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Tag: Press Freedom

  • Pham Doan Trang in IFEX Vietnam: Campaign against independent voices barrels forward

    Vietnamese authorities regularly use the Penal Code to punish human rights defenders, independent journalists and writers, and others exercising their right to freedom of expression.  International human rights experts have repeatedly called on Vietnam to amend its Penal Code in order to make it compliant with international law.

    Excerpt:

    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.

    In September 2021, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that Pham Doan Trang’s detention was arbitrary. In October eight UN human rights experts, including members of the Working Group, noted that she was ‘only the latest victim of the authorities’ use of vaguely defined propaganda charges to persecute writers, journalists and human rights defenders, criminalising the exercise of their right to freedom of opinion and expression to share information.’

    Ahead of the original date for her trial in November, ARTICLE 19 and 27 other human rights and freedom of expression organisations released a statement calling for the Vietnamese authorities to immediately and unconditionally release and drop all charges against her.

    In November 2020, four UN human rights experts expressed their concern about the circumstances of the arrest, detention, and denial of access to lawyers and family members for Pham Doan Trang, Trinh Ba Phuong, Nguyen Thi Tam, Trinh Ba Tu, and Can Thi Theu.

    Vietnamese authorities regularly use the Penal Code to punish human rights defenders, independent journalists and writers, and others exercising their right to freedom of expression.

    International human rights experts have repeatedly called on Vietnam to amend its Penal Code in order to make it compliant with international law. In 2019, the UN Human Rights Committee called on Vietnam to revise vague and broadly formulated legislation and to end violations of the right to freedom of expression offline and online ‘as a matter of urgency.’ In early 2021, four UN Special Rapporteurs stated that Article 117 of the 2015 Penal Code is ‘overly broad and appears to be aimed at silencing those who seek to exercise their human right to freely express their views and share information with others.’

    Vietnam should 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. Moreover, the Penal Code itself must be amended in line with international human rights law.

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  • Pham Doan Trang in United Nations Press briefing notes on Viet Nam

    The UN calls on the Vietnamese Government to repeal all legal provisions that violate fundamental freedoms and to immediately release all these individuals (human and land rights defenders) as well as the many others arbitrarily detained for exercising their rights to freedom of opinion and expression.

    Title: United Nations Press briefing notes on Viet Nam
    Publish Date: December 17, 2021
    Publisher: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

    Full Statement:

    Press briefing notes on Viet Nam

    Spokesperson for the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights: Ravina Shamdasani

    Location: Geneva

    Date: 17 December 2021

    We are deeply troubled by the harsh sentencing of human rights and land rights defenders convicted of spreading anti-State propaganda in Viet Nam.

    In the span of three days this week, four prominent human rights defenders – Trinh Ba Phuong, Nguyen Thi Tam, Do Nam Trung and independent author Pham Doan Trang were sentenced to up to 10 years in jail and 5 years on probation under articles 88 and 117 of Viet Nam’s Criminal Code, all following prolonged pre-trial detention. Trinh was sentenced to 10 years in prison and five on probation; Nguyen to six in prison and three on probation; Do to 10 years in jail and four on probation; and Pham to nine years’ imprisonment.

    Journalist Le Trong Hung, who had announced his intention to run for political office as an independent, is facing trial on 31 December on similar charges. He has been held since March 2021, without access to a lawyer and without being allowed to meet his family.

    The charges against these five people, who were reporting on human rights and land rights and who were arrested in 2020 and 2021, appear to be part of a campaign to silence and intimidate those who raise their voices in defence of human rights. All the cases follow similar worrying patterns that raise serious issues concerning the presumption of innocence, the legality of their detention, and the fairness of their trial. There is prolonged incommunicado pre-trial detention, prosecution under the vaguely worded offence of “spreading anti-State propaganda”, denial of access to legal counsel and closed trials that do not respect international fair trial standards.

    We urge the authorities in Viet Nam to immediately release all these individuals as well as the many others arbitrarily detained for exercising their rights to freedom of opinion and expression.

    We also call on the Government to repeal all legal provisions that violate fundamental freedoms. The articles of the criminal code under which these charges were brought are vague and overly broad and thereby inconsistent with international human rights norms.

    Cases of this kind contribute to a climate of self-censorship in the country and have a chilling effect on media freedom. They also prevent people from exercising their fundamental rights and engaging in public debate on issues of importance.

