HCMC CONTACT ON CHINA, INTERNAL CPV POLITICS AND PRESSURE ON

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 HO CHI MINH CITY 001404 SIPDIS NOFORN SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 12/15/2016 TAGS: PREL CH PGOV PHUM PINR VM SUBJECT: HCMC CONTACT ON CHINA, INTERNAL CPV POLITICS AND PRESSURE ON MEDIA AND DISSIDENTS REF: HANOI 2996 HO CHI MIN 00001404 001.2 OF 003 CLASSIFIED BY: Kenneth Chern, Acting Consul General, EXEC, ConGen Ho Chi Minh City, Department of State. REASON: 1.4 (b),(d) ¶1. (C/NF) Summary and Comment: On December 12 we met with Huy Duc (protect),a well-placed HCMC media contact, to review the results of the APEC Leaders' Summit, media issues and internal political developments. Duc reportedly is close to Politburo member Truong Tan Sang, head of the Communist Party's Standing Committee of the Politburo's Secretariat. The U.S.-educated Duc (University of Maryland) also is an advisor and ghostwriter for former Prime Minister Vo Van Kiet. (Kiet has been one of the leading proponents of accelerated political and economic reform within the Party.) ¶2. (C/NF) Duc complained about the extent of Chinese influence in Vietnam and within the Party, but noted that the Chinese were miffed by a series of perceived slights at APEC. He said that Vietnam's Communist Party is pushing hard to reinforce control over the media, to reestablish Party discipline and strengthen Hanoi's authority over provincial leaders. Duc he was concerned that, post-APEC and post-PNTR, pressure on the Party to reform will cease and Party leaders will "do what they want." We note that this message is based primarily on the reporting of only one contact and could be driven by factionalism within the Party or other motivations. However, Duc's fretting about China, his comments on a tightening of Party control over the media and increased pressure on dissidents dovetail with those of other HCMC-based contacts. End Summary and Comment. APEC and China: Beijing Slighted? -------------- ¶3. (C/NF) According to Duc, Prime Minister Dzung was caught off guard by President Bush's query to him about the educational and other links of his adult children to the United States. (Biodata and information on the activities of the families of high-ranking officials is considered very sensitive in Vietnam.) But, according to HCMC contacts reportedly close to Dzung, Dzung's two adult children studied in the United States. Although both his son and daughter have since returned to Vietnam, his daughter reportedly has a romantic link with an unidentified "resident of the United States." A third, younger son, reportedly is in high school in the UK. Although some Vietnamese took the President's question to be a social "ice breaker," many, including the PM, saw it as a subtle warning that the United States "continues to watch Vietnam very carefully," our contact said. ¶4. (C/NF) Turning to China and APEC, Duc said that the Chinese delegation was miffed over perceived slights from the Vietnamese during the APEC Leaders' meeting. President Nguyen Minh Triet's decision to wear gold-colored traditional dress reportedly offended because gold is the color of the Chinese kings. Hu Jintao and his wife reportedly saw this as misplaced Vietnamese arrogance. Truong Tan Sang reportedly told our contact that Triet was aware of the sensitivities of his Chinese guests but decided to forge ahead. ¶5. (C/NF) The Chinese also reportedly were rankled by the lack of popular enthusiasm and media coverage for the Chinese President in Vietnam. He and another media contact told us that the Chinese advance team had requested that the GVN organize a "proper public reception" for Hu Jintao. While the GVN bussed in some participants to line the Chinese President's route in Hanoi, the reception was seen as desultory and paled with warm welcome that President Bush was accorded, especially in HCMC, one contact noted. ¶6. (C/NF) Separately, other HCMC media contacts told us that newspapers had been heavily criticized by the Party's Ideology and Culture Committee -- the press watchdog -- for "skewing" APEC press coverage in favor of President Bush and the United States. One contact, Nam Dong, the senior editor of Phap Luat (Law) newspaper (protect) told us that he pushed back by telling the Committee that the President actually made news and had events the press could cover. Nam Dong also noted parenthetically that Vietnamese newspapers had more interest in covering the activities of the U.S. President in any case. All eyes on China? -------------- ¶7. (C/NF) Referring to an earlier (NFI) visit that Truong Tan Sang made to Laos, Sang reportedly told Duc that his visit was HO CHI MIN 00001404 002.2 OF 003 designed to strengthen the pro-Vietnam faction of the Laotian Communist Party against Chinese inroads. He noted that Sang believed that all of his activities and conversations were being closely monitored by the Chinese in Laos. Sang also reportedly observed that he and other Politburo members believe that the same Chinese scrutiny is the norm inside Vietnam. Duc added that, from his experience, the