SEPARATISM AND RELIGIOUS FREEDOM IN THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 HO CHI MINH CITY 001185 SIPDIS SENSITIVE SIPDIS E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: PHUM PREF SOCI PREL KIRF PGOV VM SUBJECT: SEPARATISM AND RELIGIOUS FREEDOM IN THE CENTRAL HIGHLANDS PROVINCE OF GIA LAI REF: HCMC 998; B) HCMC 1055; C) HCMC 1050 HO CHI MIN 00001185 001.2 OF 003 ¶1. (SBU) Summary: During an October 10-12 visit to the province of Gia Lai, officials told us that U.S.-based activists continue to foment separatism in the Central Highlands and flight to Cambodia. Officials are concerned about what they believe are new efforts to organize anti-GVN activities before the visit of the President for the APEC Leaders' Summit. They also detailed additional progress on recognitions and registrations of Protestant congregations and committed to continue to work proactively to resolve outstanding VISAS-93 (family reunification) cases. We cautioned that authorities should not overreact to separatist provocations and that, in any event, the rights of detainees under Vietnamese law must be protected. Septel will detail visits to the homes of ethnic minority returnees and a number of VISAS-93 applicants. See ref C for additional analysis on overall conditions for ethnic minorities in the Central Highlands. End Summary. ¶2. (SBU) From October 10-12, PolOff, Refugee Resettlement Section (RRS) Chief and DHS/CIS officer traveled to the Central Highlands province of Gia Lai to review a range of issues involving the ethnic minority community. At our invitation, the French Political Counselor accompanied us. We received good access (especially for the Central Highlands). The province responded positively to our requests for detailed discussions with the Department of Public Security (DPS) on ethnic minority separatism and to discuss VISAS-93 (family reunification) issues. The province also facilitated our request to meet with ethnic minority returnees from Cambodia in their homes as well to investigate a number of outstanding VISAS-93 cases (covered Septel). VISAS-93 -------------- ¶3. (SBU) Provincial People's Committee Chairman Pham The Dung and Deputy Director of Gia Lai Department of Public Security (DPS) Tran Dinh Thu told us that the province remains committed to fast and transparent processing of family reunification cases involving ethnic minorities (Visas-93). According to provincial statistics, the province has processed 118 Visas-93 cases thus far, involving 483 persons. Some 13 families, covering 41 persons, have not applied for their passports. (Comment: these numbers are not far from our VISAS-93 figures for the province of 130 cases/544 persons. End Comment.) RRS Chief handed the DPS a list of 22 VISAS-93 cases needing passports; the Deputy Director promised to look into the cases and expedite wherever possible. ¶4. (SBU) The DPS official told us that officials have detected and averted fraud in the Visas-93 process. The province has detected discrepancies between the names of family members listed by the applicant in the United States and the actual names of his family members back home. Some applicants attempted to include non-family members in their petitions for provincial documents needed by the Consulate for VISAS-93 processing. Individuals caught are fined VND 20 to 30 million (roughly USD 1,200 to 1,800),but the families themselves are not fined and are allowed to continue the process. Threat of Separatism Still Looms Large -------------- ¶5. (SBU) Turning to the issue of ethnic minority separatism, the DPS Vice-Director said that, although the armed "FULRO" insurgency against the GVN ended in October 1992, the GVN has "solid evidence" that insurgency's leaders resettled in the United States and continue to foment unrest, violence and separatism in the ethnic minority community in the Central Highlands. For example, the Montagnard Foundation (MF) has distributed clandestinely maps of the Central Highlands delineating the area of an ethnic minority "Dega" state. The flag on the MF's website is virtually identical to the old FURLO flag, sending a powerful message to ethnic minority groups in the Central Highlands. According to Thu, through "various channels," MF operatives spread the word that only those that support independence would benefit when a Dega state was created. "Collaborators" would lose their land and be kicked out of the Central Highlands along with ethnic Vietnamese. Village elders supportive of the GVN have been physically threatened by Dega operatives, Thu and other officials told us. According to Thu, one former Dega operative "confessed" that he used dynamite and knives against police and local