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Tag: Pham Doan Trang

  • LIV and Pham Doan Trang in Blasting News: Vietnamese journalist Pham Doan Trang jailed for nine years for defaming government

    Blasting News discloses the calls for Pham Doan Trang’s release from various groups including the U.S. State Department.  Doan Trang is an acclaimed journalist, human rights advocate and co-founder of Legal Initiatives for VIETNAM.

    Title: Vietnamese journalist Pham Doan Trang jailed for nine years for defaming government
    Publish Date: December 16, 2021
    Publisher: Blasting News

    Excerpt:

    Journalist Pham Doan Trang has been sentenced to nine years in prison for defaming the Vietnamese government. The Washington Post noted that the sentence was longer than the 7-8 years which prosecutors had requested. Condemning the December 14 court ruling, U.S. State Department Spokesman Ned Price said Trang had done “nothing more than peacefully express her opinions.”

    Criticizing the government

    The Hill said Trang had written numerous articles criticizing the government of Vietnam. She had also been responsible for forming the environmental organization Green Trees, the Washington Post said. She received the 2019 Press Freedom Prize from Reporters Without Borders and the 2017 Homo Homini Award from the human rights organization People in Need, according to Radio Free Asia (RFA). The U.S.-funded broadcaster also noted that Trang had drawn the ire of the Vietnamese government by authoring a book on political activism.

    Prison sentence is ‘outrageous’

    Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, and the Committee to Protect Journalists responded to the journalist’s prison sentence with posts on Twitter.

    Phil Robertson of Human Rights Watch said the court’s action had been “outrageous.” He posted a link to a Reuters report where he was quoted as saying the incarceration of Trang was “a searing indictment of everything that is wrong with authoritarian Vietnam today.”

    Ming Yu Hah of Amnesty International said the journalist’s actions “should be celebrated and protected, not punished and criminalized.” Ming added that Trang’s ordeal “is cruelly emblematic of the Vietnamese authorities’ repression of peaceful human rights activism across the country.” Ming, too, called the journalist’s prison sentence “outrageous.”

    “It is outrageous that the Vietnamese authorities are convicting Pham Doan Trang, a courageous journalist and human rights defender, who has for years fought for a just, inclusive, and rights-respecting Viet Nam.”https://t.co/94m0yLXOpx December 14, 2021

    In one of its posts on Twitter, the Committee to Protect Journalists said: “Authorities should immediately and unconditionally release journalist Pham Doan Trang and stop imprisoning independent news reporters for their work.”

    A tweet from Pen International included a comment from the chair of the organization’s Writers in Prison Committee, Ma Thida: “This is a reprehensible outcome in a reprehensible case.”

    Nine-year sentence for prominent journalist Pham Doan Trang reaffirms #Vietnam’s ‘abysmal’ #pressfreedom recordhttps://t.co/1A801tXD8c December 15, 2021

    In 2014, Trang helped start a project that would eventually become Legal Initiatives for Vietnam, according to the organization’s website.

    The NGO established its headquarters in California in 2017, the website says. “Legal Initiatives for Vietnam’s mission is to build a democratic society in Vietnam through independent journalism, research, and education,” it says.

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  • France Diplomacy: Vietnam – France deplores the sentencing of Pham Doan Trang

    France reacts on the conviction of human rights defender and journalist Pham Doan Trang and calls for her release.

    Excerpt:

    France deplores the conviction and sentencing to nine year’s imprisonment of Vietnamese journalist Pham Doan Trang, one of the country’s most prominent human rights defenders and one of three recipients of the Reporters Without Borders (RSF) Press Freedom Award in 2019.

    France calls for Ms. Pham Doan Trang’s release and reaffirms its commitment to the freedom of speech and opinion. These rights and liberties are guaranteed by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Vietnam is a party.

    France calls on Vietnam to abide by the international commitments that it has undertaken freely.

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    Vietnam France deplores the sentencing of Pham Doan Trang Dec 15 Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs
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  • Pham Doan Trang in The Diplomat: Vietnam’s Annus Horribilis for Human Rights

    Today’s conviction and imprisonment of human rights defender Pham Doan Trang is part of a concerted crackdown on dissent.

