Today, I want to share with you my knowledge about characteristics of socialism and socialist society in Vietnam.

The tenth General Assembly of the Party (2006) had added and developed the model of socialism in Vietnam to make it more comprehensive, including eight characteristics.

The characteristics of socialism that being built in Vietnam indentified in the Draft Platform (addition, development) are the result of the renovation work, primarily in awareness of socialism theory, based on the creative application of Marxism - Leninism and Ho Chi Minh thought, in accordance with the practice in Vietnam at current conditions. It is the result of a harmonious combination between "the popular" and "the particularity", the general and the specific to create a model named Vietnam socialism.
First feature: rich people, strong nation, democracy, justice, civilization

This is the most general characteristic that affects other characteristics. It expresses goals of socialism in Vietnam. In our country, socialism is to make people rich, country powerful...; is fair and reasonable; people enjoy equally freedom, democracy and live happy lives...

The throughout thought of the Vietnam revolution is national independence associated with socialism. For the people of Vietnam, only socialism could guarantee their desire for a strong and rich country with democracy, fairness and civilization. This is the earnest desire of the entire Vietnamese people after the fight to gain national independence and reunification.

The second characteristic: controlled by people

The advanced feature of socialism in the 1^st characteristic is also reflected in the Party 's awareness of the gradual improvement of socialist democracy associated with ensuring that all state power belongs people ( people is the subject of all power).

The Draft Platform has further confirmed: "socialist democracy is the nature of our regime, both the goal and driving force of the national development. Construction and gradual improvement of socialist democracy, ensuring that all state power belongs to people. Democracy must be done in reality at all levels, all sectors through the operation of state which elected by people and in the forms of direct democracy...".

The third characteristic: having the highly developed economy based on modern production forces and modes of public ownership of the major means of production.

This is typical feature in the economic field of socialism that we are building compared to other social regime.

The Draft continued to assert: the basic contradictions of capitalism, especially the conflict between the modern production forces and the private ownership in capitalism, can not be solved and getting worse.

The Party reaffirmed that: the State economy plays a key role and the collective economy is constantly consolidated and developed. The State economy and collective economy becomes increasingly the solid foundation of the national economy.

The forth characteristic: having the advanced culture imbued with national identity

The preservation and development of the national culture, the selection of the traditional values and the construction of the new ones have turned the most important than any time in history. The traditional cultural values should be preserved but should be also enriched by the advanced cultural values of the mandkind. Culture should be modernized but should not be separated from the nation. And the goal is to build a culture of Vietnam unified in diversity.

The fifth characteristic: people having a life of prosperity, liberty and happiness; and having conditions to develop comprehensively.

Creatively applying and developing Marxism - Leninism and Ho Chi Minh thought about humans in a socialist society, the Draft have determined values that ​​reflect demand and practical aspirations of the people of Vietnam today are: a life of prosperity, liberty and happiness and conditions to develop comprehensively.

The sixth characteristic: the ethnics in Vietnam community are equal, united, respected and helping each other to develop.

This feature shows how superior in the Vietnam’s ethnic policy, properly resolving the ethnic relations in the multi-ethnic country of Vietnam.

After 25 years of innovation country, the results have demonstrated superiority in Vietnam ethnic policy of the Party and State and socialism in resolving ethnic relations in Vietnam. Due to these results our tradition of great national unity and consensus in the community of 54 ethnic groups have been promoting and fighting against the plot of the hostile forces to divide Vietnamese ethnic community.

The seventh characteristic: having socialist and lawful State, of the people, by the people, for the people, under the Communist Party leadership.

The advantage of a society owned by the people closely associated with the primacy of the socialist and lawful State. The State closely link with the people, fully implement all of democratic rights of the people; respect and listen to people's opinions and subject to the supervision of the people; have mechanisms and measures to control, prevent and punish bureaucracy, corruption, wastefulness, irresponsibility, abusing of power, violating democratic rights of citizens...

The eighth characteristic: having friendly and cooperative relations

 Vietnam always affirmed friendly and cooperative ties with the peoples of the world. Vietnam is a friend and reliable partner of all countries in the international community... The Party and State's policy is to equal cooperation and mutual benefit with all countries, regardless of their political and social status on the basis of the fundamental principles of the UN Charter and international law.

