Vietnam's human rights scandal
Government-controlled newspapers in Vietnam last
Thursday condemned Michael D. Benge's Jan. 13
Washington Times Commentary Forum article, "Terrifying
abuses in Vietnam." On Saturday, the Embassy of Vietnam
issued a news release slandering Mr. Benge by accusing him
of carrying out acts of sabotage against Vietnam.
In his article, Mr. Benge brings to light the Vietnamese
government's ongoing and systematic abuse of the
Montagnard people, who fought alongside U.S. forces during
the Vietnam War. As usual, the Vietnamese government's
response distorted or deliberately omitted facts.
For instance, Mr. Benge is a senior adviser to the
Montagnard Human Rights Organization, not Human Rights
Watch, as the government's newspapers reported. Of course,
I'm sure the government was confronted with several
dilemmas. First, it is not surprising that it would hesitate to
admit that there is a Montagnard Human Rights Organization
— or, more important, that Vietnam's human rights record is
so abysmal that there are several human rights organizations
concerned about the abuses.
Another distortion is the newspapers' contention that the
Vietnam Human Rights Act failed to pass the U.S. Senate. In
truth, one senator, John Kerry of Massachusetts, is keeping
the bill from a vote. In a behind-the-scenes maneuver, Mr.
Kerry blocked the bill from coming to the Senate floor,
where it surely would pass, as it did overwhelmingly in the
House of Representatives.
In its attempt to slander Mr. Benge and cover up the truth
of who he is and the abuse of the Montagnards, the
Vietnamese embassy failed to mention another important fact:
Mr. Benge is an expert witness concerning Vietnamese
human rights violations. He was held in a North Vietnamese
communist prison, where he was tortured, held in solitary
confinement, starved and beaten, from 1968 to 1973. This
was in violation of the Geneva Convention Relative to the
Treatment of Prisoners of War, which Vietnam signed. Mr.
Benge also buried fellow prisoners who died of abuse and
deliberate neglect at the hands of the North Vietnamese
government. Mr. Benge was a noncombatant when he was
captured — a civilian working to help the Montagnards and
Vietnamese as a member of the U.S. Agency for International
Development, the same agency to which Vietnam now has its
hand out for assistance.
No one who loves and cares for the Montagnards and the
majority of the Vietnamese people wants to stand in the way
of normalized trade. However, Americans do expect that in
return for that trade, the Vietnamese government will treat all
of the people of Vietnam with dignity and respect. The United
States can forgive our former enemies; however, the United
States will never forget our former allies.
I challenge the Vietnamese ambassador to open the
Central Highlands to controlled tours and truly independent
public inspections not guided by the communist government.
If he accepts this challenge, I — and I'm sure Mr. Benge as
well —will gladly provide the names and locations of
Montagnards who have been subjected to the government's
religious repression and human rights abuses to that
independent party in order to verify our claims. Is the
Vietnamese government willing to accept this challenge?
By Gregory J. Stock, Special projects officer "Save the Montagnard People Inc." - The Washington Times - January 23, 2002.
Vietnam's human rights scandal
I was taken aback while reading the completely fabricated
claims in Michael Benge's Jan. 13 Commentary Forum
column.
He tries to smear the respected U.N. High Commission
for Refugees (UNHCR) by weaving a story about two
Vietnamese policemen pressing a UNHCR official to force
117 Montagnard people into the hands of Vietnamese police
to face torture, prison or death. Instead, a series of meetings
among Vietnam, Cambodia and UNHCR have been held in
order to peacefully repatriate the refugees.
The events last year in the Central Highlands were caused
largely by land disputes resulting from mismanagement by
local authorities, as observed by former U.S. Ambassador
Pete Peterson after his fact-finding trip to the region last July.
Mr. Peterson said, "Local officials are working hard to
improve the quality of life of their citizens and are seriously
addressing the people's grievances over land distribution."
To make it worse, hostile outsiders fed the people
misleading information and instigated them to flee to
Cambodia. This was acknowledged by a senior counsel of
the U.S. House of Representatives' International Relations
Committee who visited Vietnam and Cambodia last summer.
Many demonstrators testified that they were given money
(50,000 Vietnamese dong; $1 U.S. equals 15,111 dong) to
show up at the demonstration. This fact was confirmed by
several Vietnamese and foreign professionals working in
Vietnam.
In addition, Mr. Benge challenges the common sense and
intelligence of those who have visited and worked in Vietnam
through the years with his terrifically fictitious tales describing
how the local authorities in the Central Highlands treat the
people of their own tribes.
The fact is that one of the priorities of Vietnamese
government policy is to promote economic, cultural and
social development in mountainous areas and improve the
living standards of ethnic minorities. Vietnam's achievement in
poverty alleviation has been praised recently as exemplary by
the World Bank and the United Nations. Our 54 brotherly
ethnic groups live harmoniously, hand-in-hand, addressing the
legacy of war and building the country.
Regarding religious life, an independent American
observer gave a firsthand account in a letter to the U.S.
Senate. He wrote from Vietnam: "[R]egarding 'destruction of
churches and temples' — that seems to me absurd, given the
rate of construction of new churches all over the country,
proudly displaying the construction date with large plaques
over the main door: 'Built in 1999' or more recently. Yes, the
government did tear down a Protestant church in the central
region after it had been built in a security border area, against
warnings by local officials who approved a different site for
the church. When officials realized the building had been
erected illegally, they responded by enforcing the law. The
perpetrators recorded the scene on videotape, obviously
preplanned, and used it in the U.S. to prove that there was
'destruction' of churches and temples by the government
here."
Since the September 11 tragedy, Vietnam has taken
concrete anti-terrorist measures in cooperation with the
United States. Anyone who has a little knowledge of the
Vietnamese culture will not find it difficult to apprehend the
sincerity of our condolences and sympathy.
By Nguyen Thi Thai Thong, Press attache, Embassy of Vietnam Washington - The Washington Times - January 23, 2002.
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