Rev. Danny Fisher

The Wall Street Journal chimes in with an opinion today about the trouble at Vietnam’s Bat Nha Monastery. 

Here’s the story again, very quickly: The monastery was housing members of Thich Nhat Hanh’s Order of Interbeing.  The temple itself is not affiliated with Nhat Hanh’s movement, however, but with the official Buddhist Church of Vietnam. Following Nhat Hanh’s return to his homeland in 2005, the abbot at Bat Nha invited Order of Interbeing members to study and teach at the temple. The Order spent upwards of $1 million on new land and buildings at the monastery so that they might have appropriate space to do their work and not interfere with the other trainings taking place at Bat Nha. Then, presumably upset with some of Nhat Hanh’s outspokeness on several hot-button political issues, local authorities cut off water, electricity, and telephones to the group. Then things turned violent. International concerns about religious freedom have long confronted the Vietnamese leaders, who responded to criticism about the situation at Bat Nha Monastery, saying they only want to “manage” Nhat Hanh’s community, not “control” it.

The editors of the Wall Street Journal write:

The regime has long harassed religious groups that don’t accept full Communist Party control, whether Protestant Montagnards in the central highlands, members of the banned Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam wanting to practice their faiths, or Catholic parishioners protesting state seizure of church lands. The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, an agency within the White House, posts a detailed survey of abuses on its Web site.

But the Bat Nha case still stands out. Mr. Nhat Hanh’s visit to Vietnam in 2005, after 39 years of exile, was heralded as a breakthrough for religious freedom, as was the fact that he was allowed to establish the Bat Nha community. He played by the rules early on, toning down public statements to avoid offending Hanoi. He even tried to effect a reconciliation between the state-run Buddhist church and the underground UBCV. Yet the authorities eventually cracked down on his followers anyway.

That’s something for State to remember as it decides whether to name Vietnam as a Country of Particular Concern. Hanoi was listed from 2004 to 2006, and then removed as a reward for limited liberalization. Vietnam remains the only country that has changed its laws explicitly to get itself removed from the roster. The government made it easier to register religious groups, dropped some egregious policies such as forcing believers to renounce their faith, and improved its relations with the Vatican.

The Bat Nha example exposes how prone to backsliding Hanoi is if it’s not forced to follow such early steps with further progress. Now is a good time to ratchet up the diplomatic pressure again.

Read the rest here.