Climate Defenders Silenced in Vietnam
Despite pledges of environmental action, government jails activists
By: Nguyễn Vũ
Since 2021, in the face of pledges made that same year by Prime Minister Phạm Minh Chính to bring the country’s net emissions to zero by 2050, the Vietnamese government has been criminalizing climate activists on falsified charges and forcing non-profit organizations working on environmental issues to close down.
In reality, not all sectors and citizens in Vietnam are welcome in the fight against climate change despite ringing guarantees that “Climate change response and the restoration of nature must become the highest priority in all development decisions,” as the prime minister told participants in climate negotiations in Glasgow, Scotland that year. Vietnam is the world’s 13th most climate-vulnerable country, according to the 2021 Global Climate Risk Index compiled by Germanwatch, an NGO based in Bonn, Germany. The arrests of the high-profile activists who are leaders of legally registered non-profit entities are nothing but the tip of the iceberg in the grim picture of the country. In particular, their ranks have been riddled with arrests from 2021 to 2023. Mai Văn Lợi, Ngụy Thị Khanh and Hoàng Minh Hồng have been released while Đặng Đình Bách, Ngô Thị Tố Nhiên and Bạch Hùng Dương remain in prison…