Am I Still a Vietnamese Citizen?

[BinhJerome 14]

My wifes Uncle and I was chatting about this awhile back and he told me that they still consider anyone born in Vietnam to a citizen and regardless if they became a citizen and had a passport from another country. We got to talking about it because someone in the family in California had written things critical of the VN government and he was pretty much guaranteed of not being able to return to VN or he would be arrested. Supposedly the VN government had already charged him. He had been in the states a long time and a citizen for about 20 years.

Him and I also was discussing a story I had written about my experiences of meeting my fiancee and the travails we endured. I was starting to shop the story around and he asked me not to publish it as some of my experiences I had written about of when I was in Vietnam and interviews may be construed as anti VN government. I had said that I am a citizen so had no worries but he said that they may be able to glimpse from the story who the interviewees were and also find out who I was and my wifes family and punish them. I had tried to change it up and even deleted a lot and then just ended up putting the story on the back burner. I don't want to harm my wifes family and though I doubt it was that bad I decided to not chance it. Supposedly the VN embassies and consulates has intelligence sections that have people that look for this stuff. I am sure they do as I know the U.S, embassies do also the same type stuff.

If you say something bad about Vietnam, yes it is what they consider subversion, and they can and at times do punish people for it. Lately I think that thought has calmed down greatly, but most of the older generations still remember what happened right after the American war, and at that time and for many years it was really really bad. They do recognize by the law dual citizenship, this is mainly because the outside world forced it on them, and they had many Vietnamese people living abroad that still had family at home. Many of those living abroad did lose property that was theirs, and many people raised hell about it, then throw on the fact that many Vietnamese people living abroad had tons of money and were wanting to invest, so the government finially decided if they wanted the extra tax money they needed to recognize dual citizenship. There was also the foreigners that were wanting to become Vietnamese citizens with money, and in order to have some rich investments come into the country they once again had to change laws where foreigners could gain Vietnamese citizenship, all of these changes were for investment money, and tax dollars. It is just that some people in Vietnam still do not obide by the laws, but that happens everywhere.

Jerome

[Dau Que 6]

How to tell whether you're still a VNese? If ONE of your biological parents was born in Vietnam, then according to the current VN law, you ARE a VN citizen.

Example: 1)You were born in the USA. You are 100% US citizen. You are also a VNese if one of your biological parents were born in VN many decades ago.

2) You were born in VN then immigrated to the USA and became its citizen. Unless you submit in writing to the current VN President and receive approval in writing from that authority, you ARE still a VNese (while inside the legal boundary of the country VN)

This law is intended to prosecute you easily under the current VN law, if the authority doesn't like what you're doing (politically) while being inside that country. Your legal rights won't be protected by your current citizenship status (meaning the US consulate in VN can't do squat to help you out)

Thanks so much Mr President, Nguyen Minh Triet for looking out my Vietnamese citizenship rights (even when it's against my will).

Write to him and urge him to renounce your former citizenship BEFORE traveling to that country to protect your legal rights!