    ENDS

  • Pham Doan Trang in VOA Tiếng Việt: Tại sao Đảng sợ Phạm Đoan Trang

    Why is the Party afraid of Pham Doan Trang? VOA Tiếng Việt breaks down the reasons why Vietnam’s prominent human rights defender is a threat to the state, and was handed a nine-year prison sentence.

    Title: Tại sao Đảng sợ Phạm Đoan Trang
    Publish Date: December 16, 2021
    Publisher: VOA Tiếng Việt

    Excerpt:

    Note: original texts in Vietnamese

    Ms. Pham Doan Trang, 43, was sentenced to 9 years in prison for “Propaganda against the State” under the Communist Party’s Criminal Law. Lawyer Dang Dinh Manh said, when the court paused, Ms. Doan Trang turned to look at the mother sitting about 5 meters behind. Mrs. Bui Thi Thien Can, more than 80 years old, held hands and raised a thumb: “You are Number One!”

    Pham Doan Trang founded the magazine ” Law Khoa ” to help Vietnamese people understand the law to protect their rights. She worked as a journalist from 2000 to 2013, collaborated with nearly ten domestic press agencies, such as VnExpress, Vietnamnet, Ho Chi Minh City Law Newspaper, VTC Television, etc.

    Why is it that after the prosecutor recommended a sentence of 7 to 8 years in prison, the judge increased it to 9 years?

    Because the Communist Party is afraid. That was the comment of a newspaper in Berlin, Germany, immediately when it announced the verdict.

    Mr. Duong Hong An in Germany introduced the TAZ daily newspaper reporting the trial, under the headline ” Pressefreiheit in Vietnam “. The newspaper wrote the title: “Nine years in prison for female journalists” ( Neun Jahre Haft für Journalistin ). TAZ explained, “The dictatorship gave the sentence too harshly, probably because they were afraid…” Thanks to this newsletter, readers learned that “Vietnam ranks 175th out of 180 countries, in the ranking of “self-sustaining” by the press” of Reporters Without Borders.”

    Why is the Party afraid of Pham Doan Trang? TAZ wrote that they were “afraid of the villagers” that they would continue to fight harder. A month before her arrest last year, Ms. Trang and Will Nguyen (in the US) published a file about the village of Dong Tam, a suburb of Hanoi, where villagers protested against the communist regime’s confiscation of their land and then being harassed. ruthless pressure. TAZ noted that “Two people from Dong Tam commune were sentenced to death, the others were sentenced to many years in prison.”

    TAZ newspaper also published news that the Vietnamese people in the country did not know, because no newspaper or radio station mentioned it: On the Monday before the trial, the international organization Human Rights Watch asked the Communists to Vietnam released Pham Doan Trang immediately. HRW accused the communists of violating the International Covenant on Freedoms that they signed in 1982. TAZ newspaper also recalled, in 2017 the human rights organization “People in Need” in the Czech Republic (Czech) had awarded her with the Homo-Homini Preis (Homo-Homini Preis) award, and in 2019 Reporters Without Borders awarded her the “Press Freedom” award. PEN Center in Germany honored Pham Doan Trang as an honorary member; asked the communist state to release her.

    Professor Nguyen Quang A shows another reason why the Party is afraid of Pham Doan Trang: Because the very crime of “anti-state” they accuse her of is absurd. He wrote, “…in principle no one can oppose a state…but everyone has the right to oppose a government…when it does wrong…”

    Journalist Tuan Khanh also saw the Party’s weakness. Because of the lack of reason, “obscenity.” The Party is afraid of Pham Doan Trang because she “advocates to fight with reason and words.” And the Party does not think of reasons! Secretly, the Party has to use violent actions, language, and degrading. Tuan Khanh recounted that in 2017, after Doan Trang published the book Politics of the People abroad and was arrested, she was taken to a cell. After she asked again and again why she was imprisoned, no one could answer one question. Instead of saying “I just followed the order above,” a young police officer pointed his finger at her face, shouting, “Fuck your face…!” That is the familiar logic and words of the Party.

    The 9-year prison sentence is the language “D.M.” of the uneducated when they lose reason. Nguyen Quang A sees the same 9-year sentence: “…only the weak resort to such brutal repressive measures…” But he also sees the result as “just making more people more determined!” Moreover, “many people see the illegal actions of the government, and that are really harmful to the government.”