Chinese modus operandi in Vietnam is to "quietly encourage" a desired outcome, but that they would "pull all strings" to get what they want. He said that the Chinese "were pleased" with the selection of Dzung as Prime Minister and sought that outcome. Sang and President Triet do not have the "blessings" of the Chinese, he added. Internal Political Developments -------------- ¶8. (C/NF) Duc told us that he had recently received a copy of a draft Politburo decision document proposing internal changes to the Communist Party. The proposal was drafted by a committee of 25 "scholars" organized by Sang and the Party Secretariat, and calls for reversing government decentralization and local autonomy. One proposal calls for the Prime Minister to be given the power to name the Chairmen of the provincial People's Committees, stripping that (nominal) prerogative away from the local People's Councils. Another proposal calls for courts to be centralized under the Party in Hanoi and to remove the influence of the provincial party committees over the courts. ¶9. (C/NF) The document did not broach the idea of merging the positions of the President and Party General Secretary, following the Chinese model. However, this idea is still under unofficial discussion, Duc said. The complexities in arranging a meeting between President Bush and Party General Secretary Nong Duc Manh during APEC helped strengthen the position of proponents of a merger, our contact noted. He commented that PM Dzung is best positioned to benefit from a merger of the two positions. Manh was irreparably weakened by the PMU-18 corruption scandal and Triet is not considered a candidate for further advancement. At this point, the only other viable competitor is Sang, who has shown that he "knows how to play chess." Press and Dissident Restrictions -------------- ¶10. (C/NF) We asked our contact if he thought authentic a Politburo document circulating on Vietnamese expat dissident web sites entitled "directives for increasing leadership in assuring national security in new circumstances." The document, allegedly promulgated on October 14, outlines efforts to reinforce Party discipline on contact with foreigners, oversee NGOs, and control the press and Internet. The document also calls on the party to deal more forcefully with independent labor organizers, land rights movements and "hostile external forces." Duc said that he had not seen the document, but thought that its tone and content were consistent with what he had heard emanating from Hanoi. ¶11. (C/NF) One such indication is the separate decision by the Prime Minister to issue in November "Instruction 37" tightening controls over the press (Reftel). According to our contact, this decision came at the recommendation of the Chinese Communist Party and the internal urging of MPS Vice Minister Nguyen Van Huong and Minister of Culture and Information Le Doan Hop. Instruction 37 precludes privatization of the media and empowers Party administrative bodies -- such as the Youth Union -- to exert more control over personnel and financial decisions of their subsidiary newspapers. It also calls on the State Inspectorate and the Ministries of Finance and Culture and Information to continue their financial audits of every media outlet. ¶12. (C/NF) Instruction 37 also calls on all newspapers to report to Party culture and ideology supervisors how they have implemented and adhere to Politburo directives 41 and 162 of ¶2004. These directives reportedly call on the press to strictly adhere to culture and ideology guidelines and instructions, to be vigilant against "hostile forces," to combat efforts to promote "peaceful evolution" and to enforce Party discipline within the press. ¶13. (C/NF) In this context, Duc noted that it seems certain that the chief editors of the reformist HCMC-based Tuoi Tre and Thanh Nien newspapers will be replaced. The editor of Tuoi Tre is vulnerable because the newspaper has been too aggressive reporting on corruption and other government lapses. Although Thanh Nien has been more careful, Chief Editor Nguyen Cong Khe is vulnerable because of a longstanding dispute with MPS Vice HO CHI MIN 00001404 003.2 OF 003 Minister Huong. According to contacts in the HCMC press corps, Huong sees this as his time to exact revenge for Khe's role in breaking the "Nam Cam" organized crime case in 2003 in HCMC, which brought down a police general closely allied with Huong. ¶14. (C/NF) Separately, the editor of Phap Luat, Nam Dong, confirmed that the Party is trying to clamp down on Tuoi Tre. He told us that, as a result of Tuoi Tre's unwillingness to follow strictly GVN and censor instructions on the coverage of State Bank of Vietnam problems in printing Vietnam's polymer currency and allegations of malfeasance and nepotism against the Governor of the State Bank, the two senior reporters who covered the story were censured and prevented from being promoted to the newspaper's editorial staff. According to this contact, instead, the HCMC Youth Union, which oversees Tuoi Tre, will place two of its staff on the editorial board. CHERN