Vietnamese Police Attack U.S. Official
Jan. 5, 2011 - The United States has lodged a "strong protest" with the
Vietnamese government after policemen attacked an American diplomat
while barring him from meeting with a dissident Catholic priest in
central Vietnam.
Christian Marchant, a political officer with the U.S. embassy in Hanoi,
was roughed up outside the home for retired priests in Hue where Nguyen
Van Ly, 63, is being held under house arrest after being released from
jail on medical parole last year.
"We are aware of and deeply concerned by the incident and have
officially registered a strong protest with the Vietnamese government in
Hanoi," a State Department official told RFA.
"We plan to raise the issue with (Vietnamese) Ambassador Phung in
Washington today as well," the official said.
"Diplomats are entitled under international law to special protection
against attack. The government of Vietnam has a responsibility to take
appropriate steps to prevent any attack on the person, freedom, or
dignity of diplomats," the official explained.
Ly, One of Vietnam's high-profile human rights activists, told RFA that
the incident Wednesday was witnessed by hundreds of people.
"They all saw police's brutality toward Mr. Marchant," he said.
"They reported that he was wrestled down to the ground right in the
middle of the road. His clothes got dirty. He stood back up and flicked
off the dust."
Asked for his account of the incident, Ly said, "I saw him standing, not
lying on the ground but he looked really strenuously tired."
Ly, who was released from prison in March, 2010, five years before the
end of his eight-year sentence for disseminating anti-government
propaganda, said the six-foot tall Marchant raised his camera high to
take a picture but a policeman prevented him.
"I heard him say that I was a prisoner, he could not allow (the) visit."
Ly said Marchant was bundled into a police car and taken away.
"The embassy officer exchanged words loudly with the police and they
pushed and pulled him to a police car...he yelled out very loud and
resisted hard but they put him in the car, closed the doors and drove
away."
Citizen journalists told RFA about 30 to 40 policemen blocked the
entrance to Ly's home as Marchant, accompanied by a Vietnamese
interpreter, went to meet with Ly at about 10 a.m.
Ly had suffered two strokes in 2009 when he was in solitary confinement
that left him partly paralyzed, and Western governments had repeatedly
demanded to the Vietnamese government that he be freed.
Nguyen Van Ly, 63, suffered two strokes in 2009 that left him partly
paralyzed, and Western governments had demanded repeatedly that he be
freed.
His trial grabbed world headlines as he tried to read out a poem
criticizing Vietnam's communist authorities and was muzzled by police.
He has spent more than 15 years in prison since 1977.
His release from prison last year came after a group of US senators
wrote to Vietnam's President Nguyen Minh Triet, calling for his freedom.
The Roman Catholic Father Ly, a founding member of Bloc 8406, a
pro-democracy movement, was a thorn in the side of the ruling Communist
Party, as he advocated greater human rights in the one-party state.
Reported by Thao Dao of RFA's Vietnamese service and Richard Finney.
Translated by Viet Nguyen. Written in English by Parameswaran
Ponnudurai.
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