Propaganda and a member of the Party’s Standing
Committee of Huu Lung district. After his changing views became known, he was
expelled from the party, subject to orchestrated public denunciation sessions,
and detained and interrogated. He then publicly affiliated with the dissident
To Quoc (Fatherland) bulletin.
In August 2010, Vi Duc Hoi published a
fictionalized account of the violent death of 21-year-old Nguyen Van
Khuong, who died shortly after being taken into police custody for a routine
traffic violation in Bac Giang province in July 2010. It provides a detailed –
and ostensibly fictitious – description of police officers beating Khuong to
death. News of Khuong’s death at the hands of the police had been widely
reported in the Vietnamese state press as well as by overseas media, independent
bloggers, and international rights organizations,
and had caused a mass protest against police brutality
by thousands of people in Bac Giang during the funeral procession.
In his 2008 memoir, Facing Reality, Vi Duc Hoi wrote: “The biggest loss
for a human being is the loss of the right to be a human being; the biggest
criminal is the one who robs others of human rights; the most pitiful person is
the one who does not understand human rights; the one who deserves criticism
most is the one who forgets human rights; the most cowardly person is the one
who accepts the loss of human rights. I once deserved to be criticized and was
once a coward.”
During the last year, the Vietnamese government has intensified its
suppression of independent writers and bloggers who question government
policies, expose official corruption, or call for democratic alternatives to
one-party rule. Writers, bloggers, and online activists are placed under
intrusive surveillance, detained incommunicado for long periods of time without
access to legal counsel, and sentenced to increasingly long terms in prison.
“Vi Duc Hoi deserves better than this,” Robertson said. “And so do dozens of
other writers and bloggers who find themselves locked up for simply expressing
their views on rights and good governance. When
Vietnam continues to lock up peaceful dissidents, the rest of the world should
question if it can be trusted to take any of its international commitments
seriously.”
For more Human Rights Watch reporting on Vietnam, please visit:
https://www.hrw.org/asia/vietnam