On the morning of March 4, in Hanoi, the Office of the President held a press conference to announce the President's decision on amnesty in 2025.
At the press conference, Lieutenant General Le Van Tuyen - Deputy Minister of Public Security - said that amnesty is a special leniency policy of the State, decided by the President to release prisoners who meet the prescribed conditions early.
Regarding whether there will be one or two amnesty cases in 2025, the Deputy Minister of Public Security said that the number of amnesty cases will be decided by the President and officially announced. In the immediate future, this year, Decision 266/2025/QD-CTN issued on March 3 shows that early released amnesty for those sentenced to prison terms with a term, life imprisonment, will be carried out on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of the Liberation of the South and National Reunification Day (April 30, 2025).
As of January 31, 2025, the total number of prisoners serving sentences in prisons, temporary detention centers, and detention centers of local police units is 197,158 prisoners.
Based on the conditions according to the President's decision, the Central Examination Council will assign the competent authorities to review. The number of prisoners eligible for amnesty according to regulations will be reported to the decision-making authorities.
"There are currently no results, so we cannot confirm how many prisoners have been granted amnesty," said Lieutenant General Le Van Tuyen.
Sharing about the new point in the President's amnesty decision in 2025, Lieutenant General Le Van Tuyen said that to be considered for amnesty, he had served at least 1/3 of his prison sentence in cases of limited imprisonment, at least 14 years in cases of life imprisonment that had been reduced to a limited imprisonment.
"In 2024, the sentence must be served at least half of the time, this year it is 1/3 for cases of prison terms. 2024 also stipulates 15 years for cases of life imprisonment that have been reduced to a term, this year it will be 14 years," said the Deputy Minister of Public Security.
The second new point mentioned by the leaders of the Ministry of Public Security is cases eligible for amnesty when there are priority conditions.
Accordingly, those who have been sentenced to prison for a term of at least 1/4 of their term and those who have been sentenced to life imprisonment and have been reduced to prison for at least 12 years will be proposed for amnesty if they have made great contributions during the prison term, with confirmation from the prison, detention camp, criminal enforcement agency or other competent authority.
These people are also recommended for amnesty if they are people with revolutionary contributions or people suffering from serious illnesses, people who are often sick but do not serve themselves.
People aged 70 and over; people with particularly difficult family circumstances and being the only worker in the family; pregnant women or women with children under 36 months old living with their mother in prison or detention center; people with severe disabilities or extremely severe disabilities... are also eligible for amnesty.
Regarding the conditions for amnesty for foreign prisoners, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Do Hung Viet said that the conditions for amnesty for Vietnamese prisoners and foreign prisoners are the same.
The basic principle is that there is no discrimination between Vietnamese prisoners and foreign prisoners, said the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs.