officials during the 2004 protests. He offered to allow us to interview the former operative during a future visit. (Comment: A church leader from the GVN-recognized Southern Evangelical Church of Vietnam separately had told us of threats against him and other moderates from local separatists. End Comment.) ¶6. (SBU) According to Thu, the MF continues to spread rumors HO CHI MIN 00001185 002.2 OF 003 that international recognition of a Dega state is imminent. It made such claims while organizing the April 2004 protests in the Central Highlands. The MF reportedly now is spreading the rumor that President Bush will recognize the Dega state during the APEC Leaders' Summit. The goal of the MF is to try to stir up unrest and to foment violence to secure international intervention in the Central Highlands. ¶7. (SBU) Thu claimed that the GVN also has evidence that the MF is diverting monies it collected from the ethnic minority community in the U.S. pledged for economic development to support its separatist activities. Similarly, the "Dega Protestant Church" is an artifice designed to promote the FULRO message of separatism. The MF also seeks to encourage illegal cross-border migration to Cambodia as a way of destabilizing village life in the Central Highlands. The vast majority of cross-border migrants are leaving for economic reasons, particularly as they have been told that they can be resettled in the United States. Unfortunately, because of the ethnic minority community's overall low level of education and poor economic competitiveness, they are susceptible to the separatist message. ¶8. (SBU) We reiterated that the USG recognizes Vietnam's territorial integrity and that it is illegal under U.S. law to foment violence overseas. We welcomed this most detailed briefing on Dega activities to date, and added that sharing concrete evidence of possible violations of U.S. law is critical if we are to address the issue constructively. ¶9. (SBU) That said, we stressed that local authorities and police should be careful and sophisticated in their response to separatist provocations. Detainee rights under Vietnamese law must be protected. Referring to the death in police custody of an ethnic minority individual in the neighboring province of Dak Lak (ref A),we stressed that physical abuse of detainees is unacceptable and undermines GVN efforts to build trust with the ethnic minority community. Thu said that he agreed, and that it was not GVN policy to abuse ethnic minority detainees. He said that some "unfortunate situations" had occurred at village levels. Religious Freedom -------------- ¶10. (SBU) Provincial People's Committee Chairman Dung and Chairman of Gia Lai Committee for Religious Affairs (CRA) Tran Thanh Hung said the province is implementing fully the GVN's legal framework on religion. Hung noted that, especially since September 2005, there has been significant progress in the province. All of the 82,000 members of the Southern Evangelical Church of Vietnam (SECV) are able to gather and practice freely in 35 recognized and 206 registered congregations. The province has approved a second training course for SECV pastors. Over the past year the province has facilitated the construction of 17 new SECV churches. According to Hung, the SECV has told the CRA that it wants to hold off on further recognitions of congregations until 2007. In a separate meeting, Pastor Siu Y Kim, SECV national representative board member from Gia Lai, confirmed the steady progress for the church in the province. He said that the SECV needs to consolidate its organization following an intense period of expansion and legalization. ¶11. (SBU) CRA Chairman Hung also noted the recent (ref B) national-level registration of the United World Mission Church, based in Danang. Gia Lai Province is working to assist the UWMC congregations to develop their local congregations. For example, it has facilitated the church's dispatch of its deacons to Danang for training. At present, the UWMC does not have any accredited pastors in Gia Lai. In addition to the UWMC, five other house church organizations have begun to operate in Gia Lai over the past year, including Baptist and Mennonite denominations. According to Hung, these fledgling groups sometimes poach members from the SECV; their evangelists come to the Central Highlands from HCMC. All of these groups are allowed to operate without interference, Hung claimed. Asked how the CRA deals with frictions within the ethnic minority community between animist traditionalists and Protestant converts, Hung emphasized that the GVN's policy of freedom of belief and non-belief makes clear that government officials must remain neutral and not intervene