Vietnam court upholds democracy activist's jail sentence

HANOI -- Vietnam's Supreme Court of Appeals has upheld the jail sentence of a democracy activist and former journalist for a communist publication who was convicted of espionage after publishing articles critical of government policy and giving testimony to a US human rights panel.

Nguyen Vu Binh, who had been sentenced to seven years in jail followed by three years of house arrest, announced he would go on a hunger strike until he is freed.

''For me, it's either freedom or death," he declared in his final statement to the court on Wednesday.

In December 2000, Binh, 35, resigned from the Communist Party ideological review, Communist Review (Tap Chi Cong San), and sent letters to the country's top political leaders announcing his intention to form an alternative political group, the Liberal Democratic Party. He went on to publish several articles critical of the government on the Internet.

In July 2002, Binh submitted testimony on Vietnam to the US Congressional Caucus on Human Rights. In August 2002, he posted an article criticizing the settlement demarcating the Vietnam-China border. He was arrested the following month, and convicted of espionage on Dec. 31, 2003.

The verdict stated Binh had exchanged information with foreign organizations that slandered Vietnam's Communist Party and government. The US State Department issued a strongly worded call for Binh's release. ''No individual should be imprisoned for the peaceful expression of his views," it stated, adding that the sentencing ''violates international standards of human rights." The State Department said it was particularly concerned that Binh may have been targeted because of his testimony to Congress.

According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, five people are currently jailed in Vietnam for airing critical views on the Internet or via e-mail. In June 2003, Internet essayist Pham Hong Son was sentenced to 13 years imprisonment. After protests by foreign governments and human rights organizations, his sentence was reduced to five years on appeal. Foreign diplomats had expressed the hope that the appeals court would take a similar step for Binh.

Binh was accompanied inside the courtroom only by his wife, his father, and his lawyers. A small group of foreign diplomats and press gathered outside the courthouse, but were prevented from entering by dozens of uniformed and plainclothes security agents. Also refused entry were Binh's wife's family and several elderly Vietnamese political dissidents.

''Binh's family asked me to help defend him, but I haven't been permitted to enter," said dissident Hoang Minh Chinh, who waited on the street outside the courthouse. Chinh, 85, has been a fixture of Vietnam's tiny political opposition since being ousted from his post as director of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism in 1964.

''They accuse Binh of espionage," Chinh said. ''How can he be a spy when he proclaims his opinions openly on the Internet?"