I. Dr. Cu Huy Ha Vu’s Arrest

A little after midnight on November 5, 2010, police burst into the Mach Lam Hotel in Ho Chi Minh City after “being informed by the people” about possible prostitution and drug activities in Room 101.[1] The police discovered a couple in the room who were not married to each other and checked their ID cards. The man was Dr. Cu Huy Ha Vu, one of Vietnam’s most outspoken legal activists. The woman was Ho Le Nhu Quynh, a real estate entrepreneur.

Police took the pair to Ward 11 police station where they searched Dr. Vu’s laptop and two USBs. In his computer they found documents they described as promoting “the elimination of the leading role of the Vietnamese Communist Party and article four of the Constitution,”the latter being the legal rationale for one-party rule in Vietnam.[2]The case was then transferred to the Security Investigation Agency of the Ministry of Public Security. At 4:20 p.m. the same day, the agency dispatched a team of officers with a warrant to search Dr. Vu’s home in Hanoi, where they confiscated a number of documents, floppy discs, cassette tapes, and CDs. [3] The Security Investigation Agency then issued an order to temporarily detain Dr. Vu, pending further investigation.

At 7:10 a.m. on November 6, the Ho Chi Minh City police newspaper, Cong An Thanh Pho Ho Chi Minh, published an article about Dr. Vu’s arrest. Headlined “Lawyer Commits Administrative Violation and Threatens to Assault Officers on Public Duty,” it featured an incriminating photo of a shirtless Cu Huy Ha Vu seated in a room together with a fully-dressed woman. It stated:

At midnight on November 4, 2010, during a routine administrative check, the police of Ward 11 District 6 discovered a couple in Room 101 of the Mach Lam hotel. […] Cu Huy Ha Vu and Q (born in 1974, lives in Ward 11, District 6, a lawyer and a member of the Ho Chi Minh City Bar Association, without a marriage certificate). [4] The man was bare-chested and wore only a pair of underwear; the woman was fully clothed. The contents of the room included a small suitcase, a laptop, and personal clothes and belongings. In the trash bin police found two used condoms (the Public Security office has proposed to have the contents of the condoms examined). The police officers produced a report, witnessed and signed by the owner of the hotel; however, only Ho Le Nhu Quynh signed the document. Cu Huy Ha Vu protested and refused to sign. Vu appeared uncooperative and threatened to assault members of the inspection team. After finishing the procedures to record the administrative violations that occurred at the hotel, the ward police took the two subjects to the police station to work with them, but both refused to provide information. The police office is currently investigating the case.[5]

On the afternoon of November 6, two high-ranking Ministry of Public Security (MPS) officials, Lt. Gen. To Lam and Lt. Gen. Hoang Kong Tu, held a press conference to announce that charges had been filed against Dr. Vu. The officials stated that Dr. Vu had “produced documents that opposed the state of Vietnam, employed propagandistic rhetoric as a form of a psychological warfare, demanded the overthrow of the regime and the realization of pluralism and a multi-party system, opposed the interest of the nation and called for foreign intervention.”[6] Dr. Vu was also accused of “producing documents that spread false and fabricated information, distorted the [role of the] leadership and management of the state; [thereby] causing confusion for the people, and provoking, advocating for, and exhorting against the state, and slandering and offending the honor of the leaders of the state.”[7]

The incriminating documents referred to at the press conference included two lawsuits that Dr. Vu had filed in June 2009 and October 2010 against Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung for approving two controversial decisions: a 2007 Decision permitting bauxite mining in the Central Highlands of Vietnam and a 2006 Decree prohibiting class-action petition.