• Urgent Action

Urgent Action: EXECUTION IMINENT IN TORTURE TAINTED CASE (Vietnam: UA 79.23)

September 5, 2023

TAKE ACTION:

  1. Please take action as-soon-as possible. This Urgent Action expires on November 10th, 2021.
  2. Write a letter in your own words or using the sample below as a guide to one or both government officials listed. You can also email, fax, call or Tweet them.
  3. Click here to let us know the actions you took on Urgent Action 79.23. It’s important to report because we share the total number with the officials we are trying to persuade and the people we are trying to help.

CONTACT INFORMATION

Võ Văn Thưởng, President of Việt Nam

No. 2, Hùng Vương, Ba Đình District

Hà Nội, Việt Nam Tel: (+84) 8043176

Emails: [email protected]; [email protected]

Ambassador Nguyen Quoc Dzung
Vietnam Embassy
1233 20th St NW #400, Washington, DC 20036
Phone: (202) 861-0737
Email: vnembassy-washington.mofa.gov.vn

SAMPLE LETTER

Your Excellency,

I am writing to express my grave concern at reports of the imminent execution of Nguyen Van Chuong, who has been on death row in Viet Nam, after he was convicted of robbery and murder in unfair proceedings and given the death penalty in 2008. I urge you to immediately intervene and stop the execution from taking place.

It is distressing that Nguyen Van Chuong said that he was stripped naked, hung and beaten during police interrogation to forc e a “confession”. For 16 years, Nguyen Van Chuong’s family and lawyers have been sending petitions to all court levels requesting reconsideration of his conviction and death sentence. In 2011, the Prosecutor General of the Supreme People’s Procuracy requested that the Supreme People’s Court quash the appellate criminal judgment and commute his death sentence out of concern for the conviction. However, in December 2011, the Supreme People’s Court rejected the request.

A death sentence that is imposed following proceedings which do not meet international standards f or a fair trial − including those contained in Article 14 of the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) to which Viet Nam is a party − violates international law. This renders its execution arbitrary.

Therefore, we urge you to:

  • Immediately halt any plans to carry out the execution of Nguyễn Văn Chưởng and grant him a fair review of his case;
  • Initiate a prompt, independent and impartial investigation into the allegations that he was subjected to torture or other cruel, degrading or inhuman treatment.

Yours sincerely,

[YOUR NAME]

ADDITIONAL RESOURCES