A court in southern Vietnam on Friday the 12th December rejected the appeals of three jailed bloggers convicted on charges of public disorder, prompting a prominent human rights group to denounce the handling of the case by the authoritarian government. The three bloggers-Bui Thi Minh Hang, Nguyen Van Minh, and Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh-were sentenced in August to up to three years in jail on what rights activists called phony and politically motivated charges after a one-day trial in Dong Thap in the Mekong Delta region. The hearing on Friday was to consider their appeal against the sentences they received. "In political cases like this, nothing in the courts is even remotely independent of the ruling Vietnam Communist Party," said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director of New York-based Human Rights Watch. "What happens has been dictated in advance, so these appeals cases are best understood as a second sentencing hearing and a judgment by the authorities on how cooperative the activists have been in prison so far." The trio originally was accused by the government of causing public disorder by creating a "serious obstruction to traffic" while they were on their way to visit a former political prisoner in February. The People's Court of Dong Thap province had ordered 50-year-old Hang to be imprisoned for three years, while fellow blogger Nguyen Thi Thuy Quynh, 28, received a two-year sentence, and Nguyen Van Minh, 34, a Hao Hao Buddhist sect follower, got a two-and-a-half-year term. Defense lawyer Tran Thu Nam told RFA's Vietnamese Service that the appeals court upheld the sentences, although the defendants had not admitted to the crimes with which they had been charged. "People even agreed that none of the defendants had committed any crimes, but the appeals court still upheld their sentences," he said. Quynh Anh, Hang's daughter, told RFA that she was not allowed to attend the hearing. "This morning, I was with the group of lawyers and others who went to the court, but we were not allowed to enter, except for the lawyers." She said blogger Huynh Cong Thuan had accompanied her to the courthouse, but was beaten by an unknown group of people and taken to the police station. Dissident rights lawyer and former political prisoner Nguyen Bac Truyen told RFA that police had been stationed outside his home in Ho Chi Minh City for the last two days in the run-up to the appeals hearing, and he was not allowed to leave the premises. "This is all part of a government strategy to hit rights activists with charges that talk about maintaining order rather than criminalizing exercise of rights-but the effect is exactly the same, throwing people in prison for daring to demand transparent, democratic governance and respect for rights." Reporters Without Borders says Vietnam is currently holding 34 bloggers in detention. Although Vietnam is a member of the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council, it has been criticized by international human rights groups for harassing and jailing bloggers and government critics as well as repressing religion freedom. UPDATE: 12/ 05/ 2015 A prominent imprisoned activist and blogger in Vietnam has gone on a hunger strike to protest against authorities who have forced her to wear a prison uniform and encouraged her cellmates to mistreat her, one of her family members said.Bui Thi Minh Hang has been on a hunger strike since April 2 to protest against the decision of authorities at Gia Trung prison (Pleiku) to force her to wear prison uniform and let other cellmates mistreat her, her son Bui Trung Nhan told RFA. He said before he went to the prison to visit his mother on Monday, she had called to inform him that she had been on a hunger strike since the beginning of the month. "She has still been drinking water and milk during this time," he said. Hang also told her son that prison authorities confiscated all her regular clothes and forced her to wear a prison uniform just like other prisoners."I have not seen her yet, so I don't know if she is wearing the uniform or not," he said. When Nahn visited his mother on Monday, she had refused to wear her prison uniform, so the guards did not let him see her, according to visiting rules, he said. "We want to send a complaint about the fact that they did not let us see her and their ill treatment of my mother, Bui Thi Minh Hang," he said. Activist and protestor In 2011, Hang had staged peaceful demonstrations condemning what Vietnamese saw as Chinese aggression in Vietnamese territory in the disputed South China Sea.In November of that year, authorities sent her to the Thanh Ha Education Center in Binh Xuyen district, Vinh Phuc province, after arresting her a day earlier outside Notre Dame Cathedral in Ho Chi Minh City for allegedly "causing public disorder." She was freed the following year. In February 2014, the Vietnamese government accused Hang, along with two other bloggers, of causing public disorder by creating a "serious obstruction to traffic" while they were on their way to visit a former political prisoner. While she was detained, Hang went on a hunger strike to protest her arrest.She was later sentenced in August of that year to up to three years in jail after a one-day trial in Dong Thap in the Mekong Delta region on what rights activists said were phony and politically motivated charges.