HUMAN-RIGHTS BLOGGER FREED, EXILED TO U.S.

A prominent blogger freed from prison in Vietnam on condition that she live in exile in the U.S. says she is glad to be reunited with her family and that she knows she is not alone in advocating for freedom.

Nguyen Ngoc Nhu Quynh, pictured, was smiling when she emerged from the George Bush International Airport in Houston on Wednesday night to be greeted by a crowd, many of them Vietnamese-Americans. Her two young children and her mother travelled with her.

Quynh blogged as “Mother Mushroom” about human rights and industrial pollution. She was arrested in 2016 and sentenced to 10 years in prison on charges of defaming Vietnam’s Communist government — a conviction that drew criticism from some governments and human rights groups.