BANGKOK – The outspoken Vietnamese journalist and activist Pham Doan Trang knew it was only a matter of time before the police came for her.
She wrote a letter last year and gave it to an American friend with instructions to release it upon her arrest. In the letter, she asked that her friends not just campaign for her freedom but use her incarceration to fight for free elections and an end to single-party rule in Vietnam. “I don’t want freedom for just myself; that’s too easy,” wrote Ms. Pham, 42, who has walked with difficulty since a police beating in 2015.
“I want something greater: freedom for Vietnam.” Shortly before midnight on Oct. 6, the police raided her apartment in Ho Chi Minh City and arrested her on charges of making and disseminating propaganda against the Vietnamese state. She faces up to 20 years in prison.
Source: The Jailed Activist Left a Letter Behind. The Message: Keep Fighting. – The New York Times, Oct. 15, 2020, by Richard C. Paddock