A new page on the Viet-Am Review website (www.vietamreview.net)  features current essays, letters, and statements about democracy and human rights in Vietnam by people who have been imprisoned by the Communist government there beginning in the 1950s and 1960s and as recently as 2007. 

The first essays featured are by the elder dissident Hoang Minh Chinh; the American Marine, a civilian who was imprisoned by the Communists from 1968 - 1973 and now activist for human rights in Vietnam Mike Benge;and Vietnamese dissident poet Nguyen Chi Thien.

Father Nguyen Van Ly's prison wisdom is his own poetry, in English translation by Andrew Lam, editor of New America Media.

The notices on the Prison Wisdom page link to recent online publications by the former prisoners and news articles about them.  Some are in Vietnamese and some in English.

Jean Libby, editor
VietAm Review