Below is an article published by the Catholic News Agency:

Witnesses at a Jan. 24 [2012] House subcommittee hearing on human rights abuses in Vietnam urged the U.S. government to intervene on behalf of those who are oppressed in other countries.

Former U.S. congressman Anh “Joseph” Cao testified that the repression of minorities in Vietnam is growing worse.

The country “has no intention of keeping the promise that it made to the U.S. congress in 2006” to improve its human rights record, he said.

Cao was one of the witnesses at the Tuesday afternoon hearing, which focused on the suppression of ethnic and religious minorities in Vietnam, as well as human trafficking that involves both labor and sexual abuse. 

The former congressman described how Vietnamese authorities exert pressure on religious groups to make them submit to government control. Those who do not “are often harassed, arrested, imprisoned, or put under house arrest.”

Cao recounted for those present how the land and facilities of Thai Ha Catholic parish in Hanoi were seized by the government.