Viet Nam jails activists

Four Vietnamese men convicted of collecting complaints against the government and sharing them with Western news organizations have had their sentences upheld by an appeals court, Radio Free Asia reported Wednesday. They will each spend between eighteen months and four and a half years in jail.

The four activists – Tran Thi Le Hong, Phung Quang Quyen, Doan Van Dien, and his son Doan Huy Chuong – have been sentenced under Article 258 of Viet Nam’s penal code, which bars “abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the State.”

They were accused of collecting complaints of government land-rights violations and passing them on to news organizations, as well as distributing anti-government leaflets at a meeting in Hanoi before the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in November 2006.

The group is linked to the pro-democracy movement Bloc 8406. Authorities have jailed as many as twelve dissidents associated with the movement over the last year.

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