Penalty: House arrest
Location: 3 Nguyen Thuong Hien Street, Dalat, Lam Dong Province, Viet Nam
Telephone: (84-63) 821-675 (disconnected by authorities April 7, 1997)

Born October 3, 1940 in Ha Tay province in northern Vietnam, Bui Minh Quoc is also known under the pen name Duong Huong Ly.

Bui Minh Quoc was a Communist Party member and well known poet in North Vietnam. After the war, he was assigned Chairman of the Writers and Artists Association of Lam Dong province, and later Editor-in-Chief of the Langbian Magazine.

In late 1988, Bui Minh Quoc organized and led a delegation of young intellectuals and artists traveling throughout Vietnam. They stopped along the way to campaign other intellectuals and writers to join them in asking the Vietnamese Communist Party for a democratic social structure and freedom of the press. Immediately after the trip, Party leaders in Hanoi terminated Bui Minh Quoc’s position at the Langbian Magazine and expelled him from the Party. Despite the punishment and threat to his personal safety, Bui Minh Quoc continued to openly present his views to the National Assembly, the Party Central Committee, the Fatherland Front, the People's Supreme Inspectorate, and the State media.

• In an October 3, 1993 letter, he wrote: “I earnestly suggest the following urgent actions: (1) Respond promptly to the 7-point petition by Hoang Minh Chinh; (2) Print and distribute to all citizens the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which our government is a signatory; (3) Move Marxism-Leninism to its proper place as the ideological choice of the Party and do not impose it on the people; (4) Drop Article 4 of the Constitution and issue a set of laws on the operation of the Vietnamese Communist Party; (5) Redress past injustices publicly, completely, and systematically; (6) Add to the current laws on the press allowances for private newspapers; (7) Change current election laws to guarantee people's right to run for offices instead of letting the Party assign the seats in advance; (8) Stop considering the topics of multi-parties and pluralistic systems taboos, but organize public and fair debates on these matters so that people can take appropriate steps together in the effort to democratize the country in peace, stability, and development.”

• After the poetry collection Poetic Flashes in the Interrogation Chamber by Bui Minh Quoc found its way across and out of Vietnam in April 1998, Public Security cadres forced their way into his residence, ransacked the place, and took away most of his writings and reading materials. In the following days, the dissident was interrogated at the local Public Security office from early morning to after sunset each day. His phone service was also disconnected.

Using the pretext of Directive 31/CP, which authorizes local Public Security cadres to detain up to two years suspected citizens without trial, authorities have placed Bui Minh Quoc under house arrest. The tactic of economic isolation has successfully kept away most visitors and buyers of the hand-carved dolls in Vietnamese traditional costumes which the Bui Minh Quoc family makes and provides their only means to earn a living.

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