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UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights - Article 18
"Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance."
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Saturday, June 05, 2004 |
VIETNAMESE MILITARY ATTACKS CHRISTIAN DEMONSTRATORS
By Jeremy Reynalds
Special Correspondent for ASSIST News Service
SPARTANBURG, S.C. (ANS) -- Some of the Christian Montagnards conducting peaceful demonstrations inside Vietnam’s Central Highlands calling for an end to years of religious persecution and confiscation of their ancestral lands were brutally attacked, and others reportedly killed, by Vietnamese paramilitary forces. (Pictured: Demonstrators holding banner).
According to a statement by Human Rights Watch (www.hrw.org/english/docs/2004/04/14/vietna8430.htm), “The human rights situation for Montagnards in the Central Highlands has plummeted to a new low,” said Brad Adams, executive director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. “Vietnam’s policy of repression of Montagnard Christians is only fueling the unrest.”
As Human Rights Watch (HRW) pointed out, the movement by indigenous minority Christians—collectively known as Montagnards—seeks religious freedom by peaceful means and the return of ancestral lands in the Central Highlands.
According to HRW, many Montagnards remain missing since the demonstration. Some stayed away from their villages after the demonstrations knowing that the police planned to make arrests.
According to HRW, “Others have been arrested and their current whereabouts are unknown. Some may be wounded or dead. The provincial hospital in Dak Lak reported 40 injured people (that) night. Montagnards living near Buon Emap in Cu Mgar district, Dak Lak province reported that all of the men in Emap village disappeared the night of April 10. It is not known if they were arrested, or went into hiding.”
In a statement issued by HRW, Adams said “We are extremely concerned that so many are missing or being held incommunicado by the police, and about the possibility of torture and mistreatment ... The Vietnamese government should immediately allow independent observers into the region.”
In a recent press release issued by the Montagnard Foundation, organizational president Kok Ksor echoed the concerns expressed by HRW.
Ksor said the group’s Easter demonstrations were fact based on Christianity and Gandhi’s principles of non-violence. However, he added, “Some of the demonstrators, after brutally (being) attacked by the Vietnamese military and police forces armed with crude weapons such as clubs and metal bars, acted in self-defense.”
Ksor said that Montagnards living inside Vietnam organized the demonstrations and the Montagnard Foundation offered its support. He added, “It is the right of all the Vietnamese people to demonstrate peacefully according to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights ratified by Vietnam.”
Ksor said he and his fellow countrymen are far from being terrorists as the Vietnamese government is claiming. He said, “We only want our human rights and indigenous rights respected according to international law. We also have no word for ‘independence’ in our language but we do have a word for ‘freedom.’ It is this word ‘freedom’ (with) which the government of Vietnam falsely claims that we are seeking independence.”
According to Ksor, the Montagnards are desperate for help. “Our people are crying out for help. Our most immediate concern for our people is that international must be allowed into the Central highlands to monitor the ongoing human rights abuses as recommended by the 2002 Human Rights Commission.”
He added, “The Vietnamese communist government presents defamatory opinions as fact, and use underhanded tactics to discredit any organization that dares to object to their misdeeds,” Ksor said. “It is also trying to link our organization with other groups that have been using violence. I thus advise the international community to carefully examine any and all information that the government of Vietnam puts forth.”
That notwithstanding, Ksor added, “As a Christian I pray not only for our brothers and sisters inside Vietnam who struggle for freedom but also I pray for the Vietnamese communist authorities that persecute us.”
In a related story but in the same release issued by the Montagnard Foundation Ksor said that in addition to covering up the Easter Massacre the Vietnamese Government has also told the United Nations that both Ksor and his organization are terrorist.
Ksor said that the government controlled newspapers even dubbed him a “a desperate terrorist attempting to set up a separatist Degar State in the Central Highlands.”
HRW reported that during the last year, the Vietnamese government has stepped up its persecution of Montagnard Christians, particularly those thought to be following “Dega Protestantism.”
“This is” HRW reported, (www.hrw.org/english/docs/2004/04/14/vietna8430.htm)
“a form of evangelical Christianity banned by the Vietnamese government, which links it to the increasingly popular Montagnard movement for return of ancestral lands and religious freedom. Prior to the Easter protests, authorities had dispatched hundreds of additional police and military to the region—often placing police officers in the homes of villagers suspected of political activity or returnees from Cambodia—and established military checkpoints along the main roads.”
Ksor also accused the Vietnamese Government of “trying to subvert the democratic principles of the United Nations by intimidation and threats.”
He added, “They have formally declared to the UN that the .... Transnational Radical Party (TRP) ... of (which) I am a member of the General Council ... be sanctioned and suspended from the United Nations forums.”
According to its web site (www.radicalparty.org/welcome2.html) the TRP is “an association of citizens, parliamentarians and members of government of various national and political backgrounds who intend to achieve, through nonviolent Gandhian methods, a number of concrete objectives aimed at creating an effective body of international law with respect for individuals and the affirmation of democracy and freedom throughout the world.”
Ksor said, “I cannot stress the urgency of how our people inside Vietnam cry for help and also what a terrible injustice will be done if Vietnam is permitted to dictate to the United Nations who can and who cannot be allowed to speak in the United Nations. I am not a terrorist and the Transnational Radical Party must be allowed to support myself and other repressed peoples in the United Nations.”
Ksor said that in mid July the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations will decide whether or not he is a terrorist and whether the TRP will be permitted to speak freely for oppressed peoples in the United Nations.
“Vietnam cannot be allowed to hoodwink the United Nations in this fashion. These intimidation tactics are a political stunt to prevent word of Hanoi’s brutal human rights abuses from reaching the ears of the international community,” Ksor said.
The Montagnard Foundation may be contacted by going to www.montagnard-foundation.org. Human Rights Watch may be contacted at www.hrw.org
8:36:33 AM 
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© 2004 Radio Free China
Last Update: 6/30/2004; 1:19:01 PM
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