Nguyen Vu Binh
Current Status: Pre-trial detention
Other Names: Nguyễn Vũ Bình
Date of Birth: November 2, 1968
Gender: M
Ethnicity: Kinh
Occupation: Journalist
Last Known Prison: Hanoi Police Detention Center No. 1, Hanoi
Areas of Activism:
- Digital rights
- Democracy
- Freedom of expression
- Human rights
- Sovereignty
Highlighted Human Rights Concerns:
- Former Political Prisoner
- Prolonged Incommunicado Detention
April 2024:
Nguyen Thi Phong, Nguyen Vu Binh's sister, told Project88 that she visited him at the Detention Center No. 1 in Hanoi on April 3. Since Binh is still under investigation by the State, he is still not allowed to have visitors. Phong could only leave Binh with some food and money.
Details - Background, History of Activism.
Binh is a journalist who worked for The Communist Magazine (Tạp Chí Cộng Sản) for 10 years before joining RFA in the early 2000s.
In December 2000, Binh attempted to file an application to form an independent political party, named Freedom-Democracy Party. He was one of several dissidents who called to form an anti-corruption association in 2001. He is also a founding members of the Democracy Club for Vietnam.
Binh was convicted on September 25, 2002 and sentenced to seven years in prison for for espionage under Article 80 of the 1999 Criminal Code for allegedly slandering the Vietnamese state in a written testimony Binh provided to the US Congress in July 2002 regarding human rights abuses in Vietnam. Under international pressure, Binh was released two years and three months early from prison, in June 2007.
He was awarded the Hellman-Hammett Prize by Human Rights Watch in 2002 and again in 2007 for his courageous activism.
Personal communication and interview with Nguyen Thi Phong, Nguyen Vu Binh’s sister, March 4, 2024.
Vietnam: Release Imprisoned Cyber-Dissident, HRW, May 5, 2004
Banned, Censored, Harassed and Jailed, HRW, Feb. 5, 2007
Vietnam: New Wave of Arrests of Critics, HRW, March 5, 2024
Nguyen Vu Binh Facebook account
Arrested February 29, 2024. Charged under Art. 117 (2015 Code).
February 29, 2024
- Art. 117 (2015 Code)
Hanoi city public security, Hanoi
Hai Ba Trung district (map)
unknown
- freedom from arbitrary arrest or detention
- liberty and security of the person
- freedom of expression
Journalist and former political prisoner Nguyen Vu Binh was arrested for a second time. On the morning of Feb. 29, 2024, Binh was summoned to the police headquarters in Hanoi to discuss the YouTube channel TNT Media Live, which he and lawyer Nguyen Van Dai (currently in exile) worked on together from 2021 to 2022. After the meeting with the police, Binh was taken back to his rented house where the police formally arrested him and searched his residence.
Nguyen Thi Phong, his sister, who witnessed the arrest, told Project88 that when she went to the police station on March 4 to retrieve Binh’s motorbike, she was told verbally that he had been charged with conducting “anti-state propaganda” under Article 117. She said she was not shown anything in writing. The police said Binh will be held at Detention Center No.1 in Hanoi for four months while they investigate his case.
Phong said that her brother had been “invited” to visit the police many times in the past year. She added that it was thus reasonable to assume that the police had been following his activities for some time now, and that the need to “investigate” Binh was just a legal fig leaf in order to detain him for as long as the law allows.
On March 11, Phong visited the Detention Center No.1 and was able to send Binh clothes and some pocket money.
Personal communication and interview with Nguyen Thi Phong, Nguyen Vu Binh’s sister, March 4, 2024.
Vietnam: New Wave of Arrests of Critics, HRW, March 5, 2024
Bắt ông Nguyễn Chí Tuyến và Nguyễn Vũ Bình vì phát tán tài liệu, vật phẩm chống Nhà nước, Tuor Tre, March 7, 2024
Công an Hà Nội xác nhận bắt giữ hai nhà hoạt động Nguyễn Chí Tuyến và Nguyễn Vũ Bình, RFA, March 7, 2024
Nguyen Vu Binh Facebook account
Interviews with family, April 2024
Profile last updated: 2024-04-16 18:34:11