VZCZCXRO5210
PP RUEHCHI RUEHDT RUEHNH RUEHPB
DE RUEHHM #0466/01 1251112
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 051112Z MAY 06
FM AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 0780
INFO RUEHHI/AMEMBASSY HANOI PRIORITY 0565
RUCNARF/ASEAN REGIONAL FORUM COLLECTIVE
RUEHHM/AMCONSUL HO CHI MINH CITY 0817

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 HO CHI MINH CITY 000466 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PHUM PREL PGOV KIRF VM
SUBJECT: EASTER AND THE PROTESTANT COMMUNITY IN SOUTHERN AND CENTRAL 
VIETNAM 
 
REF: 05 HCMC 1212; B) 05 HCMC 1082; C) HCMC 72; D) 05 HCMC 910 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000466  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1.  (SBU) Summary:  Protestant Easter celebrations generally 
were peaceful throughout Central and Southern Vietnam, including 
in the Central Highlands.  Unregistered house churches were told 
to apply for permission to hold Easter services, but largely 
were not prevented from celebrating the holiday even if they 
refused.  In late April, HCMC authorities allowed unregistered 
Baptist groups to hold the first officially-sanctioned public 
revival meeting in the city since 1975.  However, a number of 
congregations of the GVN-recognized Southern Evangelical Church 
of Vietnam and unregistered house churches continue to face 
serious harassment.  Most of these incidents occur in rural 
areas and often involve the ethnic minorities.  A key Protestant 
leader in the Central Highlands province of Gia Lai reported 
that an ethnic minority group in the United States continues to 
foment ethnic minority separatism and seeks to undermine the 
independence and credibility of the Southern Evangelical Church 
of Vietnam. 
 
¶2. (SBU) Summary continued:  House church leaders remain 
suspicious of the GVN and reluctant to register under the new 
legal framework on religion.  Vietnamese officials say they are 
frustrated by this unwillingness to register, despite their 
"encouragement."  We have urged the GVN to build confidence in 
the house church community by responding to religious freedom 
violations.  End Summary. 
 
Easter for the House Church Community 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶3.  (SBU) With a few notable exceptions, Easter services for 
house churches in southern and central Vietnam went smoothly 
according to Pastor Pham Dinh Nhan, President of the Vietnam 
Evangelical Fellowship (VEF), an umbrella organization for 
unrecognized house churches.   Overall conditions for religious 
freedom also continue to improve.  However,  police had 
prohibited celebrations at the Full Gospel Church in Quy Nhon 
city in Binh Dinh province (Central Vietnam) and at a house 
church of the United Gospel Outreach Church (UGOC), in a rural 
community in Tra Vinh province (Mekong Delta).  According to 
Nhan, police in Tra Vinh have repeatedly stopped services and 
confiscated religious materials on the grounds that they were 
not published legally.  On a more positive note, a house church 
in HCMC's District 2 belonging to the Inter-Evangelistic 
Movement of Pastor Tran Mai has not been harassed following 
ConGen's intervention with HCMC authorities in early April. 
Pastor Nguyen Quang Trung's Mennonites and the Seventh Day 
Adventist church also did not report any harassment.  (Both 
organizations are legally registered in HCMC.) 
 
¶4.  (SBU) Pastor Nhan gave us a copy of an April 3 decision of a 
district-level Party Secretary in Binh Phuoc province explicitly 
prohibiting unregistered house church organizations from holding 
services in the district.  In his decision, the Party Secretary 
argued that "bad elements" could exploit house church services 
to undermine social and political order in the district. 
However, when the local UGOC pastor refused to comply with the 
requirement to register his church and list congregation 
members, police backed down and allowed Easter services to 
continue. 
 
First Sanctioned Revival in 31 years 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶5. (SBU) PolOff attended an April 28 Baptist Easter revival, in 
a jam-packed theater in HCMC's District 5.  The meeting was 
organized by Pastor Nguyen Ngoc Hien,  head of the Vietnam 
Baptist Fellowship, the largest umbrella organization for 
Vietnam's Baptist house churches.  Local government, Party and 
police (uniformed and plainclothes) were in attendance 
throughout the three-hour prayer meeting.  This was the first 
time since 1975 that unrecognized house church organizations 
have secured official government approval to hold a prayer 
meeting in a public venue.  Pastor Hien said that HCMC 
authorities pressed him to hire the biggest hall possible so 
that the Baptists could celebrate Easter en masse, a  sharp 
contrast to past years when police discouraged the Baptists from 
gathering to celebrate Christmas and Easter. 
 