The active international integration and participation in organizations, international and regional forums have vividly demonstrated the superiority of the socialism that Vietnamese people are building.

Those sayings that democratic activists and reactionaries always slander are "the Communist Party of Vietnam is scared of China", or "the Party is afraid of enemies but cruel with the people". Today, I just want to clarify this nonsense to prove you the allegation right or wrong .
The evidences which democratic activists cite for their allegations are what they call government’s crackdowns on patriotic protests and enhancement of the relationship with China in the spirit of 16 golden words. Arguing that "the Party uses the thousands-year foe of the nation to oppress the people’s patriotism, they spread the charge that the Party and the State have sold the sovereignty of islands and sea for China which I see very hilarious and silly. No country, no government on earth would do that, that thing could destroy the government itself. Just those who are paranoid could speak out something like that.
Only some who are so naïve should believe in diplomatic language to assume about the relationship between the two countries. Because the rhetoric of diplomacy is simply another beauty items and create the exuberant to international community. Our relationship with China is now able to say that is quite good in compare with the 1979 border wars, but it’s primarily in economic terms. Above all the staff the Party’s members understand that even saying all about the 16 golden words or millions of good thousands words, the Chinese still keep conducting aggressive actions in the matter of territorial disputes with us. China will not give up the dream of Great Han and plot of expanding territory to find living space and interests. So, we have sufficient grounds in both history as well as current situation to conclude that China will be our long-term enemy. Therefore, the Party and the State have promoted relations with China in business, trade development for economic growth. But on the other hand we also has promoted weapons procurement and enhancing military power to create deterrence and prepare for probable wars. So saying the Party and the State are “scared of China is so foolish and ignorant and understand nothing about politics and international relations.
And based on the facts that we have reacted humbly to China’s aggression in territorial claims and activities on the field in disputed areas to say that we are scared of China, it is even wrong. Because we are now weaker than China in terms of all aspects, we must keep that temporary truce. Moreover, the trade turnover between we and China is more than $40 billions in 2013. So if we jump into conflicts and even wars with China at the moment, our economy will take large damages. So, we just refrain from overreaction in relationship with China for bigger benefits not be afraid of China. Now, a war with China is unpredictable one, but in the past the Party had led our people and troops to struggle against China in the 1979 border war, caused them large damage. So who dare to say that we are afraid of China?
On the other hand, we must accept that we are just a small country, and it’s smart to avoid using force. China has tried to incite us to make a cause for invading our sea and islands. We need to keep calm and stay alert before their schemes. The Party and the State are still trying to use all diplomatic measures, legitimate means as well as spreading historical evidence to the world to promote our territorial claims and contribute to protect our sovereignty over sea and islands. We're weaker and smaller, we must be wiser in struggle to protect our national interests.
So if you are patriotic and devoted to the country and the people, you need to be aware of these and don’t hastily jump into any conclusion through some phenomena, don’t be fooled and incited by those allegations of so-called democratic activists to take part in activities against the Party and the State.

Looking back the history, since the establishment of the Vietnamese State, it is the Communist Party of Vietnam who led the country to great triumphs in the two wars against France and US. And, in the nation's history, our nation has never known fear of enemy. The Party too does not fear any enemy, whether it is France, US or China./.

Culture is the root as endogenous strength of the nation. In oder to weaken intrinsic strength, the hostile forces have quietly and aggressively invaded through many cultural activities with sophisticated and wicked tactics.

 “Information empire” in a flat world

Executing the motto “Investing 1 USD in culture more effectively than invest 10 USD in military”, the years , the Western media has spent millions of dollars on facilities, equipments and training technical manpower to form “information empire" with clearly purpose of transforming ideology, cultural values in Vietnam, overturning the social moral standards in our country in which they regarded the young generation as “the center”, intellectual circles and artists (especially those with complex and extreme views) as “the key roles”, a number of officials (both retired and incumbent) with multi-dimensional viewa as “key factors”.

