Vietnamese journalist sentenced to five years in prison
A court in Hanoi on Wednesday handed down
sentences to a journalist and a relative who tried to hide him from
authorities.
Le Van Dung, an activist and independent
journalist who publishes to Facebook and YouTube, was sentenced to five years
in prison and five years’ probation for “propaganda against the state.”
The court handed Dung’s 66-year-old uncle
Nguyen Van Son an 18-month suspended sentence for helping the journalist hide
from police.
Dung denies the charges, according to his
lawyers and family.
Ha Huy Son, one of the lawyers representing
Dung, described the court’s decision as an “unjust verdict, with no basis.” He
added that they will appeal.
Dung, a 51-year-old journalist also known as
Le Dung Vova, was arrested for his reporting in June 2021.
He posted videos and articles to social media
about corruption and land confiscations, and commented on political and social
issues.
An indictment cited by state media alleged
that Dung “made and posted to the internet 12 video clips” between March 2017
and September 2018 that included propaganda against the state, defamed the
government, spread false news, caused confusion, and were insulted the “honor
and prestige of the Party and State leaders.”
Vietnam’s state-run radio Voice of Vietnam
quoted part of Dung's statement to the court, in which he said it makes no
sense to argue about the legal system in Vietnam.
His lawyer, Ha Huy Son, gave VOA the full
statement.
In it, Dung said that the accusations against
him have “no legal basis. It does not follow a standard or a rule. I am not
guilty.”
A second lawyer, Dang Dinh Manh, wrote on Facebook after the trial that while Dung
admitted posting content to social media, “he has consistently rejected the
views that the statements in the clips are illegal.”
Dung’s wife, Bui Thi Hue, told VOA that she
and his mother were not allowed to attend the trial, even though the court said
it was “open to public.”
The Hanoi People’s Court did not immediately
respond to VOA’s request for comments.
Human Rights Watch earlier said Vietnam
should drop the charges and that Dung is one of more than 60 people being
prosecuted for speaking out.
“Vietnamese authorities persist in treating
any sort of criticism of the government as a grave threat to be prosecuted with
long prison terms,” the rights group’s deputy Asia director Phil Robertson said
on Tuesday.
“International donors and trade partners of Vietnam should
press Hanoi to listen to its critics instead of persecuting them,” he added.
With limited space for independent reporting
in Vietnam, many independent bloggers and journalists use social media to
report or comment on sensitive issues.
The country has one of the worst records on
the global press freedom index, ranking 175 out of 180 countries where 1 is
freest. Accusations of propaganda against the state and abusing freedoms are
regularly used to jail critics, media watchdog Reporters Without
Borders says.
An activist arrested in July on propaganda
charges lost his appeal against the sentencing on Thursday.
The appeals court in Nam Dinh province upheld
a sentence of 10 years’ prison and four years’ probation for rights activist Do
Nam Trung, his lawyer told VOA.
“This is an unjust judgment,” said the
lawyer, Dang Dinh Manh. He added that under Vietnam’s penal code, violations of
speech should be punished only under civil charges.
“Trung has held the view that his statements
in his video clips and articles are exercising his right to freedom of speech
as provided by the constitution, and therefore he believes that the verdict is
wrong”, Manh said.
Trung, 40, was arrested on July 6, 2021, for
posting six video clips that authorities said were “distorting content” and
“defaming the government,” according to state-run media.
“Vietnam routinely prosecutes people for
simply expressing their views critical of the government, making it one of the
most dangerous countries in Southeast Asia to be a human rights activist,” said
Robertson of Human Rights Watch.
“Authorities should immediately and
unconditionally release [Trung] for speaking his mind about the government.
Vietnam should also immediately repeal the rights-abusing charge of ‘propaganda
against the state,’ which has been used so frequently to target government critics,”
he added.
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