January 29, 2010

HANOI (Reuters) - Vietnam on Friday sentenced yet another democracy activist to jail in what political analysts say is an intensifying crackdown on dissent.

A court in the northern port city of Haiphong convicted writer Pham Thanh Nghien of "conducting propaganda against the state" and sentenced her to four years in prison, followed by three years of house arrest, the state-run Vietnam News Agency reported on one of its websites, Vietnamplus.vn.

Nghien, born in 1977, was one of six Vietnamese writers given the Hellman/Hammett award by the U.S.-based group Human Rights Watch this year for their commitment to free expression in the face of political persecution.

Her jailing comes little more than a week after a court in Ho Chi Minh City sentenced four people to prison terms ranging from five to 16 years for pro-democracy activities labelled subversive. In October, nine other activists were imprisoned.
On Thursday, U.S. Senator Barbara Boxer and two members of the U.S. Congress, Loretta Sanchez and Zoe Lofgren, sent an appeal to Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet to release Nghien and another detained activist who they said was due to go on trial in early February.

Nghien was accused of writing articles that distorted the truth about state policies, libeling the ruling Communist Party and the government, "inciting the masses against the government", and demanding pluralism, the news agency reported.
It said Nghien recognised that she had violated the law.