Attorney Le Cong Dinh is a prominent Vietnamese attorney who is known for defending the poor and the oppressed in Vietnam. Upon his arrest, the Socialist of Vietnam' police charged Dinh with violation of the article 88 of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam's Criminal code, "conducting propaganda against the government," which carries a sentence of up to 20 years. The arrest came just days after Communist Vietnam's Prime Minister Nguyen Minh Triet addressed the International Association of Democratic Lawyers, on June 6, 2009 at their annual congress in Hanoi. In his speech, Triet vowed to respect and support for "progressive" lawyers and vowed to criticize those who "trample democracy and human rights." Perhaps Triet should criticize himself since it was he and his regime who openly "trample democracy and human rights."
The arrest of Le Cong Dinh sent a warning to all the lawyers and human rights activists in Vietnam that they will be silence if they dare to stand up for the poor and the oppressed in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
The Nhan Dan newspaper, the official newspaper of the Vietnamese Communist Party accused Dinh of using his "privilege" as a defense lawyer for democracy and religious freedom activists to "disseminate propaganda against the regime and distort Vietnam's constitution and laws".
Dinh is the former vice president of the Ho Chi Minh City Bar Association and a managing partner of DC Law, a private law firm in Ho Chi Minh City who clients include Yahoo!, Sun Wah International, Nestlé, and Toyota. After studying law at Hanoi Law School and Saigon University, Dinh received a Fulbright scholarship to study at Tulane University in the United States, where he received a master of law degree in 2000.
Dinh is known for his sympathatic defense of Vietnamese bloggers, human rights activists, democracy and labor rights activists such as Nguyen Van Dai, Le Thi Cong Nhan, and Nguyen Hong Hai (known as Blogger Dieu Cay). Attorney Le Thi Cong Nhan is currently suffering from various illnesses including eye infections due to the unsanitary condition of her jail cell. Nhan' request for treatments and medicines have been đenied by the Socialist Republic of Vietnam' regime.
Democracy advocate and attorney to the poor and the oppressed Le Thi Cong Nhan at her trial
Democracy advocate Father Nguyen Van Ly on trial. Father Ly was denied defense council, when father Ly tries to speak on his defense, he was silence by Communist State Security Officer.
Le Cong Dinh is also known for his criticism of controversial Chinese exploitation of bauxite mines in Vietnam's Central Highlands and of China's claims to dispute offshore islands in the South China Sea. In interviews with the BBC and Radio Free Asia, Dinh has called for multi party elections to accompany economic pluralism in Vietnam, currently a one-party state controlled by the Vietnamese Communist Party.
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam' state run media accuses Dinh of distributing "distorted information" about the Socialist Republic of Vietnam' regime" and colluding with foreign and domestic "reactionaries and counter-revolutionary elements". The state run media claimed that Dinh called for multi-party reforms in published documents, posted pro-democracy articles on the internet, and has the audacity to express his pro-democracy views in interviews with foreign media like the BBC.
After their acceptance into the WTO and their removal as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC), the Socialist Republic of Vietnam regime has stepped up their crackdown on human right activists and the pro-democracy movement in Vietnam. Democracy and human rights advocate groups were now labeled by the Vietnamese government as "terrorist" groups.
In recent years, the Vietnamese government has drastically increased their confiscation of small farms and private properties without compensation or without fair value compensation to build state run business parks, villas and golf courses. Many of the large villas and golf courses was built for the enjoyment of rich foreigners and members of the Vietnamese Communist party elites. This gives rise to the phenomenon known as Dân Oan (victims of gross injustice).
Vietnamese lawyers seeking to defend Vietnamese human rights and religious freedom have faced increase threats and harassment from the Vietnamese government. Lawyer for the poor and the oppressed Dân Oan in Vietnam such as Bui Kim Thanh was involuntarily committed to a mental institution in 2008 and 2006 because of her defense of farmers seeking redress for confiscation of their land by the government.
Attorney Le Tran Luat, who is defending Catholic parishioners from Thai Ha parish in Hanoi, calling for return of government-confiscated church properties was harress by the Vietnamese government. In 2009, State Security Officers raided Luat's law office in Ho Chi Minh City several times, confiscating computers, documents and files. Authorities also prevented him from traveling to Hanoi in March to meet with his clients, detained and interrogated him on several occasions, and pressured him to drop the Thai Ha case. In addition, the state-controlled press has run articles accusing Luat of fraud. Luat's local bar association in Ninh Thuan under the pressure from the government has opened an investigation into his "reactionary, counter-revolutionary activities".
Just a few weeks ago, the official news agency of the People Republic of China announced that the PRC considered the Eastern Sea to be part of China territorial water and that China is instituting a ban on fishing in the South China sea. Much of the area where Vietnamese fishermen had fished for centuries is now considered by the People Republic of China's regime to be "Chinese's territory" and the PRC announced that her navy will "punish" any transgressors. Thousands of Vietnamese fishing boats were grounded in the last few weeks because of fear that they will be fire upon, by the Chinese Navy. According to Le Cong Dinh's friends and family, Dinh may have been arrested because he has agreed to represent the Vietnamese fishermen in a class action law suit against The People Republic of China.
On June 18,2009 the Socialist Republic of Vietnam published a signed "confession" by Le Cong Dinh in which Dinh' s admitted to having violated article 88 of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam's Penal code. The Socialist Republic of Vietnam forbids her citizen from forming any political or labor association. Only one party is permitted in Vietnam, the Vietnamese Communist Party. Dinh admitted in his "confession" that he and his friends was trying to form two new parties called the Vietnam Democratic Party and the Vietnam Labor Party. Dinh also claimed in his "confession" that he was a member of Mr. Nguyễn Sĩ Bình and his democracy advocate group called the Nhan Dan Hanh Dong Party. However, Mr. Nguyễn Sĩ Bình who is currently residing in the U.S denied that Dinh was a member of his democracy group.
The Socialist Republic of Vietnam' state run media produced this picture of Le Cong Dinh supposedly reading his "confession"
The SRV regime claimed that Dinh confessed to participation in a training course in non-violent struggle held in Pattaya, Thailand by the US-based Viet Tan. Also known as the Vietnam Reform Party, the group says it wants peaceful democratic change but Vietnam calls it a "terrorist group". One of the evidence uses by the SRV regime to show Dinh's crime includes Dinh's copy of Gene Sharp "From Dictatorship to Democracy", a book view by the Vietnamese government as tools of "democracy terrorists".
Dinh's copied of Gene Sharp's "From Dictatorship to Democracy" was use as evidence of Dinh' s anti-government tendencies
Prisoners in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam are considered guilty until proven innocent. It's a normal process for prisoners in the SRV to be force to admit their "crimes" and ask for "leniency". The International Bar Association's (IBA's) an international association of lawyers says that Communist Vietnam's "arbitrary" arrest of a human rights lawyer contravenes international legal standards and Vietnam's own constitution.
Le Cong Dinh is one of a growing number of peaceful human rights defenders who are challenging Vietnam’s vague national security laws and other laws inconsistent with the Vietnamese Constitution and international covenants and human right treaties to which Vietnam is a signatory.
Although Attorney Le Cong Dinh had yet to be tried for his "non-violent, pro-democracy activities", the Ho Chi Minh City decided to debar Le Cong Dinh on June 23, 2009 because of Dinh's suspected "pro-democracy activities". Once again, this proves that in the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, a person is presumed guilty until they can prove themselves to be innocent (or until they bribe all the judges).
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