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Concerted effort needed to combat false and distorted information
Concerted effort needed to combat false and distorted information
3/8/15
Recently, hostile forces have increased their activities against the Party and State. In response to their domestic security sabotage campaign, the People’s Army Newspaper in association with the Defence Radio and Television Center, on July 30th, held a seminar themed “Improving the efficiency of preventing toxic information and building a firm political stance,” aiming to identify and clarify schemes and tricks used by hostile forces in their campaign against the Party and State, as well as propose ideas for approaches to more effectively combat hostile forces’ information operations.
Malicious schemes and sophisticated tricks
The seminar attracted a number of experts, scientists and officials from military and civilian units. The organizers also received several reports from other high-profile scholars and officials.
Major General Pham Van Huan, Editor-in-Chief of the People’s Army Newspaper, and Senior Colonel Nguyen Kim Ton, Deputy Director of the Vietnam Radio and Television Center co-chaired the seminar.
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| At the seminar. |
At the beginning, Associate Professor, Doctor Dao Duy Quat, Permanent Vice Chairman of the Central Council for Criticism-Theory and Arts-Literature said that hostile forces have recently used an increasing number of forces and assets along with various tricks in an attempt to sabotage the Party and State.
In terms of forces, they recruit many scholars and experts in ideology and psychology to oppose the nation in politics, thought, theory and culture. What is more, hostile overseas forces strengthen their organizations by setting up connections with domestic political opportunists, dissidents and anti-revolutionaries. In terms of assets, hostile forces know how to exploit the internet and other mass media to broadcast false information and spread poisonous documents to the country.
According to Senior Colonel Dang Ngoc Tuyen, Deputy Chief of Department A87 under the Security General Department of the Public Security Ministry, one of the tricks used by these hostile forces is to make use of the internet and social websites and blogs to post false and distorted information, aiming to blacken the image and damage the credibility of senior leaders of the Party, State and Army as well as to undermine the national great unity bloc, cause division in the Party and separate people from the Party, State and Army. So far, as many as 62 foreign-based radio stations, 390 foreign-based newspapers and magazines, 88 foreign-based publishing houses and 397 websites, social network pages and blogs registered overseas, at different frequencies, have released articles and reports in Vietnamese which are harmful to the nation.
Discussing hostile forces’ tricks in cyberspace, Associate Professor Truong Ngoc Nam, Rector of the Journalism and Communications Academy, provided several examples, such as; hostile forces hire experts to produce fake video clips, audio files and photos and then upload them to social network websites; use modern technology to edit and renew data for their negative purposes; and pay for quotes and images of famous figures to intentionally add to articles, in order to cheat online readers into believing what they read.
Meanwhile, Associate Professor, Doctor Nguyen Hong Vinh, Chairman of the Central Council for Theory-Criticism and Arts-Literature pointed out that arts and literature is a special sensitive area that usually has a swift and profound impact on people. Taking advantage of this feature, hostile forces wisely insert negative and extreme thoughts into art and literature pieces in order to distort history, revolutionary achievements and leaders’ revolutionary careers, undermining people’s confidence in the Party and State. Such art and literature pieces also poison the thoughts of people, particularly the younger generations, and damage the social cohesiveness and spiritual values of the population.
Horrible consequences of bad and poisonous information
In a report sent to the seminar, Major General, Associate Professor, Doctor Nguyen Ba Duong, Director of the Defence Institute for Military Sciences and Social Humanities, wrote that it is very dangerous when hostile forces intentionally distort the truth, disseminate false and fake information and fabricate stories. Their tricks could make people confused with information, lead people to doubt their beliefs, cause anxiety and fluctuation in thought, poison information available to society and harm social security and political stability.
Sharing this view, Doctor Truong Minh Tuan, Deputy Minister of Information and Communication, affirmed that hostile forces’ tricks and attempts to distort information and use false and fake information in propaganda against Vietnam break Vietnamese law and moral values. He also pointed out that their hostile information campaigns against Vietnam have a widespread negative effect on the political system and society. Apart from the above-mentioned potential for damage, he held that they also refuel the hatred of the former Saigon regime’s people and their relatives for the Party, State and Army and cause social division and turbulence.
Discussing the current context, Professor, Doctor Dinh Xuan Dung, Vice Chairman of the Central Council for Theory-Criticism and Arts-Literature, held that hostile forces seek to bring many poisonous and bad cultural products to Vietnamese people. They aim to spoil Vietnamese society by prevailing and leading people to wrong, bad and evil things. He warned that Vietnamese cultural and moral values as well as good traditions are seriously in danger as a result.
Concerted defence against hostile forces’ plots and tricks
The participants at the seminar agreed to mobilize the whole political system and society for the combat against hostile forces’ plots and tricks in the information and cultural front.
Speakers at the seminar pointed out that hostile forces’ plots and tricks in the information and cultural front is part of their “peace evolution” strategy. They discussed the ways to help people identify hostile forces’ plots and tricks; analyze the dangerous consequences of bad and poisonous information in the internet and art and literature works for the survival of the political system, social and political stability and people’s lives; and sought approaches to defeat hostile forces’ plots and tricks and prevent bad and poisonous information from spreading out.
In a report sent to the seminar, Professor, Doctor Hoa Chi Bao, Member of the Central Council for Theory-Criticism and Arts-Literature, wrote: It is necessary to firmly maintain the leading position and role of the Party as stated in Term 4 of the 2013 Constitution; at the same time, agencies, units and organizations should always uphold the Party building work, the leadership of Party organizations at all levels meeting the requirements of the missions in the new context, and frequently educate Party members, improve their political stance, leadership, working abilities and moral virtues. According to him, strong and clean Party organizations at all levels with capable and high-quality Party members could serve as an “unbreakable wall” denying the infiltration of any bad and poisonous information and cultural products.
