A European Union delegation that visited Vietnam's troubled Central Highlands last week to investigate alleged human rights abuses has questioned the merits of taking part in future "stage-managed" trips.

The EU troika team, which consisted of diplomats from Italy, the Netherlands and the European Commission, arrived in Dak Lak province --one of four making up the Central Highlands -- last Wednesday for a three-day trip.

"We are having doubts about these kinds of visits. We have been three times now and we don't know if we want to be stage-managed and used again," a European diplomat told AFP.

The EU troika previously travelled to the region in May and November 2002. It requested the most recent visit.

The diplomat said the delegation was particularly irked by an article in Monday's edition of the state-controlled newspaper Le Courrier du Vietnam,in which they were said to have "congratulated" the authorities for the "stable situation and the improvement in living standards of the people in Dak Lak".

"We certainly didn't congratulate them. This appears to be a deliberate misrepresentation of our position," he said.

The EU is the largest aid donor to Vietnam, but it has become increasingly vocal in its criticism of the country's human rights record.

This latest visit came in the wake of a highly controlled two-day trip to the province last month by foreign reporters.

It was only the third time foreign media were granted permission to visit the highlands since more than 20,000 ethnic minorities or Montagnards took to the streets across the region in anti-government protests in February 2001.

The demonstrations were sparked by grievances over the long-term Confiscation of their land for use by ethnic Vietnamese or Kinh settlers and a crackdown on their Protestant faith.

The government, however, blamed the unrest on US-based exiles who fought alongside American troops during the Vietnam War and who are seeking an independent "Dega" state in the Central Highlands.

Many of the politicized Montagnards in the region and refugees from there in the United States refer to themselves as Dega, a term connoting the type of evangelical Christianity they follow and the homeland they seek.

Diplomats say that only a minority of the people who took to the streets in 2001 were agitating for an independent state. The majority, they say, simply wanted the return of their ancestral land and religious freedom.

Topping the EU delegation's agenda during its talks with the Dak Lak provincial authorities were accusations from human rights groups that the communist regime has orchestrated a systematic crackdown on the region's indigenous minorities, creating a climate of fear.

In April, the New York-based Human Rights Watch accused Hanoi of escalating its campaign of repression through the destruction of churches, beatings of clergymen, prohibitions on night-time gatherings and travel, and widespread confiscation of farm land.

The government, however, has categorically refuted the charges. As was the case during the visit by foreign correspondents, the diplomat said the EU delegation was told by official after official in Dak Lak that the Montagnards were guaranteed "freedom of religion and non-religion".

However, the officials also pointed out that all churches and religious organizations have to be approved by the ruling Communist Party, and warned "attempts to sabotage the great national unity would be severely punished".

"These legal provisions are not in compliance with the international conventions on human rights to which Vietnam is a party," the diplomat said.

Following the May 15-16 media trip, AFP obtained five "invitations" issued by Dak Lak authorities to church leaders between January and April this year ordering them to attend meetings to "thoroughly understand religious issues".

Some were invited to bring along copies of their "self-criticisms". All the invitations stated "no reason to be absent".

Denials of human rights abuses from ethnic minority villagers also characterised both the EU and the media trips. But there may have been a reason.

Three days before foreign journalists began their official visit, police intelligence agents and Dak Lak police called at the houses on the itinerary and threatened occupants with "problems" and "suitable measures" if they deviated from the government line during interviews, one Kinh pastor told AFP.

"The government now has firm control of the region. Nearly every ethnic minority household has one soldier living with them. That is why reporters were allowed to visit," he said.

Copyright C 2003 Agence France Presse