New Life Fellowship 
------------------- 
 
¶6. (SBU) Pastor Eric Dooley, head of the expatriate New Life 
Fellowship church reported that he organized public services in 
the garden of an HCMC hotel for 250 expatriates.  This marks the 
first time that the New Life Fellowship (NLF) has been able to 
gather on a large scale since August 2005, when police halted 
the church's services (Ref A).  The NLF continues to meet in 
smaller groups in the homes of worshipers for regular Sunday 
services.  Pastor Dooley is continuing quiet discussions with 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000466  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
HCMC and GVN representatives on a permanent solution.  (Comment: 
 we have made clear to HCMC officials our desire to see a 
satisfactory solution to the NLF saga.  End Comment.) 
 
To Register, or Not To Register 
------------------------------- 
 
¶7. (SBU) Nhan indicated that there was a division of opinion 
within the VEF on whether to comply with government requirements 
to apply for permission to hold Easter services.  Some refused 
outright, others were more open, but balked at listing all the 
names and addresses of church goers.  Nhan added that the debate 
within the VEF extends to the broader question of whether house 
churches should register with the government under the new legal 
framework on religion and under what conditions.  He noted that 
churches that refused to apply to hold Easter services did not 
face any harassment or discrimination. 
 
Central Highlands 
----------------- 
 
¶8.  (SBU) In Dak Lak province, Pastor Huynh Cuong of the 
Southern Evangelical Church of Vietnam (SECV) said that the 
GVN-recognized church was able to conduct Easter services in its 
eight recognized churches and hundreds of meeting points in most 
districts in the province.  However, SECV adherents in Ku Mgar 
and Ea Sup districts were only allowed to worship at home. 
District officials argued that the churches there were not yet 
formally registered.   In other districts in Dak Lak, SECV 
congregations were able to hold services without formally 
registering with local authorities.  Pastor Cuong added that 20 
additional SECV congregations in Dak Lak are in the process of 
securing official recognition. 
 
¶9.  (SBU) Pastor Nguyen Toi, head of the Danang-based United 
World Mission Church (UWMC), said that only one of his churches 
was harassed over Easter.  (The UWMC operates house churches 
throughout the Central Highlands and central coastal Vietnam.) 
According to Pastor Toi, police prevented an ethnic Bru church 
in the Van Kieu hamlet of Ea Kar district in Dak Lak from 
holding Easter services.  Village authorities subsequently 
issued an administrative reprimand and summoned the preacher, Ha 
Van Hiep, for three days of questioning.  They reportedly told 
the preacher that the Prime Minister's February 2005 
"Instruction on Protestantism" may apply elsewhere in Vietnam, 
but not there.  Pastor Toi noted that this particular house 
church has endured a long history of police harassment.   Pastor 
Toi also noted that the UWMC still awaits a GVN decision on its 
application for registration under the legal framework on 
religion, which it submitted to the central-level Committee for 
Religious Affairs in mid-2005.  (See ref B for additional 
information on the UWMC.) 
 
¶10.  (SBU) In a phone conversation after Easter, senior SECV 
leader Pastor Siu Y Kim, , told us that all churches and 
"meeting points" in Gia Lai were able to hold Easter services 
without incident.  He noted that this now tends to be the rule 
for the SECV in the province on any given Sunday, although the 
provincial SECV board periodically has to intervene with local 
officials to head off possible incidents.  Conditions in 
neighboring Kontum province also generally were positive except 
for Sa Thay district.  In mid-March, two SECV followers there 
were beaten by police and fined for leaving the village for six 
days without first securing a temporary absence permit.  When 
Kim intervened, provincial officials apologized, but the two 
offending officials remained unpunished.  (Note: Per ref C, Sa 
Thay district struck us as the most retrograde area that we have 
seen in the Central Highlands, when we traveled there to assess 
the welfare of ethnic minority returnees from Cambodia in 
January 2006.  End Note.) 
 
