Authorities
confirm arrest of two cyber-dissidents
Reporters Without Borders
9.26.06
According to
Agence France Presse, the Vietnamese authorities confirmed on 21 September
that they have arrested cyber-dissidents Le Nguyen Sang and Huynh
Nguyen Dao for distributing pamphlets and posting political documents
online. These activities were "contrary to the interests of the Vietnamese state
and could be interpreted as terrorism," the authorities said.
Nguyen Hoang
Long is the pseudonym used by Le Nguyen Sang, a 48-year-old doctor, while Huynh
Viet Lang is the pseudonym of Huynh Nguyen Dao, a 38-year-old journalist.
According to the US-based People's Democratic Party, an exile organisation that
is banned inside Vietnam, the two cyber-dissidents are being held in a detention
centre in Ho Chi Minh City. The group claims that four more of its members are
also currently detained in Vietnam although the authorities have so far refused
to release any information about them.
Reporters Without Borders reiterates its call for the release of Le Nguyen Sang
and Huynh Nguyen Dao and urges the authorities to say whether or not they are
also holding the four other People's Democratic Party activists. Two other
cyber-dissidents, Nguyen Vu Binh and Truong Quoc Huy, are also
still in prison in Vietnam. Reporters Without Borders calls on foreign diplomats
to try to promote respect for free _expression in Vietnam, which is about to
join the World Trade Organisation.