Freelance journalist Bui Minh Quoc was charged with “possessing anti-government literature,” including his own writings, and put under administrative detention, or house arrest, for two years in Dalat District. Administrative Detention Directive 31/CP allows two years of house arrest without due process. Prior to his arrest, he had conducted extensive research on Vietnam’s territorial concessions to China, according to international news reports.
A Foreign Ministry spokesperson told journalists that, “The competent authorities told me that Quoc had violated Vietnamese law and they will provide more specifics on his violations in the coming time.” Quoc, a poet and journalist who was a North Vietnamese Radio correspondent during the Vietnam War, was also under house arrest between 1997 and 1999.