18

Libera photographed a multi-generational family of Vietnamese immigrants living in Poland since 1992. The first Vietnamese residents of Polish land were university students in the 1957/58 academic year. By the mid-1960s, about 40 Vietnamese were arriving in Poland annually. By the end of the 1990s, 4,500 Vietnamese citizens had received higher education here. Most of them remained in Poland, some left for Germany. A minimal percentage decided to return to Vietnam. At the end of the 20th century, the second wave of Vietnamese emigration began. Today Poland is the third center of Vietnamese immigration in Europe, after France (500,000) and Germany (100,000). It is estimated that between 25,000 and 60,000 Vietnamese live in Poland permanently. According to data from the Public Information Bulletin of the City of Warsaw, there are more than 3,000 Vietnamese registered for permanent and temporary residence in the capital, making this community the second largest national minority in Warsaw after Ukrainians. In 2006, a founding convention of the Vietnamese Workers' Defense Committee was held in Warsaw. It was attended by representatives of Vietnamese émigrés from all over the world. The reunion was under surveillance by the Vietnamese security service. Officers from the A18 division of the Vietnamese Militia come to Poland on the basis of an agreement on the mutual transfer of citizens that the two countries signed in 2004. "This agreement is being used to fight the Vietnamese opposition,” - says Robert Krzysztoń, an associate with Amnesty International.