A court in southern Vietnam jailed three bloggers on Monday for “anti-state propaganda” at a brief but dramatic hearing, prompting calls from the United States and EU for their immediate release.
After a trial lasting just a few hours, high-profile blogger Nguyen Van Hai, alias Dieu Cay, was sentenced to 12 years in prison, while Ta Phong Tan, a policewoman-turned-dissident whose mother self-immolated to protest her detention, was given 10 years and led from court screaming.
“Their crimes were especially serious with clear intention against the state,” said Nguyen Phi Long, president of the court in Ho Chi Minh City.
He added the pair had “caused disorder” in the court and so were not allowed to make closing statements. “They must be seriously punished,” he said.
Phan Thanh Hai, the only one of the trio to plead guilty, was handed a four-year term after promising the court “not to commit the crime again and to have no further contact with anti-state people.”
Tan, whose mother died after setting herself on fire in front of a local authority building in July in a desperate denunciation of the charges against her daughter, was led out of the court wailing.