    Excerpt:

    2021 in Vietnam is ending in much the same way as it began, with the imprisonment of high-profile critics of the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP). This time it was the turn of the democracy advocate and woman human rights defender Pham Doan Trang, who was sentenced to nine years imprisonment at a court in Hanoi yesterday after being charged with “conducting propaganda against the state.”

    Observers will be disappointed, but few will be surprised. Today’s news follows the publication of the latest annual report by the Committee to Protect Journalists, which listed Vietnam as having the fourth highest number of imprisoned journalists in 2021. Hopes for Trang were raised slightly in October, however, when her initial trial date of November 4 was delayed following a report by the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (UNWGAD). The statement expressed concern at Trang’s arrest, deemed her arrest to be politically motivated, and called for her immediate release. Officially, the trial was delayed after two members of the prosecution were forced to self-isolate, but observers were hopeful that the UNWGAD statement had pressured the authorities to reconsider a conviction.

    Peaceful critics of the regime like Pham Doan Trang will continue to face persecution so long as the Vietnamese authorities continue to be empowered by overly broad laws like Articles 117 and 331, which criminalizes the spreading of “hostile” information and “abus(ing) democratic freedoms.” These vague prohibitions enable the government to crack down on any criticism to which it takes exception. In spite of its poor record on freedom of expression, Vietnam is likely to be elected to the U.N. Human Rights Council next year. If it is serious about its commitment to human rights, it must either discard or amend these laws so they cannot be applied to peaceful criticism of the government. This is an optimistic view, however, and there is little reason to expect Vietnam to change course any time soon. Expect Vietnam to continue locking up its critics in 2022.

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    Vietnams Annus Horribilis for Human Rights The Diplomat
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  • Pham Doan Trang in Committee to Protect Journalists: Nine-year sentence for prominent journalist Pham Doan Trang reaffirms Vietnam’s ‘abysmal’ press freedom record

    Committee to Protect Journalists calls on the Vietnam government for the immediate release of journalist Pham Doan Trang, and stop imprisoning independent news reporters for their work.

    Excerpt:

    In a one-day trial yesterday, Hanoi’s People’s Court sentenced Trang to nine years in prison under Article 117 of the penal code, a provision that bars “making, storing, distributing or spreading” news or information against the state, international news reports said. She did not plead guilty and will consider an appeal, Reuters reported, citing one of her lawyers.

    Trang, who has been detained since October 2020, reports widely on human rights-related issues, including cases of police abuse; she founded the local legal magazine Luat Khoa and edits and writes for the independent English-language news site The Vietnamese, according to news reports and CPJ research.

    “Pham Doan Trang’s harsh sentencing on bogus anti-state charges reaffirms Vietnam’s abysmal record as one of the world’s worst jailers of journalists,” said Shawn Crispin, CPJ’s senior Southeast Asia representative. “Trang should be released immediately and unconditionally, and be allowed to resume her work as a journalist without fear of reprisal.”

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    Nine year sentence for prominent journalist Pham Doan Trang reaffirms Vietnams abysmal press freedom record Committee to Protect Journalists
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  • Pham Doan Trang in Asia Democracy Chronicles Vietnam: Campaign Against Independent Voices Barrels Forward

    ADC calls on the Vietnamese government to immediately and unconditionally end its relentless persecution of independent voices and release all those currently detained for the exercise of their right to freedom of expression.

    Excerpt:

    The conviction of three leading Vietnamese human rights defenders in relation to their online advocacy signals the continuation of the Vietnamese government’s repressive campaign against independent voices, said ARTICLE 19. Vietnamese authorities should immediately and unconditionally release Pham Doan Trang, Trinh Ba Phuong, Nguyen Thi Tam, and all other arbitrarily detained human rights defenders.

    “These three convictions are unacceptable acts of reprisal against courageous rights defenders and part of a nefarious campaign to silence and intimidate anyone who speaks out against government abuse,” said Matthew Bugher, ARTICLE 19’s Head of Asia Programme. “The Vietnamese government is clearly allergic to criticism and routinely reacts by jailing independent journalists and others who use social media to document and disseminate information about its failures.”

