Morning Star News, 25 July 2022 (excerpts)
Severe persecution of Hmong Christians is underway in the central Vietnam province of Nghe An where officials, vying with each other to create “Christian-free zones”, operate “with no conscience or humanity”.
Authorities pressure animist relatives to drive Christians from their homes. In the worst cases, villagers are pressured into seizing all the Christians’ property and driving them out of their community. Officials say these outrages are purely family matters.
Most Christians steadfastly refuse to give up their new-found faith, which they testify has freed them from the demonic oppression of their ancestral religion.
Church leaders’ attempts to visit the persecuted have been blocked, and they have received no response from any government agency.
Such suffering, quietly going on for years, has hit mainly members of the not-yet-legally recognized Vietnam Good News Mission Church and the officially recognized Evangelical Church of Vietnam-North.
Nghe An Province is the birthplace of Ho Chi Minh and thus proudly considered the cradle of the communist revolution. Officials compete for the honour of calling their jurisdiction “a Christian-free zone.”
The refusal of any Vietnamese authority to intervene is inexcusable and argues for embarrassing exposure and international accountability.