Facts
About
Vietnam

Official Name: Socialist Republic of Vietnam

Government type: Communist state

Capital: Hanoi

Location: Southeast Asia - bordered by Laos, Cambodia, and China

Population: Over 83 million

Economy: The average working person in Vietnam earns around $10 per week.

Climate: mainly tropical

Terrain: low, flat delta in south and north; central highlands; hilly, mountainous in far north and northwest

Geography: Vietnam has over 2,000 miles of coastline. At its narrowest point, Vietnam is only 31 miles wide.

Natural hazards: occasional typhoons (May to January) with extensive flooding, especially in the Mekong River delta

Religion: Buddhist 54.14%, non-Religious 21.80%, Christian 8.16%, Traditional ethnic 8.10%, Cao Dai/Hoa Hoa 5.60%, Chinese 1.10%, Muslim 0.70%, and Baha’i 0.40%. Constitutional guarantees of religious freedom are meaningless, as government policy is to control all religious movements, including Buddhism.

Religious persecution: Believers are harassed, beaten and imprisoned for preaching illegally or illegally organizing evangelistic activities. Persecution is especially harsh for unregistered and ethnic minority churches. Seeing the role of Christianity in the demise of communism elsewhere, the regime has attempted to either control or wipe out believers. Government efforts have intensified as churches respond to persecution with growth and outreach. Believers see church registration as compromise, and failing to register churches is seen as illegal in the eyes of the government, forcing the church underground. (As quoted from Voice of the Martyrs)

*Of all the countries in the world, Vietnam was recently ranked #3 where Christians are most persecuted for their faith.

*Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) was named after Ho Chi Minh, meaning 'bringer of light', which was one of the fifty or so aliases used by Nguyen Tat Thanh (1890-1969), communist guerrilla fighter and first president of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam.

*The Vietnam War began in 1958 and lasted until 1975.

*The country continues to experience protests from the Montagnard ethnic minority population of the Central Highlands over loss of land to Vietnamese settlers and religious persecution.