Communication project to enhance public awareness of human rights, reduce fake news

The project aims to enhance public awareness and knowledge of human rights and give people inside and outside the country a better insight of Việt Nam’s achievements in human rights.

To enhance public awareness of human rights and give people a better insight into Việt Nam’s policies, Deputy Prime Minister Phạm Bình Minh has approved a project that will strengthen communication on the issue between 2023 and 2028.

The project also looks to enhance Việt Nam’s reputation in the field of human rights in the national, regional, and global arenas.

The project will cover 63 provinces and cities across the country, countries with large Vietnamese communities, priority partners in external relations, and areas where international human rights organisations are based such as New York (the United States), Geneva (Switzerland), and Bangkok (Thailand).

Under the project, by 2028, 100 per cent of State administrative agencies will regularly provide human rights-related information to the press, while 100 per cent of State officials working in human rights, communications and information and external information duties as well as 70 per cent of officials holding key positions in socio-political organisations at central and provincial levels will be kept up to date with the human rights situation in Việt Nam and receive training on human rights communications.

A series of exhibitions on human rights in Việt Nam will be held in all 63 localities and a number of foreign localities, 1,000 book titles on human rights will be published and reprinted, and the forms of mass communication products will be diversified. The proportion of media products in ethnic minority and foreign languages as well as those on digital platforms will be raised to 15 per cent to 20 per cent of the total number human rights-related media products.

Another goal is to digitise and popularise 100 per cent of statistics and media products produced under the project to make them available in cyberspace, while efforts will be made to minimise fake news and wrongful information on human rights in Việt Nam to about 10 per cent of the total.

At the same time, Việt Nam will strive to complete the implementation of accepted international recommendations on the strengthening of communications on human rights, while increasing the popularisation of international law regarding human rights as well as the Party and State’s policies and laws in the field.

The information project on international human rights law will pay special attention to seven basic international conventions on human rights to which Việt Nam is a member, including (1) the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (2) International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (3) Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; (4) International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination; (5) Convention on the Rights of the Child; (6) Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities; (7) Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment; as well as international experience in ensuring and promoting human rights.

The project will also ensure sufficient information dissemination on the Party's guidelines, the Vietnamese State's legal policies on human rights, results of internalising and implementing international commitments on human rights, and bilateral and multilateral international commitments to which Việt Nam is a member or plans to join.

The information will also cover the efforts and achievements in ensuring human rights in various fields, including hunger eradication and poverty alleviation, taking care of people's lives, especially vulnerable and disadvantaged groups, in the spirit of ‘no one being left behind’, positive assessments and comments of the public and international media on the results of Việt Nam’s work on ensuring and developing human rights.

The project will encourage the popularisation of moral value, humanity, solidarity, national pride, and other positive values and fine traditions.