Vietnam activists sentenced to up to three years after one-day trial

A Vietnamese court has jailed three activists for up to three years, a lawyer said yesterday, after a one-day trial marked by strict security including the detention of scores of supporters.

Bui Thi Minh Hang, a high-profile anti-China activist and the most prominent of the three, was given a three-year jail term by the court in the southern Mekong Delta province of Dong Thap. She was found guilty of "causing public disorder", her lawyer Tran Thu Nam said.

Hang, 50, was arrested alongside the two others in February while on their way to visit a former political prisoner who lives in Dong Thap province. Rights activist Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh, 28, was jailed for two years.

Nguyen Van Minh, 34, who is an independent Hoa Hao Buddhist practitioner, received a two-and a-half year jail term. All faced the same charges.

Scores of people trying to attend the trial were detained, according to activists and online reports.

"About 60 or 70 people; they arrested them and beat them at the police station," activist Nguyen Lan Thang said from Dong Thap province.