According to authorities, 62 foreign radio stations have  Vietnamese programs; 390 magazines, 88 publishers, 397 websites and social network sites with overseas servers often provide and post information against Vietnam. In 2013, 475 private websites misrepresented thousands of articles to smear image of the country; 250 websites, blogs, forums posted articles against the amendment of the 1992 Constitution; 245 websites and blogs contained reactionary content. Besides, nearly 58,000 documents entitled “psychological war” that the security forces had discoveredand collected in 2013 (an increase of more than 5,200 documents in comparision with 201), in which more than 7,100 ones were reactionary documents.

Representative of the Information Security Office, Ministry of Public Security said that: One of the subtle and sinister tricks have been conducted recently by hostile forces is fully taking advantages of the internet, e-mail, messages... to spread negative information to some high-level officials in an attempt to confound information, causing internal disunity especially on such a sensitive time of personnel selection or election. More remarkable, nearly 400 websites, blogs impersonating members of the Political Bureau, the Party Central Committee, Party Secretary, Provincial Committee and senior officials of the departments and ministries, branch offices have been discovered. More than 130 articles, clips, video among them were found out with abusive content. If these images and articles were not prevented promptly and thoroughly, it would spread fast to cause considerable doubt among the people and  impact seriously on people's confidence in the Party, the State and the socialist regime.

“Publishing activities on Internet”

There are many ways to spread the malicious information including publish and distribute books, documents, literary and artistic works with bad content on the internet. The hostile forces consider this way as a “low cost” infiltration but “maximum efficiency”.

In recent years, the trend of publishing on the internet has been increasing with ever-expanding scal. According to Mr. Chu Van Hoa, Director of Bureau of Publication (Ministry of Information and Communication), in the past, the external forces used to publish objectionable, depraved, malicious content and smuggling via the border gate, port, aviation into our country. But recently, this traditional method tends to decrease instead of the “publishing method via internet” with more sophisticated properties and more formidable harms.

Literature is a sensitive sector which has far-reaching affects to all classes of people. So that, this is the field that hostile forces always hold many activities against the Vietnamese government. From drawing writers and artists to follow anti-government movements to abusing them to write and spread works against the regime... Now some extremists are trying to establish a new organization called "The League of independent Vietnamese writers". Which is disguised as a civil society organization by democratic activists in Vietnam.
       According to some authors who call themselves in the name of democracy, the founding of " The League of independent Vietnamese writers" is a big step to "restore freedom of literature through the rights of writing and publishing their works in the flow of history". These words are so noble and humane, but with a careful review on the aspects of the nature of the organization, you’ll see different purposes. In fact, The League of independent Vietnamese writers is a first step in the plot against the Vietnamese State of democratic puppets who are manipulated by foreign forces. In other words, This organization is nothing more than the product of the American and the West’s policy to overthrow of the Communist regime in Vietnam smoothly.
       Literature is the ideology of culture, it has a positive or negative impacts depend on purposes of writers, but if someone takes the entire literature, it will easily manipulate public opinions. Therefore, the establishment of The so-called League of independent Vietnamese writers" is a long-term plot of the foreign forces to change the cultural ideology of our society in particular and to overthrow our regime in general.
       It is no coincidence that we have The central department of propaganda and training. If you consider the country as an ideological entity, then the culture is the soul of the country. It is people who have been making history, creating cultural values ​​and practices... But writing can also follow positive or negative movements and trends. So, the right orientation is essential to preserve the culture with national identity as well as avoid the hybrid culture, especially during the deep integration today.
         Vietnam Writers' Association – an organization of Alliance of Arts and Literature Associations of Vietnam must operate under the management of the State. The State monitors and takes responsibility to navigate ideological cutural activities for people’s and nation’s interests. The ultimate purposes are to create many high quality works in content, form and containing progressive ideas. The State’s censorship will keep the literary works do not lose humanity, not go against ethnic customs and traditions and do not cause damages to the national interests... So "The League of independent Vietnamese writers" is just a disguised organization of the anti-Vietnam forces to break away from the governmental management of the State, to spread the anti-communist ideology and promote the western values which might hurt our own literature and culture.
        From the above, it can be inferred that the so-called The League of independent Vietnamese writers is just a disguised civil society organization of those hostile forces to serve the plot of gradually control our social ideology and undermine our regime, a steps actions of the “peaceful evolution” scheme. Don’t let yourself be fool by that, writers!

