HANOI, Vietnam - A court in Vietnam's Central Highlands has given
long jail terms to seven minority people for organising independence protests
earlier this year backed by U.S.-based exiles, officials said on Thursday.
The seven were convicted at a one-day trial on Wednesday in the province of
Daklak and jailed for six to 11 years on charges of disturbing security, and
one was also charged with illegal possession of military weapons, a senior
court official told Reuters.
Thursday's official media said the defendants had been backed by exiles in the
United States, including remnants of FULRO (The United Front for the Liberation
of Oppressed Races), a Vietnam War-era guerrilla army.
The official Vietnam News Agency (VNA) said the court heard that the seven men
had organised protests by thousands people in Daklak in early February to
demand an independent state. It said they had also tried to set up their own
Protestant sect.
VNA said Y Nuen Bya received an 11-year sentence and Y Rin Kpa and Y Nok Mlo,
ten and eight years respectively.
Nay D'ruk and Y Phen Ksor received seven years each and Y B'hiet Nie Kdam six
years. Y Tum Mlo received eight years, four months after being convicted of the
additional weapons charge.
RATTLED AUTHORITIES
The court heard that protesters attacked and destroyed government offices and
caused many days of disorder.
Similar protests by minority people occurred in other provinces of the Central
Highlands in February and March.
The unrest was the worst to hit communist-ruled Vietnam for years. It rattled
the authorities who limited access to the region and stationed large numbers of
police and soldiers there to prevent new outbreaks.
Foreign journalists were not permitted to attend the trial.
The communist authorities blame the protests on incitement by Montagnard
Foundation Inc, a South Carolina-based exile organisation which describes
itself as a human rights group.
The foundation is led by Kok Ksor, a former guerrilla fighter who fought
alongside U.S. forces during the Vietnam War and later emigrated to the United
States.
Hundreds of minority people fled the crackdown to neighbouring Cambodia and 38
were permitted to resettle in the United States, a decision that greatly
angered Hanoi.
The response to the protests provoked fresh scrutiny of Vietnam's human rights
record and encouraged the submission to the U.S. Congress of a bill that would
link future increases of non-humanitarian aid to Vietnam to improvements on
rights.
Vietnam was incensed by passage of the bill by the U.S. lower house earlier
this month and has not ruled out the possibility that it could delay approval
of a long-awaited trade agreement with its former enemy if it is enacted.
23:37 09-26-01