May 17, 2001
Hanoi (dpa) - Vietnam on Thursday arrested a dissident Catholic priest who recently testified to the U.S. Congress about human rights abuses in the communist-ruled state, the government said.
Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly was arrested at sunrise by security personnel in the central province of Thua Thien-Hue and will be held in detention for at least two months while prosecutors prepare a case against him, a local official said.
"Father Ly was arrested (Thursday) morning, and we have a well-founded reason and enough evidence to decide to arrest him," Dang Cong Dieu, chairman of the Phu An commune people’s committee, told the German Press Agency dpa.
Ly has continued his religious lectures "blackening socialist Vietnam, distorting the party and state policies, and defaming President Ho Chi Minh," Dieu added.
Vietnam’s foreign ministry confirmed the arrest.
"Father Nguyen Van Ly has been arrested and detained for acting against the law," the ministry said in a statement.
"Recently Ly continued with activities to cause public instability and provoke activities against the local government which is detrimental to local security and order," it added.
Ly, 53, endured a full-scale assault by Vietnam’s state-run media in March, when several newspapers ran front-page attacks on him saying the Catholic priest was a "traitor" involved in a "wicked plot" to destroy the communist regime.
In February, in testimony prepared for the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, Ly said Washington should delay ratification of a landmark U.S.-Vietnam trade agreement on human rights grounds.
Ly also branded the late revolutionary leader Ho Chi Minh a war criminal. He was put under house arrest a month later.
Dieu said Ly was arrested in part because of his refusal to cooperate with local authorities on household registration issues and his violation of the house arrest order.
The foreign ministry appeared to corroborate these reasons, saying Ly "failed to adhere to an administrative restrictions order."
The provincial people’s committee dismissed him from his post as of April, but Ly continued his attacks on the state, Dieu added.
Father Ly had reportedly asked to abolish Article 4 of the Constitution, which asserts the Communist Party is the ruling force in state and society, and sent his testimony demanding a multiparty system in Vietnam to the U.S. Congress.
"Those actions can not be tolerated," Dieu said.
Vietnam claims freedom of religion under its constitution.
Hanoi has appointed all Vietnamese Catholic bishops since 1975, when communists defeated the U.S.-backed Saigon regime to end the Vietnam war.
Earlier this week, Vietnam intensified controls on dissident Buddhist monks Thich Huyen Quang and Thich Quang Do by putting their pagodas under 24-hour surveillance and cutting their telephone lines.