Obama Heads to Vietnam, Japan; Is Religious Freedom on the Agenda?

By Anugrah Kumar, Christian Post Contributor Sunday, May 22, 2016

U.S. President Barack Obama arrives to board Air Force One to depart for Vietnam and Japan from Joint Base Andrews, Maryland, U.S. May 21, 2016.

Commuters stop near a poster promoting the 14th National Assembly election on a street in Hanoi, Vietnam May 20, 2016. Communist Vietnam holds its five-yearly day of democracy on Sunday with an election for its parliament, and the only national poll in a country tightly controlled by one party for 41 years. The secretive Communist Party has been on a publicity blitz to showcase its democratic credentials, with the rural roads and the streets of its bustling cities festooned with billboards of a hammer and sickle and the workers, farmers and soldiers synonymous with the stateÕs socialist foundations. The poster reads: 'Voting for members of the National Assembly and People's councils is a citizen's right.'

Vietnamese dissident priest Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly (R) is escorted by police as he faces a court in Vietnam's central Hue City March 30, 2007.

People drive past posters promoting the 14th National Assembly election outside Nhan Dan daily, the Vietnam Communist Party's paper, on a street in Hanoi, Vietnam May 20, 2016. Communist Vietnam holds its five-yearly day of democracy on Sunday with an election for its parliament, and the only national poll in a country tightly controlled by one party for 41 years. The secretive Communist Party has been on a publicity blitz to showcase its democratic credentials, with the rural roads and the streets of its bustling cities festooned with billboards of a hammer and sickle and the workers, farmers and soldiers synonymous with the stateÕs socialist foundations. The poster (1st L) reads: 'Voting for members of the National Assembly and People's councils is a citizen's right.'

A girl walks past a poster promoting the 14th National Assembly election on a street in Hanoi, Vietnam May 20, 2016. Communist Vietnam holds its five-yearly day of democracy on Sunday with an election for its parliament, and the only national poll in a country tightly controlled by one party for 41 years. The secretive Communist Party has been on a publicity blitz to showcase its democratic credentials, with the rural roads and the streets of its bustling cities festooned with billboards of a hammer and sickle and the workers, farmers and soldiers synonymous with the state's socialist foundations. The words on the poster read: 'Voting ballot.'

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Barack Obama departed Saturday afternoon for his first trip to Vietnam and Japan. As a goodwill gesture, Vietnam's Communist government released a Catholic priest from prison, but the president agenda might press for the release of more political prisoners while making no mention of a new highly restrictive religion law being enacted in that country.

Obama will arrive in Hanoi on Sunday evening and later visit Ho Chi Minh City, spending three days in Vietnam before leaving for Japan, Asia's second-largest economy, to attend the G7 Summit in Ise-Shima.

Obama is the third U.S. president to visit the country since the Vietnam War ended 41 years ago. The president will also visit Hiroshima, and become the first president to visit the city.

The trip highlights Obama's commitment to the Asian-Pacific region, an aide of the president said, according to ABC News.

"The Asia rebalance has been a central objective of the president's broader foreign policy and economic policy, rooted in our belief that this largest-emerging market in the world is critical to our future prosperity and also central to a whole host of critical U.S. national security interests as well," Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes was quoted as saying.

Vietnamese detainee Father Thadeus Nguyen Van Ly talks to the media at Nam Ha prison in Ba Sao county, Nam Ha province, 80 km (50 miles) south of Hanoi, February 1, 2005. | (Photo: Reuters/Kham/File Photo)

Accompanying Obama is Secretary of State John Kerry, who served in Vietnam and later protested the war.

Obama is expected to discuss lifting of the remaining arms embargo in Vietnam, which is being seen as an attempt to boost regional defenses against China's growing clout. However, the president has been urged not to expand weapons sales to Vietnam until Communist officials agree to improve the country's human rights record and ease political oppression.

In an apparent move to help Obama make a case for the lifting of the embargo, Vietnam released a Catholic priest, the Rev. Nguyen Van Ly, from prison the day before the president's departure.

The Catholic Archdiocese of the central city of Hue welcomed the release of Ly, who has served several long terms in prison or under house arrest for promoting political and religious freedoms, according to The Associated Press.

The U.S. State Department also welcomed Ly's release. "We consistently have called for the release of Father Ly and all other prisoners of conscience in Vietnam," said Gabrielle Price, the department's spokeswoman for East Asia and Pacific affairs.

However, Price added, "We remain deeply concerned for all prisoners of conscience in Vietnam. We call on the government to release unconditionally all prisoners of conscience and allow all Vietnamese to express their political views peacefully without fear of retribution."

While Obama is likely to lift the embargo partially, the possibility of a full suspension cannot be ruled out.

A religious freedom issue more important than the release of political prisoners is a new religion law being enacted in Vietnam for the first time.

Currently in its fifth draft, the "Law on Belief and Religion" has been debated in the National Assembly and is expected to be voted on later this year. A series of decrees, ordinances, decisions and directives already repress religious freedom, but the new law is more worrisome as it will cement those restrictions.

The number of religious followers continues to grow in Vietnam, and it was hoped that the government would use this opportunity to lift restrictions in religious legislation and bring its laws in line with Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights to which Vietnam is a state party, but the draft text of the new law falls far short of these expectations, according to the Vietnam Committee on Human Rights. "Not only does it not improve protection of religious freedom, but according to religious communities, it is 'a step backwards' even in comparison to current law."

The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom has recommended the U.S. State Department to designate Vietnam as a "country of particular concern" for 16 consecutive years, since 2001, for "systematic, ongoing and egregious violations" of freedom of religion or belief. However, the State Department removed Vietnam from the CPC list in 2006.

According to estimates, the majority of Vietnam's more than 94 million people practice Buddhism. More than 6 million Vietnamese are Catholic, more than 1 million practice the Cao Dai or Hoa Hao faiths, and approximately 1 to 2 million are Protestant. Smaller numbers are Khmer Krom Buddhist, Muslim (including ethnic Cham Muslims), Baha'i, Mormon, and Falun Gong, as well as several local religions or other forms of traditional worship.

During his visit to Hiroshima in Japan, Obama is not likely to apologize for the U.S. decision to launch the world's first nuclear attack in 1945, but could use it just as a reminder of the need to rid the world of nuclear weapons.