(Sydney) – Australia should press the Vietnamese government on human rights by seeking clear, concrete, and measurable benchmarks for progress in upcoming meetings, Human Rights Watch said in a recent submission to the Australian government. The 19th Australia-Vietnam Human Rights Dialogue will take place on July 30, 2024, in Canberra.
Vietnam’s abysmal human rights situation continues to deteriorate as the authorities increasingly harass, detain and prosecute peaceful activists. More than 160 people are currently imprisoned in Vietnam for criticizing the government, including on social media. The authorities have increasingly targeted environmental activists. All media agencies remain under the control of the Vietnamese Communist Party: Vietnam is the world’s third largest jailer of journalists.
“Australia has held 18 largely fruitless human rights dialogues with Vietnam over the last two decades and needs to take a new approach,” said Daniela Gavshon, Australia director at Human Rights Watch. “Instead of taking a reactive approach to human rights, the Australian government should press for systemic reforms backed by clear benchmarks.”
Human Rights Watch in its submission recommended that the Australian government focus on five priority areas of Vietnam’s human rights situation: releasing political prisoners and arbitrarily held detainees; ending persecution of environmental activists; respecting labor rights; ensuring due process for criminal suspects and defendants; and ending its repression of the right to freely practice religion and belief.
The Australian government should raise the cases of detained rights activists including Dang Dang Phuoc, Bui Tuan Lam, Tran Van Bang, Nguyen Vu Binh, Nguyen Chi Tuyen, among others, Human Rights Watch said. On June 1, the police arrested a prominent journalist, Huy Duc, and a lawyer, Tran Dinh Trien, for their pro-democracy posts on Facebook. Both were charged with “abusing the rights to democracy and freedom to infringe upon the interests of the State” under the penal code’s notorious article 331.
In March, Vietnamese Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh visited Canberra to upgrade the countries’ relations to a Comprehensive Strategic Partnership. The Australian government should not let improved relations between Australia and Vietnam become an obstacle to addressing the human rights of the Vietnamese people, Human Rights Watch said.
“The Australian government has shed little light on the human rights issues raised with Vietnam during previous dialogues, but they clearly aren’t having an impact,” Gavshon said. “Australia needs to consider a different and more effective approach, and make human rights central to all dealings with the Vietnamese government instead of relegating them to an isolated and inconsequential annual bilateral dialogue.”
