The Washington Times: President Obama called on Vietnam’s communist leaders to allow greater freedoms for their people Tuesday, even as some Vietnamese dissidents were prevented from meeting with him on his second full day in the country.
In a speech to an audience of about 2,000 at the National Convention Center in Hanoi, Mr. Obama said governments are stronger when they allow freedom of speech and free access to social media, which authorities are blocking even during the president’s landmark three-day visit.
“Upholding these rights is not a threat to stability but actually reinforces stability and is the foundation of progress,” Mr. Obama said. “Vietnamwill do it differently than the United States does. … But there are these basic principles that I think we all have to try to work on and improve.”
But earlier, in a meeting with 10 activists at a hotel, the president acknowledged that some dissidents who had been invited by the White House were not able to attend the meeting. A White House aide blamed the Vietnamese government for preventing two dissidents from attending the meeting, and human rights groups said police are preventing some activists from leaving their homes during Mr. Obama’s visit.
“I should note that there were several other activists who were invited that were prevented from coming for various reasons,” Mr. Obama said, adding that “there are still areas of significant concern” on human rights in Vietnam.
One prominent intellectual, Nguyen Quang A, told Reuters that about 10 policemen had come to his house around dawn and put him in a car that was driven out of the capital until Mr. Obama was about to leave. An outspoken lawyer, Ha Huy Son, said he was also stopped from joining the meeting that the president held with six other civil society leaders. Human Rights Watch said a journalist who was also invited had been arrested on Monday.
