Vietnam’s authorities has proposed an extra narrowing of its use of the demise penalty, a part of a broad overhaul of its Penal Code that might additionally see the authorities enhance punishments for “anti-state” acts.
A draft revision of the Code introduced to the Nationwide Meeting yesterday proposed eradicating the demise penalty for a further six offences, together with drug trafficking, the rape of minors, crimes in opposition to humanity, and warfare crimes, state media reported.
If accepted, the revision would go away the demise penalty in place for simply 4 crimes: treason, homicide, terrorism, and the unlawful manufacturing of narcotics. The Nationwide Meeting is anticipated to debate the revisions within the coming weeks earlier than voting on them in October.
The transfer comes after Vietnam final yr eliminated the demise penalty for eight legal offenses, together with embezzlement, bribe taking, espionage, illegally transporting narcotics, sabotaging state infrastructure, and “crime geared toward overthrowing the individuals’s authorities.” These adjustments spared the lifetime of actual property tycoon Truong My Lan, who was sentenced to demise in 2024 for her position in a $12 billion corruption scandal.
The utmost sentence for all of those crimes is now life imprisonment.
Over the previous 4 a long time, Vietnam’s authorities has steadily diminished the scope of capital punishment. Within the 1985 Penal Code, the demise penalty utilized to 44 offenses, Tuoi Tre reported final week. This dropped to 29 within the 1999 Code, 22 within the 2009 Code, 18 within the 2015 Code, and 10 beneath the present model, which took impact on July 1, 2025.
Final yr, Minister of Justice Nguyen Hai Ninh stated that the choice to cut back using the demise penalty “was primarily based on cautious evaluation of the character and severity of the offenses, the worth of the pursuits protected, and the potential for remedying the hurt precipitated.”
The narrowing of using capital punishment is a part of a wider authorized reform effort that might have an effect on tons of of provisions of Vietnam’s Penal Code. The aim of the hassle is to “streamline” the Code, “enhance consistency and higher differentiate legal legal responsibility in line with the character, position, and degree of hazard posed by various kinds of conduct,” state media reported.
On the similar time, nonetheless, the Ministry of Public Safety is decided to keep up sturdy sanctions for essentially the most severe offenses – a priority that was additionally echoed throughout yesterday’s Nationwide Meeting debate.
As such, the most recent draft revisions additionally enhance the punishments for sure crimes. These embrace acts deemed to “infringe upon the pursuits of the state” (Article 331[2] of the Penal Code) or acts “goal to oppose the Communist Occasion of Vietnam” (Article 117) – two vaguely worded provisions which were used liberally in opposition to authorities critics. Among the many different adjustments are the exemption of the police, armed forces, and paramilitary self-defense forces from legal legal responsibility for acts dedicated whereas finishing up official duties, and the criminalization of offenses in opposition to the Communist Occasion’s hammer-and-sickle flag, which may quickly be punishable by as much as three years in jail.
“Vietnam’s legal legal guidelines should be revised to turn into extra protecting of individuals’s rights, to not facilitate higher abuse by the police,” Elaine Pearson of Human Rights Watch stated in an announcement earlier this month.
Moreover, the proposed revisions add 9 new legal offenses to the nation’s Penal Code. This features a new offense overlaying the institution of or participation in an organized crime group, in addition to crimes regarding “financial administration, cybersecurity, excessive know-how, the surroundings, public security, and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.”