Vietnam secret order cracks down on rights

Directive 24 deems international commerce and cooperation as threats to national security.

BANGKOK, Thailand (AFP) — Vietnam’s leaders have issued a secret directive that will frame almost all international commerce and cooperation as a threat to national security, a rights group said Friday, adding that it will further entrench “systematic” human rights violations.

“The directive frames all forms of international commerce and cooperation as threats to national security and articulates a disturbing plan to deal with these perceived threats by systematically violating the human rights of the country’s 100 million citizens,” Vietnam-focused human rights organization The 88 Project says in its report.

Directive 24, as it is called, was issued in July 2023 just two months before American President Joe Biden visited Hanoi as Washington seeks a reliable alternative trading partner to China.

The directive’s stated goal is to ensure national security at a time of deepening international integration, according to a review of it by T88P.

Directive 24 issues nine orders for party and state organizations, including instructions to control foreign travel by Vietnamese citizens and to closely monitor international cooperation “to prevent attempts to exert influence through economic, cultural and social activities that affect national security.”

It also orders the development and “strict implementation” of policies and laws on national security, especially in relation to foreign investment and foreign nongovernment organizations in Vietnam.

The authenticity of the secret document has not been officially confirmed, but T88P Project said it had been referred to by name and date by at least 45 state media sources and 18 government documents, and a senior party official promulgated the directive in a conference speech in December.

Vietnam’s communist government tolerates no dissent and there are currently 175 activists in jail in the country, according to T88P.

Government critics face intimidation, harassment and restricted movement.

Since 2021, five environmentalists have been jailed for tax evasion, in what activists see as a campaign to silence them.

A sixth was arrested for allegedly misappropriating government documents.

SANDY HUFFAKER/GETTY IMAGES VIA AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE VOLUNTEERS with Border Vets help erect barbed wire along the United States-Mexico border wall in Jacumba Hot Springs, California as a deterrent. Border Vets is a group of military veterans concerned with the flow of illegal migrants.