VIETNAM
Nguyen Khac Toan
(Released on January 26, 2006)
Former North Vietnamese army officer and businessman Nguyen Khac Toan, forty-seven, was arrested on January 8, 2002, a day after meeting prominent dissident Nguyen Thanh Giang. Mr. Toan, an outgoing entrepreneur, was known to have assisted persons whose property had been confiscated by local authorities petition the government for redress. He was charged with having “collected complaints, information, documents and illegal articles spread by opposition figures in the country in order to put out information distorting the political situation” in Vietnam, according to the Communist party newspaper, Nhan Dan. Toan, Nhan Dan reported, had “vilified and denigrated Party and state officials, sending emails providing information to certain exiled Vientamese reactionaries in France.”
Nguyen Khac Toan’s lawyer has only been given limited opportunity to speak alone with his client before the trial. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison under Article 80 of the Vietnamese Criminal Code for “spying” and three subsequent years of house arrest. The trial and the severity of the sentence confirm that the authorities are cracking down on dissent. One April 2nd, he will have an appeal trial.
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