Profile of Ta Phong Tan

Birthdate: 1968

Occupation: Former police officer, blogger

Arrest Date: September 5, 2011

Trial Date: September 24, 2012

Sentence: Ten years in prison and five years of probationary detention

Ta Phong Tan is a former policewoman, a well-known blogger, and co-founder of the Free Journalist Club. She often blogged about corruption within the one party state. In 2011, she was arrested under Article 88 of Vietnam’s Penal Code. Her trial was continuously delayed. On July 30, 2012, her mother, Dang Thi Kim Lieng, self-immolated in protest of Tan’s detention. Tan was tried that September, along with Nguyen Van Hai (Dieu Cay) and Phan Thanh Hai, and was sentenced to ten years in prison. Tan and her co-defendants’ appealed their verdicts and sentences, but the appeal was denied on December 28, 2012.

In 2013, Tan received the International Women of Courage award from the United States. Tan has previously fallen into ill health while in prison, where she remains today. In addition to her supporters worldwide, Tan is currently adopted under the Press Uncuffed campaign, a campaign by the Committee to Protect Journalists and the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism, and has also been adopted by US Representative Sheila Jackson Lee (TX) under the Defending Freedom Project (http://democraticvoicevn.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/adopting-vietnamese-prisoners-of-conscience.pdf); Amnesty International has also been working on her behalf.

Support Ta Phong Tan, and call for her release: share this profile, and contact key players below.

1) Support Tan through the Press Uncuffed campaign: https://cpj.org/campaigns/pressuncuffed/

2) Tweet at the US State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor.

Suggested message: @State_DRL #TaPhongTan, #TranHuynhDuyThuc, #BuiThiMinhHang, & others unfairly imprisoned. Call on #Vietnam to release them.

3) Contact the United States Embassy in Vietnam and ask them to press for the release of prisoners of conscience:

+84-4-3850-5000, 7 Lang Ha Street, Hanoi, Vietnam.

Suggested message: “I am concerned about the imprisonment of peaceful political activists in Vietnam, including Ta Phong Tan, Tran Huynh Duy Thuc, Bui Thi Minh Hang, and others. Their imprisonment goes against international human rights agreements such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, as well as Vietnam’s obligations as a member of the UN Human Rights Council. I urge you to press for the release of prisoners of conscience in Vietnam.”

3) Contact the President of Vietnam and let him know that you oppose the cruel treatment of prisoners and the detention of peaceful activists:

President Truong Tan Sang, Office of the President, President’s Residence, Ba Dinh District, Ha Noi, Viet Nam