PARIS, 12th March 2008 (VIETNAM COMMITTEE) - The US State Department's Country Reports on Human Rights Practices in 2007, released on Tuesday in Washington D.C., condemned Vietnam's "unsatisfactory" human rights record in a 52-page overview of the legal and extra-legal barriers to citizens' enjoyment of human rights in Vietnam. Describing the Socialist Republic of Vietnam as "an authoritarian state ruled by the Communist Party of Vietnam", the report noted that in 2007 "citizens could not change their government, and political opposition movements were prohibited. The government continued its crackdown on dissent, arresting a number of political activists and disrupting nascent opposition organizations…". "Prison conditions were often severe. Individuals were arbitrarily detained for political activities and were denied the right to fair and expeditious trials. The government reinforced its controls over the press and the Internet and continued to limit citizens' privacy rights and freedom of speech, assembly, movement, and association". The Vietnamese government "persisted in placing restrictions on the political activities of religious groups [and] maintained its prohibition of independent human rights organizations. Violence and discrimination against women remained a problem. Trafficking in women and children for purposes of prostitution continued. Some ethnic minority groups suffered societal discrimination. The government limited workers' rights, especially to organize independently, and arrested or harassed several labor activists". Whereas the State Department reported that "in March [2007] the government repealed Decree 31, a provision on administrative probation often used to punish perceived political dissidents. However… the government also used other decrees, ordinances, and measures, such as Article 88 [of the Criminal Code – "conducting propaganda against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam"] to detain activists for the peaceful expression of opposing political views", Vo Van Ai denounced Vietnam's adoption of Ordinance 44 in 2002, an even more prohibitive act of legislation that authorises not only administrative detention without trial, as Decree 31/CP, but also permits the internment of dissidents in psychiatric hospitals or "Social Protection Centres" for bad elements of society. Vo Van Ai called on Vietnam to immediately repeal Ordinance 44.   more »

This lengthy report is strong in specifics and notes the many arrests and imprisonments for advocating political reform, which is crime under Article 88 of the Vietnamese Constitution of 1992. Portions are in bold by the editor of VietAm Review on topics that are frequently cited -- prison labor, specific prisoners, political parties, and the book Perfect Spy by Larry Berman, which is soon to be published in Vietnamese by the state-controlled press. To access the whole report by link, it is: http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2007/100543.htm   more »