Ho Chi Minh City police have arrested Catholic lawyer, Paul Le Cong Dinh on charges of working with foreigners to overthrow the government and creating "propaganda against the State of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam."
Security officials searched Dinh's office and house in Ho Chi Minh City and confiscated "anti-government" documents, UCA News says quoting Vietnamese reports.
The lawyer reportedly "compiled papers distorting the government's economic and social policies, slandering high ranking officials, and causing division among people." He also sent his papers to websites based in foreign countries, media reported.
Authorities also charge Dinh, 41, with working with "reactionary forces" in foreign countries to overthrow the regime.
Dinh studied in France before obtaining a master's degree in law from Tulane University in Louisiana in the United States. He then returned to Ho Chi Minh City where he has been working as a prominent lawyer specialising in international commercial law.
Some local Church observers said Dinh's arrest was a clear sign that the communist government wanted to warn those who oppose the regime and its economic and social policies.
A number of high profile Catholics have run afoul of the authorities in recent months.
Several Redemptorists in Ha Noi, who launched a campaign against two controversial bauxite mining projects in the central highlands in late April, were questioned by the police last week and had their computer confiscated.
Le Tran Luat, the lawyer who defended eight Catholics from Ha Noi's Thai Ha parish accused of causing social disturbance and damaging public property, has been continuously questioned by police.
They have also closed down his office.
The defendants were among hundreds of Catholics who occupied a plot of former Church land near the Redemptorist run Thai Ha church on August 15 last year. They placed crosses and Marian statues on the plot, which the government confiscated in the early 1960s.
Luat represented the eight in court on December 8 when seven of them were handed suspended prison sentences ranging from 12 to 17 months. One was let off with a warning.
Security officials searched Dinh's office and house in Ho Chi Minh City and confiscated "anti-government" documents, UCA News says quoting Vietnamese reports.
The lawyer reportedly "compiled papers distorting the government's economic and social policies, slandering high ranking officials, and causing division among people." He also sent his papers to websites based in foreign countries, media reported.
Authorities also charge Dinh, 41, with working with "reactionary forces" in foreign countries to overthrow the regime.
Dinh studied in France before obtaining a master's degree in law from Tulane University in Louisiana in the United States. He then returned to Ho Chi Minh City where he has been working as a prominent lawyer specialising in international commercial law.
Some local Church observers said Dinh's arrest was a clear sign that the communist government wanted to warn those who oppose the regime and its economic and social policies.
A number of high profile Catholics have run afoul of the authorities in recent months.
Several Redemptorists in Ha Noi, who launched a campaign against two controversial bauxite mining projects in the central highlands in late April, were questioned by the police last week and had their computer confiscated.
Le Tran Luat, the lawyer who defended eight Catholics from Ha Noi's Thai Ha parish accused of causing social disturbance and damaging public property, has been continuously questioned by police.
They have also closed down his office.
The defendants were among hundreds of Catholics who occupied a plot of former Church land near the Redemptorist run Thai Ha church on August 15 last year. They placed crosses and Marian statues on the plot, which the government confiscated in the early 1960s.
Luat represented the eight in court on December 8 when seven of them were handed suspended prison sentences ranging from 12 to 17 months. One was let off with a warning.