                                             Khmer people in Soc Trang flock to pagoda
I was so happy and lucky to visit the southern provinces of Bac Lieu, Soc Trang and Tra Vinh in April to join with Khmer people ahead of their traditional Chol Chnam Thmay (New Year) festival, which falls annually in mid-April.

In those days, there were a lot of visiters come here to share happiness and join with local community for the New Year festival. Among them are the officers from the State and Government. In Soc Trang, home to about 400,000 Khmer people, Secretary of the provincial Party Committee Vo Minh Chien wished all Khmer monks, heroic mothers and people a happy New Year. He praised the Khmer ethnic minority community’s contributions to the province’s socio-economic development and political security maintenance.

The Khmer people said they are pleased with the Party and State’s investment in Khmer-inhabited areas that has helped improve their living standards and reduce poverty among them.Meanwhile, leaders of the Southwestern Region Steering Committee and provincial authorities met with nearly 300 representatives of Khmer monks and people in Bac Lieu province. In Tra Vinh province, more than 600 Khmer officials, monks and people also gathered to celebrate the festival.

In 2013, thanks to the Party and State’s policies, more than 800 Khmer households escaped from poverty. In the first quarter of this year, the province invested over 314 billion VND (14.7 million USD) in building homes for 26,442 poor Khmer households. On this occasion, authorities of the three provinces also visited and presented gifts to local Khmer people.

The Chol Chnam Thmay festival is one of the most important festivals of the year for Khmer people. It is usually held at pagodas during which people wish and pray for a lucky new year.
Khmer people’s new year festival lasts three days and four days in leap years. Each of these days has its own name. Apart from worshipping the Buddha, Khmer people believe that every year the heaven sends a god called Tevoda to the earth to look after human beings and their life. At the end of the year, the god returns to heaven and another one will replace him. Therefore, in the new year’s eve, every family prepares a party, burns incense and lights up lamps in a ceremony to see off the old Tedova and greet the new one. They also pray to this god for good luck.

Khmer people always prepare for the new year ceremony very carefully. They clean and redecorate their house and buy necessary food for the holidays. They stop all farm work, relax and set free their cattle. The three official festival days are held in a joyful and exciting way.

The first day is for the ceremony to receive the great calendar. Moha Sang-Kran is considered a calendar which gives a detailed account of dates and festivals in a year and a forecast of rainfall so the villagers can foresee if they get a good or bad crop that year. On this day, at a selected hour no matter it is in the morning or afternoon, people take a bath and put on their best clothes in anticipation of the new year. They take incense, lamps, flowers and fruits to a pagoda where they do the great calendar-receiving ceremony. At the pagoda, Moha Sang-Kran, put on a red-lacquered, gilded tray, is placed on a palanquin and carried three times round the main sanctuary. This rite is to welcome the new year and wait for omens for a bad or good new year. Then the official ceremony is carried out inside the sanctuary. After that, every participant prays to the Buddha and chant prayers for a happy new year. Young males and females walk out to the pagoda yard and join in fun activities until late at night.

The second day is for the ceremony to offer boiled rice and heap up a sandy mountain. On this day, every Khmer family cooks rice and offers it to Buddhist monks at the pagoda in early morning and at noon. The monks chant prayers to thank those who make the food and bring it to their pagoda and say good luck to them.

On the afternoon the same day, people start to heap up a sandy mountain in search of happiness and luck. They make small mountains looking to eight directions and one in the middle which represent the universe. This custom originates from an age-old legend. It displays people’s aspirations for rain.

