Catholic sites
blocked in Vietnam
VietCatholic News – 8/09/2009
Catholic sites which help to uncover the persecution against Catholics in
Vietnam have become the latest casualties of the government severe censorship.
It has been known that VietCatholic News has long been on top of the list for
being blocked from domestic viewers, but recently readers from Vietnam have
reported that as of now, the leading sites of Catholics around the world
including Asia-News, Catholic Online, Catholic News Agency, Catholic World News
and Independent Catholic News all have become the latest victims of Vietnam
government's censorship.
Vietnam strictly regulates Internet access to its citizens, using both legal and
technical means. The collaborative project OpenNet Initiative classifies
Vietnam's level of online political censorship to be "pervasive" while Reporters
without Borders considers Vietnam one of 15 "internet enemies". While the
government of Vietnam claims to safeguard the country against obscene or
sexually-explicit content to justify its blocking efforts, but in reality most
of the filtered sites contain politically or religiously sensitive materials
that have been observed as undermining the Communist Party's hold on power while
porn sites can be accessed unrestrictedly.
Also, Amnesty International reported many instances of Internet activists being
arrested for their online activities.
OpenNet research found that blocking is concentrated on websites with contents
about overseas political opposition, overseas and independent media, human
rights, and religious topics. Proxies and circumvention tools, which are illegal
to use, are also frequently blocked.
Initially, the majority of blocked websites are specific to Vietnam: those
written in Vietnamese or dealing with issues related to Vietnam. Sites not
specifically related to Vietnam or only written in English are rarely blocked.
However, recently popular Catholic sites in English which with high rate of
readership have also been added to the black list along with websites of human
rights organizations such as Human Rights Watch, Writers Without Borders,
Amnesty International and other right groups to name a few.
On July 21, Asia-News dropped the bombshell about events that have been taking
place in Vietnam in recent weeks, including widespread reports on ruthless
persecutions of Catholics throughout the country. AsiaNews published a very
lengthy report which went on for several days, noting that, “On July 20, 2009
police in Quang Binh province launched a surprised attack on the unarmed
parishioners of Tam Toa - a struggling parish of the diocese of Vinh in Central
Vietnam - when these Catholics were erecting a makeshift tent as a temporary
place for worshiping services. The assault resulted in hundreds being injured,
and dozens were taken away in police vehicles and detained indefinitely.”
In following days, says the report, “series of articles on almost every state
media outlets filled with false accusations against the victims flooded the
newsstands, putting Tam Toa parish in spot light extremely unfavorable to them.
This time the victims have been portrayed as stubborn, organized criminals who
were out to disturb and destroy the national security and the integrity of the
state. Their fate now is in limbo as no one knows their whereabouts and how
badly they have suffered in the hands of this ruthless regime. Respected,
devoted priests were not excluded and two priests in the central coastal city of
Dong Hoi were badly beaten and left in critical condition.”
The report didn't seem to be acceptable to the Vietnam government which is the
exclusive owner of a massive network of monopoly media which composed of more
than 600 outlets, all are working under strict guidance and supervision of the
ruling Party, all would have to obey the strict media rules and regulations set
out for them or face severe consequences up to and including to withdraw
permission of publishing. Since Vietnam has not been used to adverse news coming
from a foreign, popular source they are apparently not happy with reports on an
ongoing situation of abuse and persecution of Catholics. Action they took to
make sure the Vietnamese public is shielded from the news is extreme though not
unexpected for those who have live under dictatorial, communist regimes such as
China or Vietnam.
Emily
Nguyen