Montagnard Christian released after sixteen years of severe beatings in Vietnam

by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – A Montagnard Christian in Vietnam was released from prison in February following sixteen years of torture by the Vietnamese government for protesting its treatment of ethnic and religious minorities.

Y Ngun Khul’s family was prevented from visiting him more than four times during his imprisonment due to their home being more than 600 miles away from the detention center where he was held.

“As [our] rights were being taken away, people were becoming upset, and so I called on everyone to take part in the protests,” Khul told Radio Free Asia of the government’s attempt in 2004 to shut down the Protestant church where his Montagnard community gathered.

Now Khul is suffering from kidney failure, high blood pressure, gastrointestinal hemorrhage and severe stomach problems from the constant beatings he endured and is only able to eat “a bowl of rice per day.”

The Montagnard are a majority Christian ethnic minority group in Vietnam that faithfully fought alongside U.S. Special Forces in the Central Highlands during the Vietnam War.

Their reward has been constant persecution and virtual stateless status by the ethno-nationalist, communist government of Vietnam that wants total ethnic and ideological homogeneity, Open Doors rating Vietnam 21st on it World Watch List for persecution of Christians.

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