The third day is for the ceremony to wash the Buddha’s statue and Buddhist monks. After giving boiled rice to the monks in the morning, they continue to listen to Buddhist teachings. In the afternoon, they burn incense, offer sacrifices and use scented water to wash the statue in order to pay tribute and gratitude to the Buddha. This is also to get rid of the old year’s misfortunes and wish all the best for the new year. The monks do a ceremony to pray for peace in the dead’s souls. After that, the people return to their house and wash the Buddha’s statue at home. They offer dishes, confectionery and fruits to ask for happiness for their parents and grandparents and being forgiven for their mistakes made in the old year.

During these three days, Khmer people go to visit each other and wish good health, good luck and prosperity to each other. They also join in fun activities.

Chol Chnam Thmay festival shows Khmer people’s aspirations, like many others ethnic groups, to forget about the old year’s misfortunes and look for a better new year. 
This is one of the clear evidences about Freedom of Religion and Belief in Viet Nam. The consistent policy of Viet Nam is to respect and facilitate the exercise of the right to freedom of religion and belief by all the people, uphold the solidarity and harmony among religions, guarantee the equality and non-discrimination as well as protect activities of religious groups by law.
On this occasion, I want to give my best wishes to all Khmer people, they have shown me how beautiful in their tradition and the importance of understanding each others among ethnics in Vietnam.

Recently, it is easy to find information about religious conflicts, conflicts between parishioners and governments, not only in Vietnam but also in many other countries. So what religion is would make it be a difficult problem like that?
Through books, magazines, Internet... we can find pretty much the definition of religion, they are so diverse based on many standpoints and different perspectives. But perhaps the short definition and easy to remember that is the most profound reflection on the nature of the religion of Marxism. Marx said "Religion is the opium of the people". That is so true. Anything that is unexplained and insolvable, people seek the answer in religion. Religion is like a painkiller soothing the spirit when people are in hard situations. Through its long-term development, religion today has developed comprehensively. Basically, the purpose of religion is to guide people to the good, to help people relieve and treat people better, more humane.
However, along with the development of society, religion has been abused by individuals to serve their purposes contrary to the principles and original purposes of religions. These include a number of guys who have “an iron fist in a velvet glove” in religions such as Nguyen Van Ly, Ngo Quang Kiet, and the most recent example Bishop Nguyen Thai Hop ...
According to the 21/2004/PL-UBTVQH11 Ordinance on Belief and Religion of  the National Assembly’s Standing Committee dated 06.18.2004, “the State shall guarantee the freedom of belief and religion of the people" “all religions are equal before the law" (quoted Article 1 of the Ordinance). Returning to the My Yen parish, the two subjects Ngo Van Hai and Nguyen Van Khoi and other parishioners have taken custody of three security officers, beaten and caused injury for them. They even seized and destructed the house of Dau Van Son – a local officer of Nghi Phuong commune. For that, they has been investigated and being detained and prosecuted on charges of "causing public disorder" under the provisions Article 245 of the Penal Code. All procedures have been conducted by the authorities of Nghi Loc district ​​in accordance with law. Yet parishioners here still petitioned and gathered to the commune’s headquarters, smashed the Committee office and threatened officers... All for the purpose of forcing the authorities to drop the charges. What do they think they are? They are also people of Vietnam, the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, they must live and work under the laws of Vietnam. Oh! Or maybe because they are Catholics, Christians who think they can do whatever they want and no one can monitor them? Violations of the law shall be subject to being strictly punished by law. If all people are like them then maybe the society would have been in chaos.

But overall, parishioners are the only one who’ll suffered by this mess. Don’t work, just gather all days long to protest, so by what you will live? Looking at pictures of kids with pure and innocent faces, holding the banners and slogans like "My parish communion with My Yen", "Brothers are innocent", “Freedom for the patriots", "Opposing government’s crackdowns on the church"..., that is extremely painful. Such cruel those adults be, just let children grow normally on everything from psychological to physical development. They are too young to understand what is happening. Do we need to sow the seeds of hatred and religious discrimination against the authorities. So look, today’s society is becoming more and more complex, be careful and cautious of thinking before doing anything, even if that’s what the "beloved fathers - the priests and bishops say./.