    On 14 December 2021, the Hanoi People’s Court convicted Pham Doan Trang under Article 88 of the 1999 Penal Code, which criminalises the ‘making, storing, distributing or disseminating information, documents and items against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.’ The court sentenced her to nine years’ imprisonment.

    In a statement released ahead of her trial, Pham Doan Trang wrote, ‘The longer the prison sentence, the more demonstrable the authoritarian, undemocratic, and anti-democratic nature of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.’

    Authorities arrested Pham Doan Trang on 7 October 2020, less than a month after five UN Human Rights experts raised concerns about the harassment of independent writers and journalists in Vietnam, including against Pham Doan Trang. She was held incommunicado for over a year before being allowed to meet with her lawyer on 19 October 2021. Court documents indicate that she was targeted for writing about human right issues and meeting with foreign journalists.

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    Vietnam Campaign Against Independent Voices Barrels Forward Asia Democracy Chronicles
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  • Pham Doan Trang in Taz: Nine years in prison for journalist

    Taz talks about press freedom in Vietnam as multi-awarded journalist and human rights defender Pham Doan Trang gets jail term.

    Excerpt:

    Prominent human rights activist and journalist Pham Doan Trang has been sentenced to nine years in prison by a court in Vietnam. The judiciary had accused the author, who has won European human rights awards, of “propaganda against the state”. The verdict was announced on Tuesday.

    Despite decades of openness to foreign investment, the communist country strictly censors the domestic media and is intolerant of those who think differently. Vietnam ranks 175th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ press freedom rankings.

    The 43-year-old was arrested in Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) in October 2020 and taken to the capital Hanoi. According to human rights groups, she was held in pre-trial detention for more than a year without access to a lawyer.

    She has written countless articles, blogs and books on politics, social justice and human rights. She is also the founder of the online magazine Luât Khoa and editor at the online magazine The Vietnamese.

    Convicted in Vietnam, awarded several times abroad

    On Monday, the human rights organization Human Rights Watch (HRW) called for all criminal charges against Trang to be dropped and for her immediate release. “The trial against her and the abusive treatment of her violate the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which Vietnam ratified in 1982,” it said in a statement.

    The Czech human rights organization People in Need Trang had already awarded the “Homo Homini Prize” in 2017, and in 2019 it received the “Press Freedom Award” from Reporters Without Borders in Berlin for particularly effective journalism.

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    Freedom of the press in Vietnam nine years in prison for a journalist tazde
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  • Pham Doan Trang in The Diplomat: Why the West Has Gone Soft on Human Rights in Vietnam

    The Diplomat surmises that countries aligned with the United States’ rivalry with China usually get off scot-free when it comes to their authoritarianism and human rights abuses.

    Excerpt:

    On Tuesday, the Vietnamese activist Pham Doan Trang was jailed by a Hanoi court to nine years in prison. It was “a searing indictment of everything that is wrong with authoritarian Vietnam today,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch.

    Trang, a prominent independent journalist, book publisher, and human rights defender, has been harassed by the communist authorities for years, briefly going into hiding in 2018. She was arrested by the police in October last year and charged with disseminating anti-state propaganda. State prosecutors had asked for Trang to be jailed for between seven and eight years, but the Hanoi People’s Court increased the sentence to nine years.

    Trang has been called the “most famous activist” in Vietnam. Her easy-to-read textbooks on political history, as well as her music and wider activism, especially on environmental issues, made her a key voice on social media. In 2019, Reporters Without Borders awarded her its Press Freedom Prize. She was also something of a key node between the disparate progressive camps, the link between pro-democracy urbanites, environmental campaigners, and rural land-rights activists.

    “This prison sentence is a giant middle finger from Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security to those in the United States and elsewhere who criticize Vietnam’s human rights record,” Bill Hayton, a former correspondent in Vietnam and now of Chatham House, told me. “The Vietnamese leadership knows that it can get away with jailing activists like Trang because Vietnam has become an important component of outside powers’ strategies in East and Southeast Asia.”

    Trang was detained in October last year on the same day officials from the United States and Vietnam met to discuss human rights and freedom of expression. That hasn’t been lost on many commentators, who accuse Western governments of doing next-to-nothing to confront Vietnam (now a close friend of the West because of its stance against Beijing’s aggression in the South China Sea, as well as its  economic importance and key position in global supply chains) about its dire human rights record.

