Vietnam frees ailing dissident priest: lawyer
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hKpJmxcETg88pKwP9EazoKJPoNrw
WASHINGTON — Vietnam on Monday freed a Catholic priest who has been an outspoken democracy advocate after he suffered debilitating strokes in his nearly three years in prison, his lawyer said.
Vietnam has been on the receiving end of international appeals to release Nguyen Van Ly, who was sentenced in March 2007 to eight years in prison after prosecutors said he helped start a banned pro-democracy coalition.
Ly's sister had been visiting the priest at his prison near Hanoi when guards told her to wait, Maran Turner, the dissident's Washington-based counsel.
"She didn't know why and she waited for quite some time. Then all of a sudden they brought out Father Ly at 4 am and said, 'He's been released,'" Turner told AFP.
Turner, the executive director of Freedom Now, which supports political prisoners, said that Ly returned to his hometown of Hue where he is surrounded by family.
Ly, 63, is partially paralyzed from two strokes he suffered while in prison, Turner said.
"He's getting better," she said. "He's able to move around and to walk with the help of a cane."
Thirty-seven US senators -- or more than one-third of the chamber -- in July last year sent Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet an appeal for Ly's freedom. The European Union had also sought his release.
"There's been a rise in attention on his case," Turner said. "And we can only assume that at least in some measure, his health was the impetus for going ahead and releasing him."
While voicing delight over Ly's release, Turner cautioned that others remained in prison.
In an annual report, the State Department last week found that Vietnam held at least 60 political prisoners at the end of 2009 including lawyers, activists and bloggers.
Leonard Leo, the chair of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, a government advisory body, welcomed Ly's release and urged the US ambassador to Vietnam to meet the freed priest.
"While this is good news for Father Ly, we continue to have grave concerns about Vietnam's deteriorating human rights situation," Leo said.
Earlier this month, Vietnam released lawyer and dissident Le Thi Cong Nhan, 30, who had also spent three years in prison for challenging the communist authorities.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hKpJmxcETg88pKwP9EazoKJPoNrw
WASHINGTON — Vietnam on Monday freed a Catholic priest who has been an outspoken democracy advocate after he suffered debilitating strokes in his nearly three years in prison, his lawyer said.
Vietnam has been on the receiving end of international appeals to release Nguyen Van Ly, who was sentenced in March 2007 to eight years in prison after prosecutors said he helped start a banned pro-democracy coalition.
Ly's sister had been visiting the priest at his prison near Hanoi when guards told her to wait, Maran Turner, the dissident's Washington-based counsel.
"She didn't know why and she waited for quite some time. Then all of a sudden they brought out Father Ly at 4 am and said, 'He's been released,'" Turner told AFP.
Turner, the executive director of Freedom Now, which supports political prisoners, said that Ly returned to his hometown of Hue where he is surrounded by family.
Ly, 63, is partially paralyzed from two strokes he suffered while in prison, Turner said.
"He's getting better," she said. "He's able to move around and to walk with the help of a cane."
Thirty-seven US senators -- or more than one-third of the chamber -- in July last year sent Vietnamese President Nguyen Minh Triet an appeal for Ly's freedom. The European Union had also sought his release.
"There's been a rise in attention on his case," Turner said. "And we can only assume that at least in some measure, his health was the impetus for going ahead and releasing him."
While voicing delight over Ly's release, Turner cautioned that others remained in prison.
In an annual report, the State Department last week found that Vietnam held at least 60 political prisoners at the end of 2009 including lawyers, activists and bloggers.
Leonard Leo, the chair of the US Commission on International Religious Freedom, a government advisory body, welcomed Ly's release and urged the US ambassador to Vietnam to meet the freed priest.
"While this is good news for Father Ly, we continue to have grave concerns about Vietnam's deteriorating human rights situation," Leo said.
Earlier this month, Vietnam released lawyer and dissident Le Thi Cong Nhan, 30, who had also spent three years in prison for challenging the communist authorities.