HANOI - Vietnam has officially authorised two Protestant churches to operate freely in a symbolic gesture towards greater religious freedom, according to officials.

Church Francisco Xavier is decorated with banners and lanterns for the Christmas holiday in Ho Chi Minh City's China town. The US State Department in November took Vietnam off the list of countries oppressing religions, saying all religious prisoners had been released, laws restricting religious activities lifted and numerous churches reopened.[AFP]

The Vietnam Seventh-Day Adventist Church and the Vietnam Grace Baptist Church have received in Ho Chi Minh City "certificates of religious practice", said an official at the government's committee for religious affairs.

"After one year, if their operations are stable and meet all criterias of the ordinance on religious activities, they will be given the full legal status," she said.

"The two were established in Vietnam before 1975 and they operated normally after, although they did not have legal status."

The US State Department in November took Vietnam off the list of countries oppressing religions, saying all religious prisoners had been released, laws restricting religious activities lifted and numerous churches reopened.

Vietnam was added in 2004 to the US blacklist for its repression of religious groups, mainly Protestants.

The state-controlled Vietnam News Agency said the two churches would be allowed to perform religious ceremonies, print prayer books, build or upgrade worship places and organize religious events.

Government's figures say there are about 60 "Protestant sects" in Vietnam.

"Two of them were fully acknowledged in 1958 and 2001. One was given a similar certificate in September 2006 in (central) Danang," the official said.

Established in 1929, the Vietnam Seventh-Day Adventist Church currently has almost 13,000 followers, VNA said. The Vietnam Grace Baptist Church started in 1962 and claims 2,592 followers, mostly in the south.

The situation for Protestants is however still difficult in Vietnam's central highlands, where authorities broke up large-scale demonstrations in 2001 and 2004 against religious persecution and confiscation of ancestral lands.

The violence triggered mass exodus to Cambodia and tension is still present in the troubled region.

VNA said that during Christmas celebrations, party leaders "expressed hopes" that Protestants in central highlands' Dak Nong province would "prevent plots and schemes aimed at shattering unity."