WASHINGTON (AFP) — Vietnam has released a US couple accused of carrying a handgun and bullets after being held at the Ho Chi Minh city's airport, the State Department and US lawmakers who pushed for their release said Tuesday.
The Vietnamese-Americans, Le Van Phan and his wife Nguyen Thi Thinh, who had travelled from Los Angeles, were labeled "terrorists" by the state media on their arrest on November 23, a charge Washington said was unsubstantiated.
"The two plan to return (home) in the next few days," Steve Royster, spokesman for the State Department's consular affairs division, told AFP.
Earlier Tuesday, the Vietnamese authorities released and deported to the United States a Vietnamese-American pro-democracy activist after his arrest November 17 with a group of other dissidents.
Leon Truong, a member of the banned California-based Viet Tan (Vietnam Reform) party, was held with five other pro-democracy activists, including one other Vietnamese-American, a Frenchwoman, one Thai and two Vietnamese nationals, also accused in state media of plotting terrorism against Vietnam.
The other Vietnamese American, Nguyen Quoc Quan, "is still in custody and we haven't received a formal notification of charges brought against him," Royster said.
US ambassador in Vietnam Michael Michalak had said in Hanoi that he had seen no evidence to support claims in the communist country's state media that the four Vietnamese-Americans were guilty of terrorism.
Loretta Sanchez, Democratic legislator from California, said "it is appalling to me these arrests ever happened," and called for the immediate release of Nguyen.
"When will the harassment, the arrest of the US citizens, and the harassment and jailing of the Vietnamese people end," she asked at a news conference on Capitol Hill, accusing Hanoi of human rights abuses against its own citizens.
Sanchez and 10 other legislators had written to Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, saying the arrests "violate the government of Vietnam's promise to continue to improve its human rights record."
Vietnam says it does not prosecute political activists, only people who break the law, including provisions that ban anti-state propaganda.
"I have little doubt that the pressure we're applying on Hanoi is making a difference and this is why it's essential that we keep up the pressure to ensure the safe release of Dr Nguyen, who remains in captivity, yet to be charged with a crime, for his peaceful promotion of democracy," said Ed Royce, a Republican lawmaker also from California.
Sanchez has also asked the US Transportation Security Administration to investigate its screening procedures at Los Angeles Airport to check into Vietnamese allegations that Le and Nguyen had passed through that airport's security with a firearm in the luggage.
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