Meanwhile, Doctor Le Van Thanh, Rector of the Hanoi Open University, suggested that competent agencies should quickly make public all cyber sources, magazines, newspapers, organizations and individuals providing and disseminating false, fake, bad and poisonous information and cultural products, and deal with such cases in a swift, serious and thorough manner. More importantly, competent agencies should apply modern technology and equipment and efficient measures to stop bad and poisonous information prevailing in the internet.
In a report sent to the seminar, Colonel Nguyen Van Ky, Deputy Dean of the Politics-Economics Faculty of the Politics University proposed: Party committees and organizations, agencies and authorities at all levels should provide political and thought education for Party members and people so that all people have a firm political stance, are aware of hostile forces’ plots and tricks and deny false, distorted information and bad, poisonous cultural products. At the same time, the whole political system should manage information sources and cultural product publications, mobilize the strength of the entire society for the common fight against hostile forces’ information operations, and quickly fill in “information vacancies” or promptly overcome information weaknesses to prevent hostile forces from making use of them.
As an information and communication manager, Senior Colonel Pham Thanh Quy, Chief of the Office for Education of Social Sciences and Humanities under the Department of Information and Political Education, General Department of Politics, underlined the need to promote political and cultural education as well as information to all units. He also held that Party committees and commands at all levels should bring into full play democracy in their units, build good relations between officers and soldiers, provide a civilized, cultural life and improve material and cultural conditions for troops in units. He concluded that it is important to train a firm political stance and healthy thoughts for troops so that they can be immune to any bad and poisonous information and cultural products.
Speaking at the seminar, Doctor Cao Duc Thai, former Director of the Human Rights Institute of the Ho Chi Minh National Political Academy, highlighted the role of the press and media in defeating the “peace evolution” strategy. He said that this is now a fierce information struggle between the good and the bad, the right and the wrong, and the true and false; therefore, the orthodox press and media should bring into full play their role of providing information; directing people and the whole society toward the true, the right and the beautiful; effectively disseminate Party’s and State’ lines and policies; help the public identify and recognise hostile forces’ plots and tricks; and should finally seek to win the information battle against these hostile forces.
To conclude the seminar, Major General Pham Van Huan, Editor-in-Chief of the People’s Army Newspaper summarized the ideas and proposals, and thanked scientists and officials for their contributions. He said that facts show that hostile forces have been using increasingly malicious plots and tricks in the information and cultural front, and that the combat against distorted and false information and poisonous cultural products has become more complex and critical. This requires the whole Party, State, Army and people to join hands to create a comprehensive strength to defeat hostile forces’ plots and tricks.
He also affirmed that the seminar was successful as it gathered a number of excellent ideas and proposals, which are very useful for competent agencies and the press and media to better perform their missions in the future.
Regarding the role of the press and media, including the People’s Army Newspaper, he suggested: The press and media first should be the most reliable source of information; in so doing, press and media agencies should provide comprehensive, sufficient, exact information on time; second, they should clarify and give sufficient explanations of sensitive information to people, direct their them towards the right and positive thoughts, and actively participate in the joint combat against false, distorted information and poisonous cultural products.
Finally, he reminded attendees that the battle against false, distorted information and poisonous cultural products, and “peace evolution” strategy in general, is a long and complex process. Therefore, the whole political system, society and army should always be on the alert to hostile forces’ plots and tricks. At the same time, Party committees and organizations should continuously promote political and cultural education for their staff and people so that all people could have sufficient immunity to false, distorted information and poisonous cultural products.
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All comments [ 10 ]
To achieve their evil objective, they have used a lot of tricks, including despicable ones, sullying a number of senior leaders of Party and State to cause internal division and undermine people’s faith in Party’s leadership.
It is necessary to reiterate that kind of argument is wrongful, distorting the truth, only serving the hostile forces resenting Vietnam.
As for our people, more than anyone else, we treasure significant achievements in all fields such as politics, economics, culture, society, democracy, and human rights, earned by countless Vietnamese people’s blood, sweat, tears.
Our people know that only the Communist Party of Vietnam whose ideological ground is Marxism-Leninism, Ho Chi Minh’s Thought is capable enough to gather the whole nation and lead them to a revolution, overthrowing feudalism and colonialism; to victory in the resistant war against imperialism, gaining independence and unification, then building a strong, prosperous, and civilized country, ensuring the true democracy and human rights.
our Party has always considered democracy and human rights the main points of its guidelines and policies it has gathered and encouraged people from all walks of life to fight and sacrifice for revolutionary victory.
In the cause of reform today, if Party did not promote the exercise of democracy and respect human rights, would it be able to mobilize and bring into full play all the resources, all the economic sectors for the cause of Socialist Homeland construction and protection?
Acts and various legal documents have recognized and institutionalized citizen’s rights and responsibilities such as ownership right, right of production material use, right of legal free business, right of free speech, right of free press, right of free association, religious and belief freedom, non-belief and non-religious freedom, and so on.
In economic field, “democrats” often loudly criticize our Party for being undemocratic, discriminatory. However, our Party holds that all economic sectors operating in accordance with law are important components of the national economy; all of them are equal under law, developing, cooperating and fairly competing with one another in the long run.
it is considered that Vietnam has security and political stability, good environment for investment, attracting a lot of international and regional investors.
In a volatile world, maintenance of political stability, peaceful environment to develop economy, culture, society, improve people’s lives, and preserve national independence and sovereignty is a significant achievement.
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