Leading Vietnamese Dissident Sentenced to Prison
By SETH MYDANS
Published: April 4, 2011
BANGKOK — A prominent Vietnamese legal scholar who sued the prime minister and called for multiparty democracy was convicted of propaganda against the state Monday and sentenced to seven years in prison and another three years under house arrest. The case was one of the most highly charged political trials in Vietnam in years.
European Pressphoto Agency
Police escorted Cu Huy Ha Vu, center, 53, from his trial in Hanoi on Monday after he was sentenced to seven years in jail for spreading 'propaganda against the state.'
The scholar, Cu Huy Ha Vu, 53, the son of a Communist revolutionary and well-known poet, had drawn unusually vigorous support, much of it spread on the Internet. Catholic churches held prayer vigils over the weekend and a large crowd gathered across the street from the courthouse in Hanoi during the half-day trial.
“I did not commit the crime of spreading propaganda against the state,” Mr. Vu told the court, according to news agency reports. “This criminal case was invented against me. This case is completely illegal.”
Standing in a white shirt and necktie and reading a long verdict, Judge Nguyen Huu Chinh said, “Born and raised into a revolutionary family, he did not sustain that tradition but instead committed erroneous acts.”
He added: “Cu Huy Ha Vu’s behavior is serious and harmful to society. His writings and interviews blackened directly or indirectly the Communist Party of Vietnam.”
A small number of Western journalists and foreign diplomats were allowed to attend and to watch the proceedings over closed-circuit television. One of Mr. Vu’s lawyers was ejected from the court after making procedural objections, and his three other lawyers walked out in protest.
Mr. Vu, who holds a law degree from the Sorbonne, is not licensed to practice in Vietnam but runs a law firm in Hanoi with his wife and has spoken out on a variety of sensitive issues.
He was arrested in November and charged with antistate propaganda for posting critical articles on the Web and giving interviews “maligning party and state institutions and policies,” according to the government.
In calling for a multiparty system he said the Communist Party serves only “the illegal benefits of a small group” and he criticized the jailing of “hundreds of thousands” of former South Vietnamese soldiers and officials after the Communists won the Vietnam War in 1975.
In 2009 he sued Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung for approving a controversial Chinese-run bauxite mining operation in the Central Highlands and last year he sued him again for signing a decree that prohibited class-action lawsuits.
Mr. Vu is the latest of dozens of Vietnamese lawyers and activists arrested over the past five years for challenging the government. He had faced up to 12 years in prison on the charge, which is often used against political dissidents.
“The authorities were determined to make an example of him,” said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of Human Rights Watch, “and I’m sure they are doing this with one eye to try to tamp down and push back into the corner many of these organizations and activist groups that have come out in support of him.”
Mr. Robertson said he had received reports that a number of people who had gathered around the courthouse had been arrested. He said it appeared that the authorities had tried to call in bloggers for appointments to keep them from reporting on the trial.
He said he had seen nothing to indicate that the government’s hard line against dissent was related to the current uprisings in the Middle East.
A clandestine video distributed on the Internet Monday showed police officers in dark green uniforms diverting traffic and blocking the crowd from approaching the courthouse. Much of the crowd was drawn by calls on the Internet that included maps of the streets around the courthouse that went to far as to indicate the location of public toilets. Vigils at Catholic churches were inspired by Mr. Vu’s support last year for Catholics embroiled in a land dispute with the authorities.
The vigorous support on the streets and the Internet probably worked against Mr. Vu as the government seeks to demonstrate its control, said Carlyle A. Thayer, a Vietnam specialist at the University of New South Wales. “The question is why they can’t do a better job of controlling the Internet,” he said. “The answer is they can’t, it’s out of control.”
As in other high-profile political trials, the outcome was probably decided ahead of time at a high level, Mr. Thayer said. “The prime minister may be a liberal economic reformer but he’s not liberal politically,” he said. “Someone who launched repeated attempts to undermine his decisions is likely to have incurred his wrath.”
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