Objection to Ho Chi Minh Statue in Wien, Austria

January 30, 2017

To: Dr. Michael Haupl

Governor of the State of Wien,

Lichtenfelsgasse 2, Stiege 5, 1. Stock, A-1010 Wien. Austria

Subject: Our concern about the building of the statue of Ho Chi Minh in your city

Mr. Governor,

We have been informed that your city/state has a plan to build the statue of Ho Chi Minh in the Donaupark of your city.

We are thankful for your nice idea to introduce and promote the Vietnamese culture to your people.

But we also think that there have been a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation you have in regard of Vietnamese history.

Ho Chi Minh – the founder of Communist Party (1930) and then Democratic Republic of Vietnam (1945) – is the true responsible man for all misery our people have been enduring. He is no hero to the people, but only to the Communists who hold power and enjoy high privilege. During the so-called Land Reform in mid-1950s, Ho Chi Minh ordered to kill tens of thousands peasants his Communist cadres labeled as landlords. In 1960, he started the war to invade South Vietnam that killed millions of innocent people. In 1968, his troops buried alive or murdered more than 6000 people when they occupied the old capital Hue during the General Offensive.

Ho Chi Minh can only be remembered as a criminal who committed to the crime against humanity.

Moreover, we would like you to take into consideration how hurtful your plan is and will be to millions of Vietnamese refugees who fled Vietnam after the Communists won the war. Many of them have chosen your beautiful country their new home.

It also hurts the feeling of tens of millions people in Vietnam who have been suffering from the Communist brutality. Many Vietnamese are still trying to flee away from the country to avoid the merciless policies and oppression of the Communist regime. Indeed, Vietnamese people are without any human and civil rights.

We’d like to cite a persistent violation of human rights in Vietnam: As reported by Human Rights Watch, the police in Vietnam routinely use torture and beatings to extract confessions and punish detainees. The criminal justice system, as well as other branches, is under control of the Communist Party.

Please, be so kind as to thoroughly research the history to learn the true identity of Ho Chi Minh and cancel the project.

Kind regards,

Michael Do

CEO, President of the Vietnamese American Community of the USA