Deutsche Presse-Agentur

                   November 10, 1997, Monday, BC Cycle
                        11:21 Central European Time

SECTION: International News

LENGTH: 485 words

HEADLINE: Police clash with Vietnamese Catholic over Church land
confiscation

DATELINE: Hanoi

BODY:

Police clashed with Vietnamese Catholics protesting confiscation of
Church property by local officials in southern Dong Nai province,
witnesses said Monday.

At least one woman was reported to have been badly injured by police
who attacked a group of women when they refused to take down banners
protesting the confiscation of parish property during the weekend.

   Several others were injured when police used electric cattle prods
to disperse the protests which broke out Saturday morning, intially
among just 30 women, they said.

Word of the confrontation spread quickly and thousands of residents
from Binh Minh commune and nearby communities soon descended on the
sitewhere many laid down blocked traffic on a main road in Thong Nhat
district.

"The police were there but because they knew people were so furious
there was nothing they could do, " said a sympathetic resident, who
witnessed the standoff.

She said the impasse was only resolved in late afternoon when Bishop
Nguyen Minh Nhat from the nearby Xuan Loc diocese came and appealed for
people to go home.

On Monday the situation was reported to be quite tense but residents
were apparently waiting to see the next step by authorities.

"It's too bad that the Bishop broke things up then because in a few more

hours thousands of people from other communes would have come and then
there could have been a real uprising, " said the witness.

In a phone interview Monday she warned that trouble could erupt again if

the injured woman in the hospital dies or if the police who beat the
protestors are not discplined.

The troubles arose when local authorities, who intially borrowed some
land from the Tra Co parish several years ago, announced recently they
were going to keep the land.

Rumors spread rapidly that the land was to be subdivided and sold,
sparking protesting that the deal was going to enrich local officials.

Late Saturday night a group of people with masks burnt the house and
car of Phan The Nam, a former commune official who through promotion
now works at the larger district level.

Police in Dong Nai province, which lies east of Ho Chi Minh City,
refused to discuss the case they said they were still investigating.

District police and People's Committee officials denied there was a
clash although they refused to provide their full names.

Residents report that there were similiar protests several months ago
and that at the time officials promised they would look into the
greievances.

The protests came against a backdrop of suppression by authorities of a
religious revival in the area, according to overseas Vietnamese
organisations.

According to these accounts a senior Hnaoi official, Politburo member
Pham The Duyet, was sent to the area in August to try to win the
cooperation of local church officials but the matter appears unresolved.

dpa ks pt

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

LOAD-DATE: November 10, 1997