10/29/2015

Further limitation of religious freedom in Vietnam expected

Vietnamese Parliament discusses new law on religion (Press Release)

Dao Cai bishops during a religious service in Vietnam. Photo: ayngelina via Flickr

The Society for Threatened Peoples (STP) fears that a new law will lead to further restrictions of religious freedom in Vietnam. “The law, which is in its first reading by the Vietnamese Parliament, is a violation of international human rights provisions that Vietnam is obliged to respect,” said Ulrich Delius, the STP’s Asia-expert, in Göttingen on Thursday. “There will be no progress concerning the implementation of the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of religion. With the new law, the local authorities will have all possibilities to harass religious communities and arbitrarily prevent believers from practicing their religion.”

Thus, religious communities are denied the right to make decisions on important matters concerning their faith or the way they are organized. Especially their religious practice is to be closely monitored by public authorities and made subject to authorization. “In addition, the imprecise and ambiguous formulations of the legal text are an open door for arbitrariness,” criticized Delius. Thus, religious festivals can be prohibited if they are seen as a “violation of public or social order” and the communities can be suspended if they are accused of “prohibited acts”.

The Interfaith Council in Vietnam criticizes the new law as well. As it is  expected that it will keep people from practicing their religion rather than promoting religious freedom, the organization demands changes to the text. The Vietnamese Association to Protect Freedom of Religion (APFOR) has launched a campaign – especially focusing on the young people in Vietnam – to emphasize the importance of a law to secure freedom of religion.

Following a visit to Vietnam in July 2014, the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion, Heiner Bielefeldt, criticized massive violations of religious freedom. Further, in a report on religious freedom issued by the US State Department in 2015, Vietnam is listed as one of the countries with the most violations of freedom of religion. Thus, the government is responsible for severe measures of persecution against unregistered religious communities and for intimidations and arbitrary arrests of their representatives. Affected religious communities include Buddhist organizations as well as the Buddhist Khmer Krom, the Catholics, Protestant indigenous peoples of the Hmong or Degar, the Mennonites, Hoa Hao and Cao Dai.

More than half of the 93 million inhabitants of Vietnam consider themselves to be Buddhists. Seven percent are Catholics, two percent are Protestants and three percent belong to the Cao Dai.


Header Photo: ayngelina via Flickr