Today August 8, 2014, we (our family) received a notice from the
office of” Civil Court Execution”, a division of the Court District # 3
saying that they are requesting our family to pay a court fee worth of
$400,000VN (we believe it is the fine) in exchange for possible pardon
of our father, Mr. Nguyễn Văn Hải (pen name blogger Điếu Cày), who was
illegally sentenced and convicted in the trial of Vietnam Free Press
Club, but later the charge was altered as tax evasion. However the
charge which has always been denied by the defendant.
This is the latest action from the Vietnam communist government pressing
on those defendants in a quick and secret trial (family and relatives
not allowed to attend), which up until now the main defendant, Mr.
Nguyễn Văn Hải still has not received the final verdict from the highest
court, despite of multiple appeals and complaints of unfair trial. The
incident is occurring in the event of the visit from the United Nations
Inspector, Mr. Heiner Bielefeldt to verify if Vietnam in compliance with
UN regulations on freedom of speech and religion. The action of sending
such notice would portrait an urgent need of improving human rights but
at the same time it would serve as a trap notice to make the defendants
confessing on the charge that they always denied.
My family have always affirmed and insisted that my father has done
nothing wrong and innocent to any charges. He only performed his civil
rights which have always been allowed in the Constitutions of Vietnam.
In addition, there were several times security inspector agent
mentioning the fact that the arrest of my father served as a way to
retain good diplomatic with China (My father wrote articles against
China telling the situation that Vietnam government has given up land
borders and water territories to China. He also called demonstration
against the aggressive China). Therefore, many appeals and complaints
from our family were not considered and reviewed. The overall of this
case would also portrait a situation that the Vietnam government can
arbitrarily arrest and release anyone with fabricating evidences set up
by the authorities as it has been the case when they arrested my father.
Please be reminded that in the previous visits to my father and he said “he rather stayed in prison to death to awake the people realizing thereal political situation in Vietnam.”
The trial of Free Press Club was brought to trial on September 24, 2012
with three (3) defendants- Nguyễn Văn Hải (my father), Tạ Phong Tần and
Phan Thanh Hải, which my father received the most severe sentence with
12 years in prison and 5 year of house arrest. He was locked and
isolated from other inmates without cause or any reason. He has
attempted to appeal the mistreatment at the prison where he stayed but
the appeals were locked many times by the prison authorities, leading to
his hunger strike lasting over 30 days during the months of June and
July 2013 to demand the review of the appeal. Also those who helped him
during the hunger strike were brutally beaten and transferred to a more
remote location (a thousand kilometer away from home) to make the family
visit more difficult and miserable like the case of Mr. Nguyễn Xuân
Nghĩa.
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