{"id":46756,"date":"2022-10-20T13:00:03","date_gmt":"2022-10-20T13:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/queme.org\/?p=46756"},"modified":"2022-10-24T21:36:43","modified_gmt":"2022-10-24T21:36:43","slug":"joint-letter-to-the-un-secretary-general-antonio-guterres-visiting-vietnam","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/joint-letter-to-the-un-secretary-general-antonio-guterres-visiting-vietnam\/","title":{"rendered":"Joint letter to the UN Secretary-General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres visiting Vietnam"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/queme.org\/app\/uploads\/2022\/10\/joint-letter-to-UNSG-2022-1024x280.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-46757\" width=\"600\" height=\"210\"\/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>October 20, 2022<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>New York, NY 10017<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Mr. Ant\u00f3nio\nGuterres<br>\nSecretary-General<br>\n<\/strong>United Nations<br>\nUN Headquarters, S-3800<br>\nNew York, NY 10017<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Re: October\nvisit to Vietnam<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dear Secretary-General,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>We are writing\nahead of your visit to Vietnam later this week. You have emphasized the\nimportance of combatting climate change, but this cannot be achieved without the\nrole of environmental rights defenders. During your trip, we urge you to\npublicly call on the Vietnamese government to release the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rfa.org\/english\/news\/vietnam\/environmental-activists-07012022191402.html\">four\nenvironmental human rights defenders<\/a> who were sentenced on trumped-up\ncharges of \u201ctax evasion\u201d earlier this year. These political prisoners are emblematic\nvictims of a new wave of repression in Vietnam which, through a combination of\nthreats and judicial harassment, is threatening progress in combatting climate\nchange, protecting human rights and achieving the Sustainable Development\nGoals. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The persecution\nof environmental defenders is only the tip of Vietnam\u2019s broader crackdown on\ndissent. Organizations that monitor the situation have documented how Vietnam\nis currently holding hundreds of political prisoners. UN Human Rights\nMechanisms have noted that once arrested, most of these people are prosecuted\nfor vaguely worded national security crimes, subjected to prolonged periods of\nincommunicado detention, and denied access to legal counsel and family\nvisitation, often while being subjected to willful neglect or mistreatment.\nThese are people who have been persecuted for exercising their civil and\npolitical rights. These are people who should not be prosecuted, and should not\nbe in prison.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The United Nations should urgently press\nthe Vietnamese government to end its policies and practices that are subverting\nrather than supporting human rights, and emphasize that there can be no\nprogress on climate change and development without an active civil society that\ncan freely exercise their rights to freedom of expression, association, and\nassembly. We call on you to remind Vietnam that, as a newly elected member of\nthe UN Human Rights Council, it has an obligation to uphold the highest human\nrights standards. Specifically, we urge you to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to\nprotect, promote and fulfill human rights obligations enshrined in the international\nhuman rights treaties signed and ratified by the government.<\/li><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to cease\ncriminalizing policy advocacy and the operation of advocacy coalitions by civil\nsociety. Specifically, Vietnam should implement the <a href=\"https:\/\/spcommreports.ohchr.org\/TMResultsBase\/DownLoadPublicCommunicationFile?gId=26885\">recommendations<\/a>\nprovided by the UN Human Rights Council\u2019s independent experts in response to\nwhat they describe as Vietnam\u2019s \u201cundue restrictions on civil society\u2026in\nviolation of\u2026international human rights law.\u201d<\/li><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to\nimmediately and unconditionally release the four environmental defenders <a>Nguy Thi Khanh, Mai Phan Loi, Bach Hung Duong, and Dang\nDinh Bach<\/a>.<\/li><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to commit\nto stop arbitrarily arresting and detaining any additional environmental\ndefenders, and all other human rights defenders, including journalists.<\/li><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to\nfundamentally amend Decree 58\/2022\/ND-CP on international civil society groups\nworking in Vietnam to ensure that those regulations fully comply with the\nInternational Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to which Vietnam is a state\nparty. <\/li><li>Publicly urge Vietnam to clarify\nif, and in what circumstances, non-governmental development organisations are\nrequired to pay corporate tax. Specifically, the Vietnamese government should\naddress ambiguity in and inconsistencies between the 2013 Science and\nTechnology Law and the 2019 Law on Tax Administration in relation to the tax\nobligations of science and technology organisations.<a href=\"#_ftn1\">[1]<\/a>\nThese regulations represent a contradictory policy framework that is open to\npolitically motivated attacks on civil society organisations.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Finally, we\nbelieve that the UN system in Vietnam has an important role to play in this process.\nWe urge you to call on the UN Resident Coordinator and UN agencies to publicly\nand pro-actively demand serious improvements to the government\u2019s atrocious\nhuman rights record and to start holding it to account. The best way that the\nUN can do this is by making itself more accountable to Vietnamese civil\nsociety.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;Sincerely,<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Access Now<br>Amnesty International<br>Asia Democracy Network (ADN)<br>Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development (FORUM-ASIA)<br>ARTICLE 19 <br>CIVICUS<br>Defend the Defenders<br>FIDH \u2013 International Federation for Human Rights<br>Frontline Defenders<br>Human Rights Watch<br>International Service for Human Rights (ISHR)<br>Legal Initiative for Vietnam <br>The 88 Project<br>Safeguard Defenders<br>Qu\u00ea Me: Vietnam Committee on Human Rights<br><br><\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"#_ftnref1\">[1]<\/a> For example, Article 143.2 (\u201cTax evasion\u201d)\nof the 2019 Law on Tax Administration stipulates: \u201cFailure to record the\nrevenues relevant to calculation of tax payable in the accounting books.\u201d\nSimilarly, Article 200.1.b (\u201cTax evasion\u201d) of the 2015 Criminal Code stipulates:\n\u201cFailure to record revenues related to the determination of tax payable in\naccounting books.\u201d However, Article 4.7 of the 2008 Law on Corporate Income\nTax, describes \u201cTax-exempt incomes\u201d as \u201creceived financial supports used for\neducational, scientific research, cultural, artistic, charitable, humanitarian\nand other social activities in Vietnam.\u201d Similarly, Decree 218\n(218\/2013\/N\u0110-CP), providing guidance on implementation of Law on Corporate\nIncome Tax, stipulates that only organisations that improperly use financial\naid are subject to corporate income tax.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>October 20, 2022 New York, NY 10017 Mr. Ant\u00f3nio Guterres Secretary-General United Nations UN Headquarters, S-3800 New York, NY 10017 Re: October visit to Vietnam Dear Secretary-General, We are writing ahead of your visit to Vietnam later this week. You have emphasized the importance of combatting climate change, but this cannot be achieved without the &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":434,"featured_media":46757,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[137,113,98,64],"tags":[1576,1575],"class_list":["post-46756","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-latest-posts","category-news","category-press-release","category-vchr","tag-antonio-guterres","tag-un-secretary-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46756","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/434"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46756"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46756\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46757"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46756"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46756"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/queme.org\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46756"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}