in favor of any particular faith. ¶12. (SBU) The province also is facilitating the operation of the Catholic Church, the CRA Chairman told us. The 91,000-strong Catholic Church continues to grow in Gia Lai, albeit at a slow rate. The province recently approved the Church's proposal to send nine new students to the seminary in Hue. The Church also ordained six new priests and transferred eight to new parishes. Two of the eight transfers came from outside Gia Lai. HO CHI MIN 00001185 003.2 OF 003 Implementation at the District Level -------------- ¶13. (SBU) Prior to meeting with returnees in Chu Se District -- a hotbed of Dega activism -- we met with District People's Committee Chairman Nguyen Dung. Dung emphasized that he has been instructed to facilitate the operation of all Protestant denominations in his area of responsibility save the "Dega Protestant Church." The latter organization is not legitimate and it only "uses the Bible" to attract followers and then call for the creation of a Dega state. Dung estimated that there are perhaps a thousand hardcore Dega activists in his district, which is home to over 70,000 ethnic minority persons. These activists continue to try and incite protests and violence and to induce individuals to cross to Cambodia. He denied that the province was taking any measures to confiscate cell phones from ethnic minorities, but noted his concern that "Dega activists" were using cell phones to coordinate activities and to spread anti-GVN propaganda. He repeated the allegations that Dega activists were spreading rumors that President Bush would recognize a new Dega ethnic minority state during his upcoming visit to Vietnam. And at the Grassroots -------------- ¶14. (SBU) During our village visits to monitor the welfare of ethnic minority returnees from Cambodia in the border district of Duc Co, we met with the ethnic Jarai village elders of Ba and Chan villages. The three elders from Ba village were former Viet Cong and adamant that Protestantism was a "counterrevolutionary" phenomenon. The elders said that it was their independent policy to discourage the practice of Protestantism. The two Protestant families in the 580-person village only could practice at home. Catholicism and traditional animist beliefs did not face restriction, although the elders said that they were atheists. Five hundred yards down the road, the neighboring village of Chan -- within the same local administrative area as Ba -- was a complete contrast. The bulk of the villagers were affiliated with the SECV. Up to 600 villagers gather for services three times a week without any incident. Villagers explained that a number of the village elders are Protestant. Comment -------------- ¶15. (SBU) The province's relatively detailed and frank discussions on ethnic minority separatism are a significant step forward as is their willingness to grant us greater access to returnees in their villages (more septel). While it is still difficult for us to gauge the extent of ethnic minority support for the separatist movement, it is clearly the biggest single worry for Central Highlands officials. The perceived separatist threat colors the provincial response to religious freedom, NGO access, views of the United States and treatment of cross-border migrants. In that context, it is particularly notable that Gia Lai -- and to a lesser extent Dak Lak -- have become increasingly comfortable with the legalization of other Protestant groups in the province. Equally encouraging is that provincial officials now tell us that they will apply the successful model of registration and recognition of SECV churches to other Protestant denominations in the province. The presence of our French Embassy colleague on the visit helped underscore that issues such as the status of ethnic minorities, human rights and religious freedom in the Central Highlands are not an exclusive U.S. issue but an international concern. ¶16. (SBU) Comment, continued: The status of the SECV in Gia Lai continues to improve steadily. Its leaders acknowledge that they must resolve internal organizational challenges, such as training additional pastors, before seeking additional recognitions from provincial authorities. The stark contrast in attitudes to religion from village elders in adjacent hamlets in Duc Co District highlights the how difficult it can be to change entrenched mindsets at the grassroots and ensure consistent application of GVN policy on religion. At least in this corner of the Central Highlands, restrictions on religious practice stem from the hardliners in the ethnic minority community who still reject the efforts of higher-level GVN officials in the area. End Comment. WINNICK