THE jailing of a Vietnamese blogger for 10 years was today condemned by rights groups as “unacceptable” and an attack on free speech.

Truong Duy Nhat, a regular contributor to Radio Free Asia, was found guilty in a brief trial yesterday of defrauding the public of US$560,000 (RM2.4 million) when he worked for a state-owned newspaper in the central city of Danang in 2004, reported state media.

Describing the sentence as “harsh and totally unacceptable”, Reporters Without Borders (RSF) called for the “immediate release” of Nhat, who had posted articles critical of the government on his blog.

RSF ranked Vietnam 176th in its 2019 World Press Freedom Index as one of the biggest jailers of journalists and bloggers.

“Officially convicted of abusing his professional position, he is, in fact, paying dearly for his professionalism,” said Daniel Bastard, RSF’s Asia-Pacific director.

Radio Free Asia also condemned the conviction as “unjust”, and “a blow against free speech and free expression”.

All media in Vietnam is state-run, and independent journalism and bloggers are banned.

Since its hard-line leadership took power in 2016, the country’s single-party state has tightened its grip on criticism and different viewpoints.

This is Nhat’s second prison stint. He was jailed for two years in 2014 for “abusing democratic freedoms” with his critical blog posts.

He was discovered at a Vietnamese prison last March after fleeing to Thailand seeking refugee status with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.

The circumstances of Nhat’s return to Vietnam have never been clarified by Hanoi. – AFP, March 10, 2020.