authorities cut power to an event over Ukraine

The seminar was organized by intellectuals who have lived in the country invaded by Russia in February. Activities continued in the dark, but this is not the first time that the Vietnamese government has tried to suppress events related to the war. Moscow is Hanoi’s main arms supplier and trade between the two countries has increased in 2021.

Hanoi ( / Agencies) – The authorities of the Vietnamese capital cut off the power supply to a building where a seminar on Ukraine was taking place. According to Radio Free Asia (RFA), on July 16, a group of Vietnamese intellectuals who had lived in Ukraine organized the cultural event at the Sena Institute of Technology Research in Hanoi. The seminar opened with a concert, but within minutes of starting the power went out.

Despite everything, the organizers decided to continue. “It was awkward, but otherwise the planned program was kept,” activist Dang Bich Phuong told RFA. “People kept reading poetry and a musician played the guitar in the dark. He was moving.”

The seminar was attended by the Ukrainian charge d’affaires in Vietnam, Nataliya Zhynkina, and some Ukrainian students. Other participants reported that they were detained by the police before arriving at the event site.

It is not the first time that events of this type have occurred in Vietnam. In March the local authorities prohibited the population from participating in a fundraiser in support of the victims of Ukraine. Another charity event scheduled a few days later by a group of Ukrainians living in Vietnam had to be canceled due to repeated interruptions by the police.

Referring to the war, Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh had declared that “Vietnam does not take sides, but chooses justice.”

In fact, the communist country has repeatedly refused to condemn Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and has opposed US attempts to suspend Russia from the UN Human Rights Council.

In early July, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was the first Russian official to visit the capital after the start of what the Russian Federation calls a “special military operation.”

Moscow is Hanoi’s main arms supplier and bilateral trade between the two countries reached $5.54 billion in 2021, an increase of 14% from the previous year.