Vietnam hill tribes say they were duped into protests
EA MAP VILLAGE - Ede minorities living in Vietnam's coffee belt said they participated in protests this month after being lured by vague promises of money and asylum in the United States.
In stories that matched the communist government's accounts of demonstrations by hill tribes on April 10 and 11, coffee farmers in the province of Daklak told a group of foreign media on officially escorted tours they were duped by "bad elements". In the first meetings with foreign media since the protests, Central Highlands officials blamed the Montagnard Foundation, based in the United States, and Kok Ksor, a founding member of defunct armed opposition group FULRO, for inciting the events.
"I saw a big crowd going to Buon Ma Thuot, I heard we would be given money, and be able to resettle in the United States," Y Puk Enuol, 40, a coffee and rice farmer, told journalists and officials outside his wooden house on Wednesday. All the interviews were arranged by local authorities in the tightly secure Central Highlands region, and officials were present at all meetings.
Following violent unrest in February 2001 in the highlands, about 1,000 ethnic minorities who fled to Cambodia for refuge were eventually given asylum in America. In a repeat of those protests, thousands of the minorities -- loosely called Montagnards -- rode tractors and walked to local government offices in Daklak and Gia Lai province over the Easter weekend.
Throwing stones
A member of Enuol's family, Y Rong Nie, said he joined the crowd in throwing stones but did not know if they hit any police. Authorities say the majority of injuries from the protests were suffered by police and militia trying to restore calm.
Ama Cuar, 40, in a house next door to Nie, blamed outside forces for the unrest. "I think bad elements deceived the people here," he said. Cuar, who has five children, said he rode toward the city on a tractor with others from his village, and was prepared to leave without them on a plane to America. He and the other two men say they turned themselves into local leaders for correction.
In the provinces of Gia Lai and Daklak, several dozen were detained, but officials say most were let go with no further charges. Up to three are expected to face trial in Gia Lai and less than 10 in Daklak provinces for social disturbance, disrupting national unity, assaulting authorities and destruction of private and public property.
Hanoi says two people died during the demonstrations, while Human Rights Watch says there were at least 10 deaths. Officials in the two provinces say they expect about a dozen of the protesters to face prosecution for social disturbance. The hill people have been regarded with suspicion by many in the ethnic Vietnamese majority because some sided with U.S. forces during the Vietnam War. Many of the minority people in the highlands practise an unsanctioned form of Protestantism. Some accuse authorities of taking ancestral lands in favour of the majority Kinh.
By Christina Toh-Pantin - Reuters - April 28, 2004
Vietnam police recount attacks by protesters
BUON MA THUOT - Vietnamese police used only rubber batons to quell violent protests this month, officials said on Tuesday, dismissing accusations from rights groups that some protesters were beaten to death. The ethnic minority protesters pelted police with stones and attacked them with metal rods, government officials said. The hill people protesters also vandalised a police station before their demonstration was quelled, the officials added.
"We had no guns," said Major Nguyen Hung, telling foreign reporters how he and his 25 officers confronted about 300 protesters marching into the capital of Daklak province on April 10. "We were trying to talk to them to go back." "We used rubber batons," he said. Eventually, reinforcements from a militia force helped restore order and the crowd dispersed, he said.
Thousands of minority hill people, known as Montagnards, marched to government buildings in Daklak and neighbouring Gia Lai province in the April 10-11 disturbances that human rights group say were over land and religious rights. Rights groups say the protests were a repeat of widespread, violent demonstrations in February 2001 over the same issues.
Many of the minority people in the coffee-growing Central Highlands region practise an unsanctioned form of Protestantism. Some accuse authorities of taking ancestral lands. The hill people have been regarded with suspicion by many in the ethnic Vietnamese majority because some sided with U.S. forces during the Vietnam War.
Mob vandalism
Officials insist that only two people died in the demonstrations which the communist government says were the result of incitement by the "reactionary" U.S.-based Montagnard Foundation. The foundation says there were numerous deaths. Bowing to foreign criticism of a government cover-up of the extent of the unrest, authorities this week allowed a small group of foreign correspondents and U.S. diplomats into the area.
Government officials who accompanied the reporters on the closely orchestrated tour pointed out gashes in the provincial police station's plaster wall and bits of broken glass, the results, they said, of mob vandalism. Officials say that about 3,000 people took part in the protests in Gia Lai province and three people might be prosecuted there for creating social disturbances.
Daklak province saw fewer than 2,500 protesters, and expects to charge fewer than 10 for assaulting officials, destroying property and violating national unity, Nguyen Van Lang, chairman of the people's committee, told reporters on Tuesday.
From a police hospital bed, Ho Bac told reporters he had been trying to persuade about 100 demonstrators to return to their villages when he was attacked. "I was not armed, I was just there trying to talk to the people," the 46-year-old officer said. He said he was hit on the head with a rock and four people then beat him with a metal rod. Hung said 10 of his officers were hurt in the demonstration. All but Bac have been discharged from hospital, he said.
By Christina Toh-Pantin - Reuters - April 27, 2004
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