evidence: Even more important, Hanoi’s contemporary claims over the Paracel Islands rest on it being the rightful heir to pre-1975 Republic of Vietnam’s sovereignty. Although the Vietnamese government released a statement of protest against Chinese occupation of the Paracel Islands on the occasion, many writers saw Hanoi’s absence of official commemorations this year as well as its attempt to control and sometimes prevent unofficial ones held by the civil society in the past as an example of Hanoi’s abhorrence of the former South Vietnamese government and its subservience to China at the expense of Vietnam’s national sovereignty. Some of them did not shy away from condemning the Communist Party of Vietnam as cowards.