THE
WASHINGTON TIMES
Commentary Forum: 7 July 2002
Will the real
terrorist please stand?
In an unprecedented
move on May 8, 2002, the Vietnamese ambassador to the United Nations
interrupted a speech at the Human Rights Commission in Geneva and accused the
speaker of being a "terrorist" and "an agent of the CIA."
There were exclamations of bewilderment as international participants and
government representatives from around the world strained to catch sight of
this "terrorist" in the U.N.
Just who was this
"terrorist" speaker? A suicide bomber? An al Qaeda fanatic? No, he
was simply a lone hill tribesman who was calling for an end to the genocide of his
people - the Montagnards or Degar peoples - of Vietnam's Central Highlands.
The so-called
"terrorist" was appealing for the United Nations to protect
Montagnard refugees fleeing Vietnam, who in the year 2002 were being beaten,
tortured and sold by Cambodian authorities for bounties paid by Hanoi. He was
appealing for Vietnam to end the military occupation of their homelands, the
confiscation of their ancestral lands and the end to the torture of Montagnards
with electric prods by the dreaded "Cong An" security forces. He was
appealing for an end to the arrests of Montagnard Christians, the burning of
their churches and the forcing of these indigenous people to renounce Christ.
He was also appealing for an end to coercive sterilization policies that
Montagnard woman are forced to endure.
This so-called
"terrorist" notably happens to be both a Christian and an American
citizen who bases his advocacy on Mahatma Ghandi's "passive
resistance." This "Christian terrorist" is Mr. Kok Ksor, an
ethnic Montagnard who now lives in the United States. As president of the
Montagnard Foundation Inc., he stands accused by Hanoi of inciting unrest in
Vietnam, when in February 2001, thousands of indigenous Montagnards, many of
them Christians, peacefully demonstrated against the persecution they have
suffered under communist rule. Human Rights Watch would find no evidence of
violence being advocated by the Montagnard Foundation and yet Vietnam responded
to these peaceful demonstrations with a brutal military crackdown.
Following the
Vietnamese delegation's accusations at the U.N., Kok Ksor regained his
composure and eventually the chairman of the commission permitted him to
continue. But Kok Ksor, had spoken only a few words, when, like a puppet, the
Cuban government again rudely interrupted him (at Vietnam's bequest) and called
for his speech to be halted.
I witnessed this
spectacle and was fortunately able to see Kok Ksor eventually finish his
speech. Unfortunately, the wheels of repression by Vietnam were already turning
and this despicable display of political bullying would develop into a
calculated strategy - a wider plan to suppress human rights. It is not only a
strategy to keep the genocidal treatment of the Montagnards hidden from the
civilized world, it is a strategy to transform the Human Rights Commission into
a farcical puppet show controlled by repressive regimes like Vietnam and Cuba.
On May 14, 2002, the
Vietnamese ambassador to the U.N. in New York, Nguyen Thanh Chau formally
requested that the United Nations take action and "revoke" the
consultative status of the Transnational Radical Party that had sponsored Kok
Ksor to speak at the Human Rights Commission. Vietnam would claim this
indigenous Christian Montagnard is a "dangerous terrorist." It would
become apparent however, that Vietnam's strategy is purely an attempt to
"weed" from the U.N., those human-rights groups that try exposing
it's repressive policies.
Thus the
Transnational Radical Party (TRP), a democratic organization with consultative
status to the United Nations and whose members include seven members of the
European Parliament, must now defend itself from these insidious allegations
and protect itself from being denied access to the United Nation's human-rights
forum. Like a "terrorist" Vietnam is attempting to "hijack"
the principals of the Human Rights Commission by dictating who may raise
allegations of human rights violations. By forming a blockade with other
nations, namely, Cuba, China, Russia, Algeria, Sudan, Pakistan (all regimes
with dubious human rights records) Vietnam now is attempting to curtail free
speech and the TRP's future human rights activities in the U.N.
If Vietnam succeeds
in its plan, human-rights advocacy across the globe will suffer a severe blow
and the worst violators of human rights may soon be dictating who comes before
the United Nations. Essentially it will be akin to letting the "wolf guard
the flock."
As to terrorism,
Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International reported hundreds of Montagnards
being tortured throughout 2001-2002. In April 2002, Human Rights Watch
published a 194-page report titled "Repression of Montagnards"
documenting systematic persecution and abuses of these peoples. Last Christmas,
Vietnamese security forces arrested and tortured Montagnard Christians and
communist officials forced Montagnards to drink pig's blood and denounce
Christ. While burning a church in Plei Lao, Vietnamese soldiers shot and killed
the Montagnard Christian "R'mah Blin" on March 10, 2001. In the
village of Plei Joning, three Montagnard Christians were actually
crucified by the
police in 2000. The list goes on and on …
The U.S. State
Department, several European Parliament Resolutions and the U.S. Commission on
International Religious Freedom have all recently condemned Vietnam's
violations of human rights. The brutalities conducted by Hanoi's security
agents over the last year subsequently led to some 900 Montagnard refugees
being granted asylum in the United States.
Typical of the
tactics once used by the North Vietnamese army during the Vietnam War, the
security forces persecute the relatives of whom they disapprove. On May 7,
2001, they dragged Kok Ksor's mother, an 80-year-old woman from her village
longhouse and beat her. She suffered broken ribs and was hospitalized. In 2002,
the persecution continues unabated as thousands of soldiers continue enforcing
martial law throughout the central highlands while Vietnam's state controlled
media publishes ludicrous propaganda with titles as "Central Highlanders
Grateful to Uncle Ho."
The "real"
terrorist, must not be allowed to get away with these atrocities, and
human-rights organizations like the Transnational Radical Party must not be
thwarted from pursuing human-rights advocacy for oppressed peoples like the
Montagnards. I say now to Communist Party General Secretary Nung Duc Man, you,
of all people, a member of the Tay ethnic minority from the north of Vietnam,
do you not feel the pain of your Montagnard cousins in the Central Highlands?
So far you have done
nothing but betray them, and your government is but a wolf in sheep's clothing.
With one hand you take millions of dollars of aid from the UNFPA, the UNDP, the
European Union, the Asian Development Bank, the World Bank and the
International Monetary Fund. You ask for trade with Europe and the United
States. You ask for entry into the World Trade Organization. With the other
hand however, you strangle the lifeblood from your indigenous people. You
persecute Christians with a medieval tenacity, while one of the oldest races of
indigenous peoples in Asia the Montagnards - are persecuted by your army.
Last year back in
Vietnam, some villagers brought Kok Ksor's mother to a phone. I was there in
the United States when he got the phone call. I saw the tears pour from his
eyes when he spoke to her.
Mr. Ambassador and
Mr. Secretary, I know who the real terrorist is.
SCOTT JOHNSON
Mr. Johnson is a lawyer based in Perth, Australia, and Human Rights Advocate for the Montagnard Foundation in Spartanburg, S.C.