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Vietnam Human Rights Network Requests for an UN Human Rights Rapporteur to Visit Vietnam
In a letter addressed to the Deputy Director of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and released publicly today, Vietnam Human Rights network is calling for an UN Human Rights Rapporteur to Visit Vietnam. The following is the full text of the letter.
Date: August 2, 2007
To: Mr. Craig Mokhiber
Re: Request for an UN Human Rights Rapporteur to Visit Vietnam and asking Vietnam to meet basic human rights to be a member of the Security Council
Dear Mr. Mokhiber:
On the night of July 18, 2007, the Vietnamese government suppressed a peaceful demonstration by over a thousand farmers who were protesting the actions of corrupt local officials. The farmers’ land had been confiscated without respect to ownership and offered to foreign investors for windfall profits.
Vietnam is a member of the International Labor Organization (ILO) but has not ratified the minimum number of ILO Conventions, including workers' rights to organize and to bargain collectively. As a result, workers are denied the rights to organize. Independent unions formed in October 2006 - the Vietnamese Independent Union, and the United Workers and Farmers Organization – were disbanded, and their founders imprisoned or put under house arrest. The regime's Labor Code makes it almost impossible to strike, thus in practice denies workers this right.
In addition, human rights and democracy activists are detained and sentenced on a regular basis. During the first six months of 2007, more than 20 of them have been arrested and prosecuted, according to Amnesty International and media information.
Before joining the World Trade Organization (WTO), Vietnam's regime promised to the world and the US Government that it would respect human rights. Immediately after becoming a member, however, it turned around and imprisoned peaceful democracy advocates. Even its schedule of commitments to the WTO, in practice, restricts Vietnamese citizens' rights to information, by requiring that the import of media products, such as books, newspapers, DVDs, be restricted to state-owned monopolies.
The Vietnam Human Rights Network would like to ask you to appoint a Human Rights Rapporteur to visit Vietnam and look into its regime’s human rights records, especially the land-lost farmers.
Also, the Vietnam Human Rights Network would like to suggest that the Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights voices its opinion about the appropriate role of a non-permanent member of the Security Council. Vietnam must respect basic human rights before it can accede to the membership status that it is seeking for 2008.
Sincerely Yours,
“Robert” Nguyen Le President
Vietnam Human Rights Network |