Vietnam activists see an opening

Tran Ngoc Ha crouched on a small blue plastic stool in a grove of woods a dozen miles outside the noisy bustle of the city. In his gamble to bring political change to his tightly controlled communist homeland, he knew it was the only place safe enough to talk freely.

To shake the ever-present government agents, the underground newspaper publisher had insisted that a Western reporter travel four hours on a circuitous route -- beginning at 4 a.m., going by cab and motorcycle, reciting various code phrases (“Do you want coffee?” “No, I’d rather be fishing.”) along the way.

Speaking softly and keeping a vigilant eye, he said his covert army of resistors finally sees hope amid the gloom: Several political parties have recently formed in Vietnam without seeking government approval -- a sure sign, he says, that the Communists are slowly losing their iron grip on Vietnamese culture and thought.

“This is a breakthrough,” said Ha, who is so fearful of being identified by the government that he insisted on using a pseudonym. “One group declaration drew 118 signatures from inside Vietnam, brave people who gave their names and addresses. Before this year, they would either be in jail or be dead.”

For years, Ha and other agitators have pushed for human rights and a two-party system in one of the world’s last remaining communist states. Working through grass-roots cells as their forefathers once did to defeat French and U.S. troops, they chronicle Communist Party wrongdoing -- such as corruption, embezzlement and land grabs -- and recruit new members.

Now Vietnamese democracy activists sense unprecedented opportunities to publicize their plight -- and take their underground fight to the streets. This week, President Bush and other world leaders will visit Vietnam for this year’s Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Hanoi. The high-profile gathering comes as the U.S. Congress is contemplating lifting trade restrictions against the former enemy state, some dating to the Vietnam War era, and as the country is poised to join the World Trade Organization.

“In the last 10 months alone, the situation in Vietnam has changed more than in the entire past 10 years,” said Diem Do, the Orange County-based chairman of Viet Tan, or the Revolutionary Party to Reform Vietnam. “Overnight, new pro-democracy groups have sprung up to challenge the government’s monopoly on power.”

Dissidents know their window of opportunity may be short. Wary of negative publicity, government agents have backed off on their harassment of activists. And three Vietnam-born U.S. citizens who had been accused of plotting violence against the Hanoi government were given light sentences last week and ordered deported. But it’s anyone’s guess how quickly the strong-arm tactics will return, dissidents say.

As he nervously sipped coffee in a hotel lobby here in the city formerly known as Saigon, activist Do Nam Hai echoed the international call for action.

“Trade and economic acceptance must go hand in hand with human rights and democracy,” he said. “For the world to grant one without demanding the other would be a painful defeat for the people of Vietnam.”

Human rights groups have called for the U.S. to take a harder stand with Vietnam over its treatment of dissidents, and some members of Congress have tried to block bilateral trade over the issue. Rights groups say that hundreds of political prisoners are being held in Vietnam, which denies that dissidents are detained, saying that only those who break the law are prosecuted.

Bowing to international pressure, Vietnam announced last month it was abolishing a decade-old law that allowed the government to detain people for two years without trial, in the name of protecting national security.

Many say it’s still not enough.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-San Jose) sent a letter to Bush last month asking him to publicize the human rights effort inside Vietnam during his upcoming APEC trip. She insisted that despite mounting pressure, Hanoi has “consistently refused to substantively improve the human rights situation in Vietnam.”

In 2004, the State Department for the first time designated Vietnam a “country of particular concern,” citing religious and human rights violations.

“In Vietnam today, it’s not permissible to talk about basic things like human rights and democracy,” said Sara Colm, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch. “Those are words that have landed people in prison.”

Officials have raided Internet cafes that antagonists have used to post underground essays. In September, the government released an activist who had spent more than four years in prison. His crime: translating articles from the State Department website for an online journal. The articles were titled “What is democracy?”

But dissidents claim new victories in their democracy battle.

Each day, more Vietnamese risk arrest by frequenting Internet cafes to express ideas, Ha said during the meeting in the woods. “People don’t believe in the Marxist doctrine anymore,” he said. “The influence of the Communist Party is slipping.”

Still, he knows the prodemocracy movement has its work cut out for it. The government controls 600 newspapers and 100 radio and TV stations throughout Vietnam. The activists run only two. But more are being launched. And employees are trying to unionize so officials can no longer harass editors.

“There are 3 million Internet users in Vietnam,” Ha said. “But only 10% have computers at home. The government has declared war on the Internet cafes, so we have to keep working to get our word out.”

The battle is far from won.

In February, Hai and another dissident were at an Internet cafe in Hanoi when 10 agents stormed the business. They interrogated the 47-year-old for five hours, accusing him of “violating state security and sending documents harmful to the Republic of Vietnam.”

Since then, his phone line has been cut three times and he has been brought into police headquarters for interrogation on scores of occasions, he said. Because of police pressure, he said, he was fired from his job as an engineer in a bank. After agents learned he had landed another job at an insurance company, he lost that position too.

“When I go to Internet cafes, they are always there,” he said. “They stand right behind my back, peering over my shoulder.”

Police have also pressured his parents, aging Communist Party members, telling them their son is a terrorist who is working to bring down the government.

In October, after Hai co-wrote a manifesto for expanded democracy in Vietnam, the harassment increased, he said. Every day for weeks, he was required to report to police headquarters for daily interrogations.

“It was the same questions, again and again,” he said. “Who are my contacts? What are their names? Where can they be found?”

Recently, Hai drew the line: One day, he refused to show up. Since then, he has dodged agents: “Nothing has happened to me yet. But I know they are out there.”

Dissident Nguyen Chinh Ket knows he is another marked man.

Ket was breathing hard as he hurried into the downtown hotel lounge here. He slumped into a chair, wiped his brow and quickly turned to peer over his shoulder.

“I know they are behind me,” he said. “The bullies are always following.”

After signing an open letter announcing a new alliance of pro-democracy resistors from banned political parties, the former sociology professor and book translator was recently arrested with two others in a coffee shop here and forced to endure daily interrogation sessions.

The government’s response to his politics had already cost him his careers as teacher and translator. Now officials rifled the 54-year-old’s home, confiscating two computers and copying his files. Since then, they have confronted him about his so-called subversive ideas, morning to night.

His livelihood gone, he says, there is nothing left but the political fight.

“I’m a very normal person and I’m afraid of the police,” he said. “But what they don’t know is that their persecution keeps me going. The ultimate goal to the journey is freedom and democracy, not just for me but for 84 million people in Vietnam. That thought keeps me in peace.

“I am willing to sacrifice my life for that very beautiful ending.”

john.glionna@latimes.com