Viet Nam goes back on promise to return church land

After a month of protests and prayer vigils, Vietnamese authorities agreed at the beginning of February to return land seized from the Catholic Church in the 1950s. But now, according to Intellasia.net, the government is going back on that promise.

According to the article, “public workers have repainted the fence surrounding the site, strengthened the gates, and erected new panels with communist symbols and slogans reiterating that the building is state-owned. In addition, new security measures were imposed.”

There are now fears that the government will require further conditions be met before the land is finally returned.

Viet Nam has Southeast Asia’s largest Catholic community after the Philippines, with about 6 million out of a population of 84 million. January’s protests represented a significant challenge to the Communist government, which officially controls all religious activity.

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