398
Amnesty International Report 2017/18
in unfair trials, and long-term
imprisonment. Prominent activists faced
restrictions on movement and were subject
to surveillance, harassment and violent
assaults. Prisoners of conscience were
tortured and otherwise ill-treated.
Suspicious deaths in police custody were
reported, and the death penalty was
retained.
BACKGROUND
Dozens of state company officials were
arrested and prosecuted during an anti-
corruption campaign, including those also
holding government and Communist Party of
Viet Nam positions. Several were sentenced
to death for embezzlement. In July, state
security officials abducted a former
businessman and government official while
he was seeking asylum in Germany, and
forcibly returned him to Viet Nam to stand
trial for embezzlement and economic
mismanagement; Vietnamese authorities
maintained that he had returned voluntarily.
During the assessment of Viet Nam’s
human rights record under the UN UPR
process, the government stated that by
February it had implemented 129 out of 182
recommendations made during the review in
2014. No amendments were made to vaguely
worded national security legislation used
against peaceful dissidents to bring it into line
with international law and standards.
Viet Nam hosted meetings of the Asia-
Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum
throughout the year, including the leaders’
summit in November.
REPRESSION OF DISSENT
The crackdown on freedom of expression
and criticism of government actions and
policies intensified, causing scores of
peaceful activists to flee the country. At least
29 activists were arrested during the year,
and others went into hiding after arrest
warrants were issued. They were charged
mostly under vaguely worded provisions in
the national security section of the 1999
Penal Code or detained on other spurious
charges. Bloggers and pro-democracy
activists were particularly targeted, as well as
social and environmental activists
campaigning in the aftermath of the 2016
Formosa Plastics toxic spill that killed tonnes
of fish and destroyed the livelihoods of
thousands of people. At least five members of
the independent Brotherhood for Democracy,
co-founded by human rights lawyer and
prisoner of conscience Nguy
ễn Văn Đài, were
arrested between July and December.
1
They
were charged under Article 79 (activities
aimed at overthrowing the People’s
Administration), which carried a punishment
of up to life imprisonment or the death
penalty. Several were previous prisoners of
conscience. In August, the same additional
charge was brought against Nguy
ễn Văn Đài
and his associate Lê Thu Hà, who had been
held incommunicado since their arrests in
December 2015 on charges of “conducting
propaganda against the state” under Article
88.
At least 98 prisoners of conscience were
detained or imprisoned, an increase on
previous years despite some releases on
completion of sentences. They included
bloggers, human rights defenders working on
land and labour issues, political activists,
religious followers and members of ethnic
minority groups. The authorities continued to
grant early release to prisoners of conscience
only if they agreed to go into exile. Đ
ặng
Xuân Di
ệu, a Catholic social activist and
blogger arrested in 2011, was released in
January after serving six years of a 13-year
prison sentence. He was immediately flown
into exile in France. In July, Pastor Nguy
ễn
Cong Chinh was released four years before
the end of his 11-year sentence and
immediately flown to exile in the USA. Both
men were tortured and otherwise ill-treated
while imprisoned.
Trials of dissidents routinely failed to meet
international standards of fairness; there was
a lack of adequate defence as well as denial
of the presumption of innocence. Human
rights defender and blogger Nguy
ễn Ngọc
Nh
ư Quỳnh, also known as Mẹ Nấm,
(Mother Mushroom), was sentenced to 10
years’ imprisonment for
Amnesty International Report 2017/18
399
“conducting propaganda” (Article 88) in
June. Land and labour activist Tr
ần Thị Nga
received a nine-year sentence on the same
charge with five years’ house arrest upon
release in July.
2
In October, after a trial lasting
just a few hours, student Phan Kim Khánh
was sentenced to six years’ imprisonment
and four years’ house arrest upon release,
after conviction under Article 88. He had
criticized corruption and lack of freedom of
expression in Viet Nam on blogs and social
media. He was also accused of being in
contact with “reactionaries” overseas.
In May, the authorities revoked the
Vietnamese citizenship of former prisoner of
conscience Ph
ạm Minh Hoàng, a member of
Viet Tan, an overseas-based group peacefully
campaigning for democracy in Viet Nam. He
was forcibly deported to France in June.
TORTURE AND OTHER ILL-TREATMENT
Reports continued of torture and other ill-
treatment, including beatings and other
assaults, of peaceful activists by individuals
believed to be acting in collusion with
security police. In September, Viet Nam’s
initial report on implementation of the UN
Convention against Torture, ratified in
November 2014, acknowledged challenges
and difficulties in implementation due to an
“incomplete legal framework on human
rights”, among other reasons.
Prisoners of conscience were routinely held
incommunicado during pre-trial detention,
lasting up to two years. Detainees were
denied medical treatment and transferred to
prisons distant from their family home.
The whereabouts of Nguy
ễn Bắc Truyển, a
human rights defender arrested in secret in
July, were not disclosed to his family until
three weeks later. He was held
incommunicado and denied access to
medication for pre-existing medical
conditions.
3
Denial of medical treatment was used to try
to force prisoners of conscience to “confess”
to crimes. Đinh Nguy
ễn Kha, an activist
sentenced to six years’ imprisonment for
distributing leaflets critical of Viet Nam’s
response to China’s territorial claims in the
region, was denied follow-up treatment after
a medical operation.
4
Hòa H
ảo Buddhist and
land rights activist Tr
ần Thị Thúy continued
to be denied adequate treatment for serious
medical conditions since April 2015.
FREEDOM OF ASSEMBLY
The authorities used unnecessary or
excessive force to disperse and prevent
peaceful gatherings and protests, in
particular those relating to the Formosa
Plastics toxic spill in April 2016. In February,
police and plain-clothes men attacked
around 700 mainly Catholic peaceful
protesters gathered in Ngh
ệ An province
before marching to present legal complaints
against Formosa Plastics. Several individuals
were injured and required hospital treatment,
and others were arrested.
5
DEATHS IN CUSTODY
Deaths in police custody in suspicious
circumstances continued to be reported. Hòa
H
ảo Buddhist Nguyễn Hữu Tấn died after
his arrest in May.
Police claimed that he
committed suicide, but his father said that
the injuries on his body suggested that he
was tortured before being killed.
DEATH PENALTY
A Ministry of Public Security report published
in February revealed the extent of
implementation of the death penalty, with an
average of 147 executions annually between
August 2013 and June 2016. The report
stated that five new lethal injection centres
were to be built. Only one execution was
reported by official media during 2017, but
more were believed to have been carried out.
Death sentences were handed down for drug
offences and embezzlement.
1. Viet Nam: Four peaceful activists arrested in connection with long-
detained human rights lawyer (
ASA 41/6855/2017
)
2. Viet Nam: Female activist sentenced to nine years in prison (
ASA
41/6833/2017
)
3. Viet Nam: Missing human rights defender at risk of torture − Nguy
ễn
B
ắc Truyển (
ASA 41/6964/2017
)
4. Viet Nam: Necessary medical treatment denied to prisoner − Đinh
Nguy
ễn Kha (
ASA 41/5733/2017
)