NEWS ANALYSIS, FEBRUARY 23, 2002.

For the last many years, the United States and international groups advocating human rights have raised pressure against Hanoi's condemnable human rights records. Their many criticisms seem not to make any remarkable changes in the related policies of this Communist regime.

When the new leader, Party General Secretary Nong Duc Manh came in power last year, many people were hoping that something new would be coming soon. Greater hopes were even expected after the final ratification of the Bilateral Trade Agreement by the U.S Congress and Hanoi's National Assembly. But realities have had such expectations ended up in the trash basket at the Politburo office.

Within weeks after Manh took his new job, harder measures have been carried out rather widely. A young party member-turned-dissident Vu Cao Quan was arrested because he had voiced his dissent opinion. The Rev. Nguyen Van Ly, a Catholic priest who was leading the long protest demanding religious freedom, was sentenced to 13 years in prison at a 3-hour, closed-door trial without a formal presence of any single defending attorney.

Local public security are still imposing harassment and crackdowns on the Hoa Hao Buddhist Church. "Cultural cops" were given orders to search, confiscate and destroy several books including the famous "Tales of the Year 2000."

Meanwhile, other dissidents who had been Communist regime supporters and Party ranking members were intimidated in day-long interrogations. Those included retired NVA General Tran Do, a one-time chief of the Office of Culture and Ideology at the Politburo, retired NVA Colonel Pham Que Duong, who had been a chief of Military History department of the General Staff. Also among them were well-known dissidents Dr. Nguyen Thanh Giang, poet Bui Minh Quoc, former head of the Political Institute Hoang Minh Chinh, lawyer Le Chi Quang, professors Tran Khue, Ha Xuan Tu... and many others.

They asked the cops to show warrants against them, but none was produced. The Communist leaders may have been afraid of arresting them and sending them to a court because such actions could lead to unfavorable consequences on the field of propaganda. But they keep having their cops watch the dissidents closely, sometimes cutting off their telephone lines and intercepting their mails. Even worse, the Communist leaders had their state-controlled publications disseminate made-up stories regarding their private life to throw mud at the dissidents. People said that a party of that strength with total ruling power shouldn't have relied on such petty devices of a fishwife to defame its opponents.

Often Communist cops resort to harassing innocent people who come visiting the dissidents as a trick to isolate them. Visitors, particularly relatives and pupils of some dissidents - Rev. Phan Van Loi and Rev. Nguyen Huu Giai in Hue - were detained for interrogations for hours at a time without acceptable reasons. Bui Minh Quoc, a poet, was arrested on his way to visit border areas where border lines had been said as being moved several kilometers to the Vietnam side after a secret agreement between Hanoi and Beijing. The charge, as usual, is "attempt to disclose state secrets..."

In many cases such as that of lawyer Le Chi Quang and Doctor Nguyen Dan Que, Communist authorities were holding sessions of "public criticism," or a form of "public denunciations." Residents of the wards where they are living were ordered to attend the public sessions. The Public Security chief cops of the wards presented reports of the dissidents' criminal law violations - usually made up - to the public. The attendants were then compelled to speak up their denunciations against the dissidents. Denunciations must be conforming to the allegations previously made by Public Security reports.

Ironically, in the public denunciating sessions against Dr. Nguyen Dang Que and lawyer Le Chi Quang last month, the two were not permitted to show up. Only the wives and maybe adult relatives were ordered to be present.

In the Central Highlands, the quiet opposition is still a great concerns of the Party. In the last few weeks, Hanoi sent more security force to the region, particularly the northern half of the Kontum province, the home area of the brave and stubborn Sedang tribes. Along with military forces, Hanoi sent more aids to the montagnards in an effort to win their hearts and minds. More TV time in local dialect programs is granted as well as more propaganda publications are distributed. However, it is difficult to predict whether the "stick-and-carrot" policy would be working well to the Montagnards.

Though local Communist authorities in the Central Highlands assert that foreign press corps members are free to visit the region, realities are quite otherwise. On Tuesday (Feb. 19), foreign reporters visited a hamlet where many Djarai tribesmen had fled to Cambodia and would be expatriated under the accord between Hanoi, Phnom Penh and the UN High Commissariat of Refugee.

Many women whose husbands would be sent back cried when the reporters entered their hamlet. Despite imminent dangers while Communist cops were present, they told the reporters that they were worried about their husbands' safety after coming back. The women themselves were under close watch around the clock by Public Security.

On February 13, Vietnamese exiled religious leaders accused Vietnam Communist regime of hounding believers and choking freedom of worship Tuesday. They urged the US Congress to shelve a historic trade pact with Hanoi until its record improves. The leaders told the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) that Vietnam's Communist rulers were bent on tightening their iron grip on religion and dissent.

The report by the USCIRF to the U.S. Congress then affirms that the Communist regime in Vietnam is having worse records. It cites undeniable evidence to support the argument. As usual, Hanoi reacted angrily, saying that the United States was intervening in Vietnam internal affairs.

Besides, Hanoi is confronting waves of protests by dissidents in Vietnam and overseas Vietnamese against its shady agreements with Beijing over the redefined border lines. The Communist regime would not make public the two agreements under which many shameful concessions of the Vietnamese soil to China are made by Hanoi for the interests of the Vietnam Communist Party, not of the Vietnamese people. Hanoi always claims such document state secret material.

The Western world powers often voice their concerns over the democracy and human rights in Vietnam. But it seems that statements only are making nothing big to stop Hanoi from religious intolerance or to promote better human rights records in Vietnam. Western impatience and Hanoi obstinacy employed as its best defensive tactic are turning most international efforts for human rights, religious freedom and democracy into failures.

Many Vietnamese are saying that they become skeptical about the true intention of Western leaders on the human rights issues in Vietnam - and Mainland China as well.

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