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Reactionary portraits: Peter Nguyen Van Hung – An extreme dissident in priest’s black robe

1/11/16

 Peter Nguyen Van Hung, born 1958, is a Vietnamese Australian Catholic priest and self-claimed human rights activist in Taiwan. Beside his duty as a God’s server, a father that guides practioners to the rights, he has also taken part in many activities against the Party and State of Vietnam as a dissident or reactionary element than a pure priest. Who is this priest dissident?
 Nguyen Van Hung grew up in a lower-middle-class family outside of Bình Tuy Province, with two brothers and five sisters; his father was a fisherman, but died after a long battle with illness, forcing his mother, a devout Catholic with roots in the country's north, to become the family's main breadwinner. Peter Nguyen Van Hung himself absorbed his mother's faith and devotion.He was an admirer of Saint Francis of Assisi, and reportedly stole food from his own family to feed to the poor.
He left Vietnam in 1979 on an overcrowded boat; rescued by a Norwegian after just 36 hours and taken to Japan, he joined the Missionary Society of St. Columban upon his arrival.
He lived in Japan for three years, studying and taking a variety of jobs to support himself, including as a highway repairman, steel factory worker, and gravedigger.[6] He first came to Taiwan in 1988 as a missionary, after which he went to Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, to study at a seminary. He was ordained in 1991 and returned to Taiwan the following year (in 1992).
In 2004, Hung established the Vietnamese Migrant Workers and Brides Office in Taoyuan County (now Taoyuan City) to offer assistance to Vietnamese immigrants in Taiwan. Vietnamese American radio station Little Saigon Radio and others helped him in his works. Vietnamese women come to Taiwan as brides, maids, and factory workers. Often their lives are negotiated through labor brokers and bosses, and they arrive only to be exploited and abused. For that reason, Van Hung opened the Vietnamese Migrant Workers and Brides Office. Here the women can go to take self-improvement and language classes, receive counseling, and receive refuge. 
Peter Nguyen Van Hung's exposure of abuses against foreign labourers and brides led the U.S. State Department to list Taiwan as a "Tier 2" region alongside countries such as Cambodia due to their lack of effort in combating human trafficking, which proved a major international embarrassment for the island's government. His work has also made him the target of intimidation in Taiwan. For that he was recognized by the United States Department of State as a "hero acting to end modern day slavery".
If stop there, he must be seen as a good priest, a good father fulfilling his duty to the Church, but sorrowly Hung seems to want more than that. Due to supports and aids that Hung received from individuals and organizations including some hostile reactionary groups like Viet Tan, he has had many links and activities with these extreme groups and anti-Vietnam elements. He has helped Viet Tan to recruit members who are workers and brides that were exploited and persecuted in Taiwan. He has slandered that Vietnam has no religious freedom and a poor human rights record, which base on no background about the real situation in Vietnam.
Moreover, in the name of the Church and abusing his position, Hung has incited and called many workers to protest against the Vietnamese government. Such as in recent mass fish death crisis in central Vietnam, Hung has incited people to rally and demonstrate in front of the Vietnamese representative office in Taiwan and Formosa’s offices which have caused the country unpredictable damages beyond his imagination.
So, it’s better that priests like Peter Nguyen Van Hung and other abroad priests focus on their jobs as a Catholic fathers that guide follwers to the right and moral things, to contribute in the country’s developments and promote Vietnam’s interests and image in the international community./.
Chia sẻ bài viết ^^
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All comments [ 2 ]


Voice of people 1/11/16 10:18

I don't think he is a good priest, everything he's done just for political purposes not religious ones.

Unknown 12/7/17 01:06

Peter Nguyen Van Hung (阮文雄) is a Vietnamese Freedom Fighter !

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