The Vietnam Briefing, released every Monday morning at Vietnam time, looks at Vietnam’s social and political developments of the past week.

Tinh That Bong Lai practitioners were sentenced to a combined more than 23 years in prison

• On July 21, a Vietnamese court in Duc Hoa District, Long An Province, sentenced five monks from Tinh That Bong Lai Monastery, an independent Buddhist temple, and their landowner to a combined total of 23 and a half years in prison under Article 331 of Vietnam’s Penal Code.
• Article 331, which criminalizes those who “abuse democratic freedoms to infringe on State and individuals’ legitimate rights and interests,” is considered a vague and redundant legal code. And due to its vagueness and arbitrariness, the law has been often used by the Vietnamese government to suppress dissenting voices and the freedom of speech in Vietnam.
• According to the convictions, Le Tung Van, the temple’s head monk, received five years in prison, and Cao Thi Cuc, the temple’s landowner, received three years in prison. Other monks, including Le Thanh Nhat Nguyen, Le Thanh Hoan Nguyen, and Le Thanh Trung Duong, each received a four-year sentence, while Le Thanh Nhi Nguyen, another monk, received three and a half years in prison.
• There were also alleged violations of due process regarding the trial. Attorney Dang Dinh Manh, one of the defense lawyers of Tinh That Bong Lai, claimed that one piece of evidence used to prosecute the temple’s monks was collected from an unauthenticated Youtube channel. Meanwhile, Trung Duong, Nhat Nguyen and Nhi Nguyen said they had been tortured and threatened while in police custody. State media reported that several related witnesses were also absent during the hearing.
• Human Rights Watch Asia Deputy Director Phil Robertson said in a statement that Vietnam’s government is now widening its rights crackdown by silencing ordinary people who complain about local officials.
• “All this shows how intolerance for any sort of public criticism is getting worse in Vietnam. Vietnam should reverse these outrageous and unacceptable sentences against all of these persons,” Robertson said.

The family of the convicted Vietnamese blogger – Nguyen Duc Hung – says they were not informed about his trial