political rights and provided aid to homeless protestors, dissidents told BosNewsLife Saturday, July 14.
Nguyen Thi Bao Phuong, 25, was arrested last month, June 6, but news of her detention has only just emerged, BosNewsLife established.
The International Movement for Democracy and Human Rights in Vietnam’ (IMDHR), a lose group made up of Vietnamese dissidents and exiles, said she had been "arrested and brutally tortured by Vietnam police in Saigon," a reference to the previous name of Ho Chi Minth City.
HOMELESS PROTESTORS
Police detained the young woman after "she had visited and given out food and beverages to homeless protesters who were gathering in front of the Vietnam House of Representatives" in the city to demonstrate against the nationalization of their properties and lands, the IMDHR added.
The detention was linked also to her participation in a political forum, also known as ‘chat room’ of the Paltalk website. Several other young people participating in similar ‘chat rooms’ have also been detained in recent months and years, BosNewsLife learned.
In a letter to the US Embassy in Hanoi, the group asks Political Counselor Marc Knapper for "humanitarian intervention" to free the woman at a time when her family has apparently been targeted as well by authorities. "Her father has been immediately fired from his employment after her arrest," the group added.
ASSISTANCE URGED
"Your generous assistance and valuable advices are highly appreciated to save a young lady who has a good heart of a Samaritan [and] who should have been completely protected by the Constitution of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam," the IMDHR wrote Knapper. US officials could not immediately be reached for comment, however the US embassy has in the past played a role in the release of some dissidents.
News of the arrest of Nguyen Thi Bao Phuong came as dissidents said that pro-democracy
activist Le Nguyen Sang’s appeal trial is scheduled for July 27, 2007 in the People’s Court of Ho Chi Minh City.
He was detained with two other members of the anti-government People’s Democratic Party, lawyer Nguyen Bac Truyen and journalist Huynh Nguyen
Dao.
A court reportedly sentenced him in May to five years imprisonment with two years of house arrest for allegedly "propagating against Vietnam.
The sentence has been condemned by human rights organizations and Western governments. Several other dissidents, including Christians, have been sentenced to prison terms in recent months.
Rights groups have linked the detentions to the Communist Party’s desire to remain a tight control over the country, despite economic reforms in the Asian nation. (With BosNewsLife’s Stefan J. Bos, BosNewsLife Research and reporting from Vietnam).
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