Diana cited in rejecting press freedom calls
HANOI - Communist-ruled Vietnam claimed a curious ally in Britain's late Princess Diana
Tuesday in an article in an official newspaper rejecting calls for press freedom.
Making a rare admission, an article in Tuesday's official Quan Doi Nhan Dan (People's Army) daily,
said there had been ''some voices asking for freedom of speech, of the press and publishing'' in
Vietnam.
The article, entitled ``Who does press freedom serve?,'' said the model of the Western media was
neither suitable nor practical in Vietnam, where the sector was highly sensitive.
``The Western press propagandizes heavily about racism, violence and sex to an extent that it is
condemned by their leaders and citizens,'' it said.
``The Western press also intrudes so much into private lives it is unbearable for many citizens. The
death of Princess Diana is an example of the painful consequence of such a 'free press.'''
The paper did not say who in Vietnam had made calls for press freedom but spoke of a ``dangerous
plot'' of the type hatched by anti-communist exiles that amounted to little more than demands for
freedom to print ``counter-revolutionary propaganda.''
``That kind of freedom is intolerable. True freedom of the press can only be in the hands of our people
and our Party.''
Reuters - October 30, 2001.
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