Taking advantages of the mistakes and shortcomings of government and authorities at all levels, especially in some wrongfully convicted cases, a number of blogs, forums, facebooks... have been under the cover of speech freedom to publish articles with headlines in hysterical style such as “Vietnam Government regards people as enemy”; “When people turn a deaf ear to Government”; “The State of Vietnam fights fire with gasoline”...

It should say immediately that the authors of these articles do not rely on mainstream sources but on scrapped information to deduce, misrepresent and distort the truth for the purpose of anti-Vietnam. When spreading these articles, the immoral and irresponsible guys are not totally for meeting the information needs of readers, which is essentially aims at incitement, conspiracy to divide our national solidarity. Their biggest goal is to divide solidarity between the people and the Party, Government, authorities at all levels. Further goal is to remove the socialist regime and overthrow the people's administration.

We need to be aware that in any circumstance or condition, most of the requirements of building and defending the socialist country are still the national unity, the inextricably linked relationship between the Party, Government and people. That is the root of national power - the decisive factor for the sustainability and development of our country.

It is undeniable the facilities that Internet brings to humanity including the people of Vietnam. But with the political opportunists and reactionaries, the Internet is considered as their most useful mean to carry out the plots and acts against Vietnam. Only with the spirit of high alert, the consensus of the entire Vietnamese, the firmness of the new management we can boycott and prevent this type of websites!

Vietnamese Youth, accounting for large proportion in the population, always have important contribution in the country’s development. During the revolutionary leadership, our Party has always put their faith and great expectations in the youth. The youth have been identified as one of the main forces of the country, the owner of the future, one of the factors that determine the future destiny of the nation. For that, the work related the youth is a key factor of the industrialization and modernization of the country, international integration and the building socialism.

In general, the Vietnamese youth are now very patriotic, having good tradition of our father's generation, believe in objectives, revolutionary ideology and the leadership of the Party; have good perceptions and attitudes to politics, resolutely against improper expressions, plot of " peaceful evolution", acts that harmful to the country’s development of the hostile forces, enemies. The youth also interest in issues of politics, economics, society of the country; have the goodwill to strive in school an work, helping the country escape early from poverty, backwardness, making contributions for the country recovery; devoting for national interests, protecting national sovereignty, volunteering for community.

However, today, a lot of young people do not have a clear direction in their life, not fully understanding of the revolutionary traditions of the Party and the nation, lacking attention to the situation of the country. A part of the youth are lazy in work and learning, afraid of hardship and suffering, not fulfill their duties and obligations to the family and society; do not have effort to enrich themselves and society. There are some even losing their faith and participating in the activities that violate the law. Their morality and lifestyle also misleading, prior to enjoyment, practical living, selfishness, wastefulness, excessive idolatry, but little interest in the community and those around them .

With the function of social school for the youth, the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union has an important, frequent and continuous task to educate revolutionary ideals, ethics, lifestyle for the youth. To achieve more positive results in the near future, the Youth Union should focused solutions as follows:

First, continuously promotes the study ideology, moral example and lifestyle of Ho Chi Minh, implements the specific criteria for training in each subject and make it as daily routine work of each person.

Second, strengthen to propagandize policies of the Party, law of the State, political theory, knowledge and social skills for young people.

Third, often discovers the good and typical examples in the youth, build up and spread these examples, using "build" to "resist", making the good values ​​pervasive in youth community. Promoting effectiveness of the Union press systems, as well as the other units to make better propaganda, education for the youth.

Fourth, the Union itself needs to innovate to make make the Union actions more attractive to the youth, thereby, expand the united front to gathered young people, put them into organized youth groups, consider this as a good environment to get education and training. In reality, major movements and specific actions in youth education bring real efficiency and sustainability.

On the other hand, education is not private task for the Union, it needs joint efforts of all levels and areas, family, school and society. Thus, all the functional departments should strengthen the cultural management and promptly prevent bad effects of unhealthy products to youth.

Our Party identified youth work strategy is survival to the nation. Strengthening education revolutionary ideology, ethics and lifestyle for youth in the current period is one of the most important requirements in the education for the youth. In addition to the key role of the Union, there is an urgent need, that all the political system have to actively join hand to ensure making a youth generation, that can take all responsibilities in the process of country’s industrialization and modernization.