¶11. (SBU) Pastor Nghia Xuan Bao of the Vietnam Presbyterian 
church reported that, with two exceptions, Presbyterian house 
churches were able to celebrate Easter.  In Dak Lak and Lam Dong 
provinces, police halted services in two congregations, arguing 
that they were not allowed to operate until they were registered 
under the law. 
 
Outside Interference in the Central Highlands? 
--------------------------------------------- - 
 
¶12. (SBU) In a separate conversation in HCMC, Pastor Kim 
(strictly protect) reacted angrily to allegations made in a 
Montagnard Foundation (MF) press release in the United States 
that provincial government officials forced worshipers to pray 
before a picture of Ho Chi Minh during the February 2006 
inauguration of a new SECV church in Gia Lai.   He said that the 
SECV continues to face provocations from the MF aimed at 
undermining the credibility and independence of the SECV.  MF 
operatives were threatening ethnic minority pastors that unless 
 
HO CHI MIN 00000466  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
they break with the SECV, they would not be allowed to serve as 
pastors once an ethnic minority "Dega" state is established.  He 
alleged that MF operatives also were circulating among ethnic 
minority villagers, claiming that a Dega state would be 
proclaimed in the Central Highlands "soon." 
 
SECV elsewhere in Vietnam 
------------------------- 
 
¶13.  (SBU)  Reporting on SECV operations outside the Central 
Highlands, Pastor Le Van Thien, General Secretary of the SECV, 
said that, with a few exceptions, the SECV was able to conduct 
Easter services without incident.  In Dong Nai province near 
HCMC, an SECV "meeting point" continues to have its services 
disrupted by local authorities, despite the SECV's protests. 
This church has had chronic problems with local authorities. 
Thien also confirmed reports that a small ethnic Hre SECV 
congregation in Quang Ngai continues to suffer harassment that 
led to the burning of a number of ethnic Hre homes in August 
2005 (ref D).  Recently "war veterans" burned the rice storage 
sheds of two ethnic Hre believers, he said.  On a more hopeful 
note, Pastor Thien noted that the government recently ended its 
objections and allowed the two SECV preachers at the center of 
the dispute in Quang Ngai to participate in an SECV pastoral 
training course.  Similarly, an unrecognized branch of the SECV 
in Baria-Vung Tau province was allowed to resume operations 
following the intervention of the national SECV representative 
board with higher-level authorities. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶14.  (SBU) Comment:  The reports from the SECV and registered 
and unregistered house churches indicate that the overall level 
of pressure on the Protestant community in southern and central 
Vietnam continues to ebb.  The congregations that suffered 
harassment over Easter have longstanding problems with local 
authorities -- such as Sa Thay district in Kontum.   These areas 
are increasingly the exception rather than the rule in HCMC's 
consular district.  Central- and provincial-level officials 
still need to do more to ensure that the new legal framework is 
consistently implemented, particularly in rural, isolated areas. 
 
 
¶15.  (SBU) Despite recent progress, house church leaders remain 
deeply suspicious of the GVN and its long-term commitment to 
improve religious freedom conditions in Vietnam.  This lack of 
trust amplifies their reluctance to apply for registration under 
the law; they fear it will simply expose them to even greater 
scrutiny and pressure in the future.  For their part, Vietnamese 
officials tell us of their frustration with the unwillingness of 
key house church leaders to register.  We have encouraged them 
to continue to adopt a patient, supportive approach.  We also 
have stressed that they must intercede effectively and rapidly 
to resolve religious freedom problems that come to their 
attention. 
 
¶16. (SBU) Comment Continued:  We cannot independently confirm 
Pastor Kim's recent allegations that the  U.S.-based Montagnard 
Foundation is  spreading separatist sentiment and attempting to 
undermine the SECV in the Central Highlands.  However, Pastor 
Kim's reporting has been reliable in the past and he is 
respected within the SECV and the house church community.  End 
Comment. 
WINNICK