VIETNAM REJECTS territory Big HUMANITY transferred \,
i ...... NUMBER: 2245
PERTH, WA: JUNE 25-JULY 1, 1981 TELEPHONE: (09) 328 1388
LONDON (NC) — The wholesale violation of human rights in Vietnam, mainly in the form of arbitrary detention without trial, was found by an Irish lawyer, Dermot Kinlen, on a visit to the A sian country last year.
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`‘z•pAGO MISSION
Kalumburu RYSDALE RIVER MISSION
oKAIUMBUR:tIISSION His visit followed a petition to the VietnaAll the time he was accompanied by Hoang Nguyen, s': , i t., ,5•Ce‘As CARSON RIVER mese government in 1978 asking about the Editor-in-Chief of the Vietnam Courier. • fate of those held in "re-education (detention) Among those he met when visiting Ho Chi Minh City c amps". 0 ,i, ' (.7 was Archbishop Nguyen Van Binh, who told him that ,i. pElf O m publicity given ollowing to the petition he was c.) F about 200 2 priests were detained. •ro ISSION• p M t.., F°ItMRIESSSTIOtNIVE • invited by Prime Minister Pham Van Dong to visit Broome The archbishop said they fell into three categories: W YNDHAM ,Pe Vietnam in April 1980. R 0 .... There were 22 chaplains to the South Vietnamese Army; Accompanying him were a psychiatrist, Dr Michael there were some who got involved in politics and supMulcahy, and French-Canadian Redemptorist Father ported reactionary movements; and there were some D IOCESE Gerard Gagnon, who had been expelled from Vietnam priests who were common criminals. in 1977 and who spoke fluent Vietnamese. Those priests in detention were not allowed to celeFather Gagnon had translated the Bible into OF brate Mass or to possess a rosary or a crucifix. Vietnamese. The visit of Kinlen and his companions coincided They saw only three camps, two near Hanoi and one with Easter, and they found the churches crammed to B ROOME near Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon). They also overflowing. Religious education, he said, is now forvisited the Chi Hoa Prison in Ho Chi Minh City. Kinlen found that detainees had been held without bidden in the schools, but is given on Sunday after trial since the summer of 1975, despite the Vietnamese Mass. Some priests were members of the Communist government's assurance that no one would be detailed Party. longer than three years. No date for their release had been set, he added. "As a lawyer of 30 years' experience and as a prison visitor and having made a study of penology," wrote • An Abbey Nullius Diocesis (belonging to no Kinlen, "I am satisfied that there is a wholesale and widespread violation of human rights in Vietnam. diocese) is a territory over which the abbot of a "The retention of an uncertain but large number of monastery, even if not a bishop, exercises the full D IOCESE OF GERALDTON people without trial in detention and forcing them to do administrative authority of a bishop. forced labour and subjecting them to indoctrination New Norcia was made an abbey nullius in 1863 and depriving them of support and social contact with and in 1903 its territory was extended eastwards their families and friends, and providing inadequate to Southern Cross. In 1971 most of the area, which medical facilities, and denying them any spiritual included seven parishes, reverted to the archdio- Geraldton administration and allowing them no intellectual exercese of Perth and today the New Norcia Abbey cise other than the absorption of selected texts for the Nullius is a territory of 1200 square miles. purpose of indoctrination, are all negations of human • A mission sui iuris (in its own right) is a rights," he added. territory independent of a diocese and under the New Norcia• Abbey Nullius Considerable doubt surrounds the number of camps jurisdiction of an abbey nullius until it becomes an that exist and the number of people detained. independent abbey nullius. ARCHDIOCESE OF PERTH Perth Kinley was told officially in Vietnam that 40,000 In 1910 the Drysdale/Kalumburu mission sui people had been held in re-education camps but that iuris was detached from the diocese of Geraldton, with the release of 14,600 the number was down to founded in 1898. Bunbury DIOCESE OF BUNBURY 25,400. In the same year the Vicariate of the Kimberley, later the Diocese of Broome, was also cut off from But "generally informed opinion puts the figure at 400 Km 190 200 300 the diocese of Geraldton, Abbot Torres of New between 150,000 and 200,000," according to Kinlen. Norcia being consecrated bishop to be its first With about 900 people to a camp, that would mean well 160 200 300 Miles administrator. over 100 camps. The camps, he said, had been manicured for their visit A 10,000-square-mile section of the north of and he never had the feeling that people were speaking 4.4 freely to him. Western Australia will be transferred from the -
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ecclesiastical jurisdiction of New Norcia to the Diocese of Broome.
T he territory includes the of Broome, piloted himself and the New * Benedictine-owned Kalumburu Norcia Apostolic Administrator Father ▪ Mission, the surrounding Aborigi_ Justin Bruce into Kalumburu to begin the nal reserve and the Benedictine- handover. On Thursday, June 18, the two leaders owned lease of the Carson River said Mass, spoke to the community and * Station, all of which have figured discussed canonical details of the transfer • * in this month's dispute. of jurisdiction. The transfer of the ecclesiastical terri* Apart from daily press reports no other * * tory will not affect Benedictine information is available whether there ownership. was a connection between the visit of • The Benedictine monks and the Bene- Bishop Jobst and Father Bruce and the • dictine sisters working at Kalumburu will walkout of Kalumburu natives reported • * now have status similar to the other reli- to have taken place on Monday, June 15, • gious orders working on various missions but which is also reported to have been * in Broome diocese. discussed a month earlier. Kalumburu is staffed by Fathers Sera• Father Justin said that the protest phim Sanz, Eugene Perez, Brother Dom group had dwindled to less than 30 when • Umberto, Benedictine Oblate John he and Bishop Jobst visited the Argon site • * Richards, five Benedictine sisters and sev- 9 km from Kalumburu. • eral lay missionaries. He attributed much of the discontent On May 31 the Apostolic Nuncio in to outside agitation by members of the -4( • Canberra, Archbishop Barbarito, Aboriginal Land Council and the Abo• * advised both jurisdictions to start arran- riginal Legal Service. • gements for the transfer pending the arriHe said an example of this was the • val of official documents from Rome. request by the Aborigines to do their own The transfer has been under considera- cooking_ whereas only in January this * • * tion since January this year when the year they had made a three-year agree* abbot president of the Subiaco Benedic- ment with the Benedictine sisters to * tine congregations, of which New Norcia supervise the mission cooking. • * is a member, took up the matter with the The terms of settlement between the * Vatican Council of Bishops which con- Aborigines and the mission are reported • trols the establishment and government to include the transfer of house titles to of dioceses. the Aborigines and the addition of 1400 * The move followed a directive of Pope hectares of reserve territory to the mis* Paul VI four years ago that abbeys nullius sion freehold. (See map, page 2). • * and independent sui iuris missions should Other reported moves include the * be incorporated into neighbouring Kalumburu Aboriginal community pur* * dioceses. chasing from the New Norcia Benedictine The New Norcia Abbey Nullius, community the lease of the Carson River • * reduced in 1971 to its present dimension, Station valued to $1 million and into * will retain its status. which Father Bruce says a great deal of On Wednesday, June 18. Bishop Jobst, money has been invested by his order.