en
fr
Written message<br>
Distinguished Participants and Members of the European Parliament,
The International Buddhist Information Bureau in Paris forwarded your invitation to send a brief message to the International Conference on Burma, Laos and Vietnam which you are organizing at the European Parliament on 16 - 17 September 2002.
I sincerely thank the Organizing Committee for thinking of me, an elderly Buddhist monk, detained in internal exile in the village of Cho Chua in Nghia Hanh Ward, Quang Ngai province since 1982, without ever knowing what crime I have committed, nor having been granted the right to stand trial. Over the past twenty years, I have written countless letters to the Vietnamese leadership asking the reasons for my detention. Not once have they made the slightest reply, nor taken any steps to set me free.
This Message to your Conference should have come from the Venerable Thich Quang Do, Head of the Vien Hoa Dao, the Unified Buddhist Church’s Institute for the Dissemination of the faith. Alas, in June 2001, Venerable Thich Quang Do was sentenced to two years administrative detention and is now detained incommunicado at the Thanh Minh Zen Monastery in Ho Chi Minh City. His only “crimes” were to issue an Appeal For Democracy in Vietnam on behalf of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV), proposing a nonviolent transition plan for democratic change. He also announced that he was leading a UBCV delegation to Quang Ngai Province to escort me to Ho Chi Minh City for medical treatment. Today, he is a prisoner within his own room, deprived of all contacts with the outside world.
. . . / . . .
I quote just two cases - those of myself and Venerable Thich Quang Do. But there are countless more to prove that today, in Vietnam, we monks, nuns and lay-Buddhists are deprived of religious freedom, banned from practicing the teachings handed down by Lord Buddha over 2,500 years ago. Not only have we lost our religious freedom, but at the same time we are deprived of the basic freedoms of expression, assembly, movement and conscience enshrined in the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In order to understand the real situation of human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam, I suggest that you follow the 75th Session of the UN Human Rights Committee on 11-12th July 2002 in Geneva, and the confrontation between the UN experts and the Vietnamese Delegation, led by its Vice-Minister of Justice, Ha Hung Cuong. The 23-point Concluding Observations and Recommendations of the UN Human Rights Committee to the Socialist Republic of Vietnam are especially revealing (Ref. CCPR/CO/75/VNM).
In this black period for human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam, I warmly welcome this initiative taken by Members of the Parliament and personalities from all over the world to meet together for this Conference on Burma, Laos and Vietnam. Only by bringing forward reliable information and listening intently to each other can we fully appreciate all the suffering and unspeakable injustice endured by humankind in every corner of our earth. To listen to and understand others is the first step towards developing compassion, from whence springs the determination to extinguish all suffering, ignorance and fanaticism. This is the path followed tirelessly by Vietnamese Buddhists throughout their history of two thousand years.
On behalf of the Bicameral Institutes of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam, I send my fraternal regards to the Conference, and wish all its prestigious participants success. I applaud the efforts of one and all, personalities, Members of Parliament and organizations from Europe and the United States, and extend my warm wishes to all representatives of Cambodia, Laos, Burma, Thailand and Vietnam.
Written in exile in Quang Ngai Province,
Buddhist Era 2546 – September 9th 2002,
Bikkhu THICH HUYEN QUANG,
Head of the Institute of the Sangha
The International Buddhist Information Bureau in Paris forwarded your invitation to send a brief message to the International Conference on Burma, Laos and Vietnam which you are organizing at the European Parliament on 16 - 17 September 2002.
I sincerely thank the Organizing Committee for thinking of me, an elderly Buddhist monk, detained in internal exile in the village of Cho Chua in Nghia Hanh Ward, Quang Ngai province since 1982, without ever knowing what crime I have committed, nor having been granted the right to stand trial. Over the past twenty years, I have written countless letters to the Vietnamese leadership asking the reasons for my detention. Not once have they made the slightest reply, nor taken any steps to set me free.
This Message to your Conference should have come from the Venerable Thich Quang Do, Head of the Vien Hoa Dao, the Unified Buddhist Church’s Institute for the Dissemination of the faith. Alas, in June 2001, Venerable Thich Quang Do was sentenced to two years administrative detention and is now detained incommunicado at the Thanh Minh Zen Monastery in Ho Chi Minh City. His only “crimes” were to issue an Appeal For Democracy in Vietnam on behalf of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam (UBCV), proposing a nonviolent transition plan for democratic change. He also announced that he was leading a UBCV delegation to Quang Ngai Province to escort me to Ho Chi Minh City for medical treatment. Today, he is a prisoner within his own room, deprived of all contacts with the outside world.
. . . / . . .
I quote just two cases - those of myself and Venerable Thich Quang Do. But there are countless more to prove that today, in Vietnam, we monks, nuns and lay-Buddhists are deprived of religious freedom, banned from practicing the teachings handed down by Lord Buddha over 2,500 years ago. Not only have we lost our religious freedom, but at the same time we are deprived of the basic freedoms of expression, assembly, movement and conscience enshrined in the UN Universal Declaration on Human Rights and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In order to understand the real situation of human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam, I suggest that you follow the 75th Session of the UN Human Rights Committee on 11-12th July 2002 in Geneva, and the confrontation between the UN experts and the Vietnamese Delegation, led by its Vice-Minister of Justice, Ha Hung Cuong. The 23-point Concluding Observations and Recommendations of the UN Human Rights Committee to the Socialist Republic of Vietnam are especially revealing (Ref. CCPR/CO/75/VNM).
In this black period for human rights and religious freedom in Vietnam, I warmly welcome this initiative taken by Members of the Parliament and personalities from all over the world to meet together for this Conference on Burma, Laos and Vietnam. Only by bringing forward reliable information and listening intently to each other can we fully appreciate all the suffering and unspeakable injustice endured by humankind in every corner of our earth. To listen to and understand others is the first step towards developing compassion, from whence springs the determination to extinguish all suffering, ignorance and fanaticism. This is the path followed tirelessly by Vietnamese Buddhists throughout their history of two thousand years.
On behalf of the Bicameral Institutes of the Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam, I send my fraternal regards to the Conference, and wish all its prestigious participants success. I applaud the efforts of one and all, personalities, Members of Parliament and organizations from Europe and the United States, and extend my warm wishes to all representatives of Cambodia, Laos, Burma, Thailand and Vietnam.
Written in exile in Quang Ngai Province,
Buddhist Era 2546 – September 9th 2002,
Bikkhu THICH HUYEN QUANG,
Head of the Institute of the Sangha
