Amnesty: Vietnam steps up online crackdown, jailed activists at record high

The current number of prisoners of conscience in Vietnam is the highest that London-based Amnesty has reported since it began publishing the figures in 1996, an Amnesty spokesman said. — Reuters

HANOI: The number of jailed activists in Vietnam has reached its highest on record, according to a tally by Amnesty International, which in a report on Dec 1 accused Facebook and Google of censorship in the South-East Asian country.

There are at least 170 “prisoners of conscience” in Vietnam, the report said, of which around 70 are currently serving jail terms for online activism, mainly on Facebook and Google’s YouTube.