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    Tai sao ang so Pham oan Trang
    Tại sao Đảng sợ Phạm Đoan Trang.pdf
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    Why is the Party afraid of Pham Doan Trang
    Why is the Party afraid of Pham Doan Trang_.pdf
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  • 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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    Vietnamese journalist Pham Doan Trang jailed for nine years for defaming government
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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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    Vietnam aujourdhuiinfo Why the West has gone soft on human rights in Vietnam
    vietnam-aujourdhui.info-Why the West has gone soft on human rights in Vietnam.pdf
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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 Article 19 – Vietnam: Campaign against independent voices barrels forward

    Vietnamese authorities regularly use the Penal Code to punish human rights defenders, independent journalists and writers, and others exercising their right to freedom of expression.  Article 19 calls on the immediate release of the 3 leading human rights defenders, including Pham Doan Trang, and for Vietnam to amend its Penal Code in order to make it compliant with international law.

    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.

    In September 2021, the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention found that Pham Doan Trang’s detention was arbitrary. In October eight UN human rights experts, including members of the Working Group, noted that she was ‘only the latest victim of the authorities’ use of vaguely defined propaganda charges to persecute writers, journalists and human rights defenders, criminalising the exercise of their right to freedom of opinion and expression to share information.’

    Ahead of the original date for her trial in November, ARTICLE 19 and 27 other human rights and freedom of expression organisations released a statement calling for the Vietnamese authorities to immediately and unconditionally release and drop all charges against her.

    International human rights experts have repeatedly called on Vietnam to amend its Penal Code in order to make it compliant with international law. In 2019, the UN Human Rights Committee called on Vietnam to revise vague and broadly formulated legislation and to end violations of the right to freedom of expression offline and online ‘as a matter of urgency.’ In early 2021, four UN Special Rapporteurs stated that Article 117 of the 2015 Penal Code is ‘overly broad and appears to be aimed at silencing those who seek to exercise their human right to freely express their views and share information with others.’

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    Vietnam Campaign against independent voices barrels forward ARTICLE 19
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  • Pham Doan Trang in Radio Free Asia: Vietnamese independent journalist Pham Doan Trang is jailed for 9 years

    Trang had called for democracy and good governance in Vietnam, and had spoken with Radio Free Asia and the BBC.

    Excerpt:

    A court in Vietnam has sentenced an independent Vietnamese journalist and activist to nine years in prison following her conviction on a charge of “carrying out propaganda” against the state, her lawyer said on Tuesday.

    Pham Doan Trang, who has won multiple foreign awards for her writing, was sentenced Tuesday at the Hanoi People’s Court, with trial judges handing down a sentence longer than the prison term requested by prosecutors, defense attorney Dang Dinh Manh told RFA.

    “The trial’s atmosphere was pretty tense,” said Manh. “But finally the panel of judges came out and pronounced a sentence of nine years’ imprisonment, which was higher than that proposed by the Procuracy.”

    “They had called only for a seven- or eight-year jail term,” Manh said, adding that the judges in announcing their verdict said that Trang’s actions had been harmful to society, and had therefore called for a harsher sentence.

    The judges had based their decision only on the arguments and information provided by prosecutors and had rejected all arguments presented by lawyers working in Trang’s defense, Manh said.

    “The verdict surprised us, and we think that Pham Doan Trang will certainly appeal against it.”

    The U.S. State Department on Tuesday condemned the conviction and sentencing of Trang, saying she had done nothing more in her writings than peacefully express her opinions.

    “We note as well the recent opinion of the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention, which found Trang’s detention to be arbitrary and in contravention of Vietnam’s international human rights commitments and obligations,” said State Department spokesman Ned Price.

    “The United States calls on the Vietnamese government to release Trang, who has been recognized internationally for her work to advance human rights and good governance in Vietnam, and to allow all individuals in Vietnam to express their views freely and without fear of retaliation,” Price said.

    Writing on Monday on his Facebook page, defense lawyer Ngo Anh Tuan said that in a meeting with Trang on Oct. 19 — her first meeting with lawyers after her arrest — Trang said she had refused during 10 periods of interrogation to confess to the charges against her.

    “In some of these sessions, investigators also asked her if she would be willing to leave Vietnam and live in a foreign country if it seemed she would be sentenced during her trial to many years in prison,” Tuan said, adding that Trang had refused to consider such a move.

    “She said she would never be willing to be a ‘commodity’ to be exchanged with a foreign government,” he said.

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    Vietnamese independent journalist Pham Doan Trang is jailed for 9 years Radio Free Asia
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