Vietnam buddhist burns himself to death in rights protest
HANOI - A Vietnamese peasant has died after setting himself on fire in protest at the communist authorities' repression of
religious freedoms, the outlawed Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV) said Monday.
Ho Tan Anh, 61, doused himself with petrol in the Revolutionary Mothers' Memorial Park in the Thanh Khe
neighbourhood of Vietnam's third city of Danang early Sunday, the church's Paris office-in-exile said in a
statement.
"It is clear that the communist party and the state are determined to destroy the UBCV," the statement quoted
Anh as saying in a letter written shortly before his death.
"I have therefore decided that the only way I can protest is by setting my body on fire to denounce repression
against the UBCV and all other religions."
Security police in Danang declined to comment on the protest when contacted by AFP.
Anh, a provincial official in the outlawed church's youth movement, took his action in defiance of church
leaders, the UBCV statement said.
But he told the church that another 13 of its followers in the province were prepared to follow his example.
Anh said his protest had been prompted by a renewed crackdown against the UBCV in June during which he
had undergone a day-long interrogation by security police.
The communist authorities launched the crackdown in response to a renewed campaign by the UBCV for the
release of the church's ailing 83-year-old patriarch, Thich Huyen Quang, from detention at a remote pagoda in
central Vietnam.
The authorities reactivated a three-year-old house arrest order against church number two Thich Quang Do --
a nominee for this year's Nobel Peace Prize -- and detained a number of other church leaders.
It is the second time this year that religious dissidents have resorted to self-immolation to protest against the
communist authorities.
In March, a member of the outlawed unofficial leadership of the Hoa Hao sect torched herself to death in the
Mekong Delta.
A few days afterwards, police in the commercial capital of Ho Chi Minh City arrested several dozen followers
of the sect in a city park following what the authorities described as an abortive mass self-immolation bid.
The tactic has particular resonance here because of its use by Buddhists during the Vietnam War in their battle
against staunchly Catholic South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem.
On June 11, 1963, 66-year-old Thich Quang Duc set fire to himself in the then Saigon in a protest against the
US-backed regime which made headlines around the world.
In a stunning propaganda own-goal which paved the way for Diem's subsequent ouster in a US-sponsored
coup, his widely unpopular sister-in-law Tran Le Xuan glibly referred to the protest as a "barbecue".
Vietnam's communist authorities recognize just five official religious leaderships. All other religious groups and
rival leaderships remain outlawed.
Agence France Presse - September 3, 2001.
|