The Long An Province People’s Court on May 16 sentenced two young people for charges of “conducting propaganda against the State of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam”  

Accordingly, Dinh Nguyen Kha, 25, of Long An Province’s Tan An City, and Nguyen Phuong Uyen, 21, of Binh Thuan Province’s Ham Thuan Bac District, were sentenced to eight years and six years in prison, respectively. Kha actually had to receive ten years in jail, the court said, since he was also given a two-year sentence for “intentionally causing injury” in another case. After serving their sentences, Kha and Uyen will be put under house arrest for three years each and will not be allowed to join any social organizations. As shown in the indictment of the provincial prosecutor’s office, Kha and Uyen, a third-year student at Ho Chi Minh City’s Food Industry University, med Nguyen Thien Thanh, a Vietnamese man who was living in Thailand, through Facebook in April 2012.

Thanh convinced the pair to join a reactionary organization named “Tuoi Tre Yeu Nuoc” (“Patriotic Youth”), of which he is a member. Provoked by Thanh, the two young people produced, stored and disseminated anti-State documents. In August 2012, they erected a yellow flag with three red stripes – the flag of the former Saigon regime that had existed before 1975 – and a banner with content slandering the Communist Party of Vietnam in public spaces in Tan An city and Ham Tri commune. Then they took many photos of their work and sent them to Thanh to publish on Tuoi Tre Yeu Nuoc’s website.

Two month later, on October 10, 2012, police caught the pair scattering leaflets on An Suong flyover in Ba Diem Commune, Hoc Mon District, Ho Chi Minh City, under the direction of Thanh via the Internet. The above-mentioned acts committed by the pair constituted the charges of “conducting propaganda against the State of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam”, under Article 88 of the Penal Code, the jury concluded.

Meanwhile, Thanh, the instigator in this case, is being hunted down by police.