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  • Pham Doan Trang in CSW: Vietnamese activist sentence to nine years in prison

    CSW’s Founder President Mervyn Thomas reacts to human rights defender Pham Doan Trang’s “outrageous” nine year sentence.  

    Title: Vietnamese activist sentence to nine years in prison
    Publish Date: December 15, 2021
    Publisher: CSW

    Excerpt:

    Vietnamese activist and journalist Pham Doan Trang has been sentenced to nine years in prison.

    She was convicted of anti-State propaganda under Article 88 of the Criminal Code at a one-day trial on 14 December.

    Trang’s mother and brother were allowed to enter the courthouse, but police stopped activists attending the trial, confining some to their homes. The harsh sentence of nine years is even longer than the prosecutors’ recommendation of seven to eight years.

    Pham Doan Trang was arrested on 7 October 2020 and was not permitted to meet with her lawyer until 19 October 2021. After a second visit, lawyer Mr Le Van Luan posted on his Facebook page that Trang had been examined for health problems following appeals made to authorities by her defence team, and that an ultrasound had revealed she had a small tumour. Her trial was initially scheduled to take place on 4 November 2021 but was postponed when the prosecutors in her case contracted COVID-19.

    In a letter published by online magazine The Vietnamese  on the day of the trial, Trang wrote: “only extremely foolish and heinous governments would try to extinguish it [pluralism] through repression and the imprisonment of dissidents, writers, journalists, social critics, and democracy and human rights activists”.

    Pham Doan Trang has a long history of peacefully advocating for freedom and human rights in Vietnam as an independent journalist, and the founder of an environmental rights group and several independent media outlets. In 2017, Trang and other writers produced a report on the right to freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) in Vietnam. The report concludes that “no religions (Buddhism, Catholicism, Protestantism, Hoa Hao Buddhism, Caodaism, Muslim, etc.) or beliefs can fully enjoy the right” to FoRB in Vietnam.

    CSW’s Founder President Mervyn Thomas said: “This nine-year sentence is outrageous; Pham Doan Trang is being targeted for her work peacefully promoting social justice and human rights in Vietnam. We concur with the conclusion of the UN human rights experts that Trang is one of many victims of the Vietnamese authorities’ use of vaguely defined propaganda charges, which effectively criminalise the exercise of the right to freedom of opinion and expression. We call on the Vietnamese authorities to drop all charges against Pham Doan Trang and to release her immediately and unconditionally. We further call on the government to release all those detained or imprisoned in retaliation for exercising their human rights or defending the rights of others, including the right to freedom of religion or belief. The US, EU, UK and other trade partners of Vietnam must raise this and similar cases directly with the government, and voice their support for Vietnamese human rights defenders both publicly and in private dialogues with the authorities.”

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    Vietnamese activist sentence to nine years in prison CSW
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  • Pham Doan Trang in Süddeutsche Zeitung: Bullied reporter who absolutely refuses to remain silent

    Luat Khoa and The Vietnamese co-founder Pham Doan Trang’s recent trial saw her charged with “anti-state propaganda” and is now facing 9 years in prison.  The internationally acclaimed author and journalist is a big sore to the Vietnamese authorities whose press freedom and human rights track record is very dismal, ranking 175th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ global press freedom rankings.

    Excerpt:

    Note:  Original texts in German.

    Pham Doan Trang has been messing with the autocratic unity party in Vietnam for 20 years – and is now paying for it with nine years in prison.

    Nothing had been heard or read from Pham Doan Trang, 43, for a year. The Vietnamese journalist and activist was arrested and detained at her home in Hoh Chi Minh City in October 2020, just hours after the annual US-Vietnam human rights dialogue ended. She was taken to Hanoi and placed in solitary confinement. A year later she was allowed to speak to her lawyer. A trial followed, about which little has leaked out in recent weeks, except for the charge: “propaganda against the state of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam” under Article 88 of the 1999 Criminal Code. She has now been sentenced to nine years in prison.

