Three Vietnamese dissidents -- all relatives of a Catholic priest currently serving a 10-year sentence -- received jail terms of between three and five years, a Ho Chi Minh City court official told AFP.
Nguyen Vu Viet, 27, and Nguyen Truc Cuong, 36, nephews of Father Ly, and their sister Nguyen Thi Hoa, 44, were sentenced respectively to five, four and three years.
They were accused of "abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the State, the legitimate rights and interests of organizations and/or citizens," the court official said.
The authorities believe they contacted US-based opponents to the communist government to send information about their uncle.
The government has made no comment on the trial.
Ly, 57, was placed under house arrest in March 2001 after he gave written testimony to the US Commission on International Religious Freedom a month earlier.
The priest was sentenced to 15 years in jail in October 2001. In a move seen as an attempt to appease human rights critics, a court in Ha Nam province in the north reduced the sentence to ten years in July this year.
Charges against his relatives have been reduced from "espionage," which carries a minimum 12-year penalty, to the new indictments, which could send the three to jail for two to seven years.
The only document laying out the charges against the three is a verdict from the Supreme People's Procuracy written in October 2002 and released in April by Amnesty International.
According to the unofficial translation of the document, the three were charged with being in contact with US-based Committee for religious freedom in Vietnam, as well as Californian Radio Que Huong, both regarded by Hanoi as "reactionary organizations".
Amnesty said at the time that "neither organization is armed or calls for the overthrow of the Vietnamese state".
Hoa had apparently been in contact with Radio Que Huong and had asked her two younger brothers to assess the situation regarding religion, especially regarding the banned Unified Buddhist Church of Vietnam.
Viet allegedly opened three email accounts after his uncle's arrest "to receive documents to propagate and distort the religious policy of the Party and the government".
Cuong went down to Quang Ngai province, where he met Thich Huyen Quang, the 86-year old leader of the UBCV, who has been placed under effective house arrest without charge or trial since 1982.
He was arrested just after the meeting.
The document said the three received some money to buy mobile phones and pay for expenses.