WRITTEN QUESTION E-1939/01 by Olivier Dupuis (TDI) to the Council. Montagnard tribes in Vietnam.
Date: 2001-07-12
Institutions: European Parliament, Provisional data
Subjects: Viet Nam, cooperation agreement (EU), ethnic group, human rights, religious discrimination, the EU's international role

16.5.2002

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

C 115 E/21

(2002/C 115 E/020)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1939/01

by Olivier Dupuis (TDI) to the Council

(12 July 2001)

Subject: Montagnard tribes in Vietnam

In February 2001 the Vietnamese Government deployed tanks, helicopters and over 13 regiments of
soldiers into the Central Highlands of Vietnam to quell demonstrations by Christian Montagnard hill tribes.
These indigenous hill tribes were protesting over the arrests of two of their church leaders as well as years
of religious persecution and confiscation of their ancestral lands. The International Commission of Jurists
(Australian section) distributed a report in February 2001 concluding that since 1975, Vietnam has
torture, arbitrary arrest,
committed gross human rights abuses against
sterilisation policies that violate women’s rights, forced relocations from and expropriations of their
traditional lands and the increased repression of religious freedom.

the Montagnards namely:

Reports indicate that the indigenous Montagnard population are now being terrorised by security forces.
The situation has deteriorated to such an extent that Montagnard refugees are fleeing to Cambodia, with
Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, Refugees International and the United Nations High
Commissioner for Refugees calling for urgent action to protection them, as Vietnam has offered ‘bounties’
for their capture and return. In June 2001, martial law and a media blackout in the region continues.
Vietnam has further cordoned off the region in an attempt to halt refugees.

Has the Council already investigated the reports of human rights violations facing the Montagnard
population inside Vietnam’s Central Highlands and the potential
for a humanitarian crisis if more
Montagnards are forced to flee as refugees? Has the Council made a provision of aid and trade to Vietnam
continent on the Vietnamese government complying with international human rights law?

Reply

(17 December 2001)

The Union regularly raises the human rights situation in its talks with the Vietnamese Government. The
Troika of EU missions in Hanoi expressed its concern at the situation in the mountains of central Vietnam
during a recent meeting on the subject of human rights. The 1995 Cooperation Agreement between the
European Community and Vietnam contains a human rights clause reflecting the importance which the
Union attaches to the promotion of human rights in the context of its relations with third countries and
human rights were discussed at the meeting of the EU/Vietnam Joint Committee on 6 November 2001.
The Council considers that dialogue is the best way to improve the human rights situation and, at present,
has no intention of imposing conditions either on its cooperation with Vietnam or on trade between
Europe and Vietnam.

(2002/C 115 E/021)

WRITTEN QUESTION E-1966/01

by Herbert Bösch (PSE) to the Commission

(5 July 2001)

Subject: European Commission representation in Vienna

By letter of 3 December 1999, the Austrian Private Employees’ Trade Union informed the Commission
that large numbers of employees of the Commission’s representation in Austria had for many years been
employed on a flat-rate fee basis thereby circumventing social-security and employment-law provisions.
The employees concerned had suffered personal disadvantages (withholding of leave and Christmas-break
payments, gaps in social insurance contributions, etc.)