    Until her arrest, Pham Doan Trang wrote mostly about politics and social justice issues. In 2000 she started working for the early internet magazine VnExpres . She switched to web TV stations and wrote books, including ones about discrimination against homosexuals in Vietnam. She was the founder of the independent magazine Luat Khoa and an editor at The Vietnamese Magazine.

    Freedom of the press is particularly bad in Vietnam

    Her colleagues there set up a portrait page for Pham Doan Trang shortly after her arrest. There she tells about her youth. “I borrowed my friends’ songbooks to copy the Beatles , in bad English and with even worse grammar… But that’s how I grew up – with the Beatles.” She studied international economics and discovered the internet. “We didn’t have many books back then, and our reality didn’t correspond to the books anyway,” she says of the online development of her political consciousness. “For the more diligent among us, foreign economic articles – either in other languages ​​or translated into Vietnamese – were an excellent source of information.”

    According to the Committee to Protect Journalists in New York, Vietnam, with at least 23 media workers in prison, is one of the countries in which the most reporters are imprisoned. Vietnam ranks 175th out of 180 countries in Reporters Without Borders’ global press freedom rankings. Pham Doan Trang has been repeatedly beaten, kidnapped, arrested and placed under house arrest in recent years. She was injured so badly that she is limping and using crutches after an operation.

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    Vietnam How the state wants to silence Pham Doan Trang opinion SZde
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  • Pham Doan Trang in The Diplomat: Why the West Has Gone Soft on Human Rights in Vietnam

    The 9-year prison charges against journalist, author and human rights defender Pham Doan Trang made Vietnam’s total disregard for human rights more glaring than ever.  The “change through trade” which supposedly gives Western governments inside track on leveraging for human rights has not been utilized at all.

    Excerpt:

    On Tuesday, the Vietnamese activist Pham Doan Trang was jailed by a Hanoi court to nine years in prison. It was “a searing indictment of everything that is wrong with authoritarian Vietnam today,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch.

    Trang, a prominent independent journalist, book publisher, and human rights defender, has been harassed by the communist authorities for years, briefly going into hiding in 2018. She was arrested by the police in October last year and charged with disseminating anti-state propaganda. State prosecutors had asked for Trang to be jailed for between seven and eight years, but the Hanoi People’s Court increased the sentence to nine years.

    Trang has been called the “most famous activist” in Vietnam. Her easy-to-read textbooks on political history, as well as her music and wider activism, especially on environmental issues, made her a key voice on social media. In 2019, Reporters Without Borders awarded her its Press Freedom Prize. She was also something of a key node between the disparate progressive camps, the link between pro-democracy urbanites, environmental campaigners, and rural land-rights activists.

    “This prison sentence is a giant middle finger from Vietnam’s Ministry of Public Security to those in the United States and elsewhere who criticize Vietnam’s human rights record,” Bill Hayton, a former correspondent in Vietnam and now of Chatham House, told me. “The Vietnamese leadership knows that it can get away with jailing activists like Trang because Vietnam has become an important component of outside powers’ strategies in East and Southeast Asia.”

    Trang was detained in October last year on the same day officials from the United States and Vietnam met to discuss human rights and freedom of expression. That hasn’t been lost on many commentators, who accuse Western governments of doing next-to-nothing to confront Vietnam (now a close friend of the West because of its stance against Beijing’s aggression in the South China Sea, as well as its  economic importance and key position in global supply chains) about its dire human rights record.

    The implicit claim many Western governments have made is that as they trade more with Vietnam, and make Hanoi increasingly dependent on economic links to free societies, they gain additional leverage to pressure the Vietnamese Communist Party (VCP) into purposeful political reform. But so-called “change through trade” hasn’t worked. As Western trade with Vietnam has increased, political rights in Vietnam have deteriorated. A report published by Amnesty International in late 2020 asserted that around 170 prisoners of conscience are currently detained in Vietnam, a record high in recent history. The 88 Project asserts that there are now 217 activists in prison, and another 306 at risk. Freedom House, in its latest survey of political rights across the world, downgraded Vietnam’s score to 19 out of 100, the second-worst in Southeast Asia, after also-communist Laos.

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    Why the West Has Gone Soft on Human Rights in Vietnam The Diplomat
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