A Vietnamese court sentenced a leading independent journalist on Thursday to 30 months in prison over Facebook posts that criticised the government, state media reported.

Huy Duc worked for influential state-run newspapers before authoring one of Vietnam’s most popular blogs and Facebook accounts, where he criticised the country’s communist leaders on issues such as corruption, media control, and relations with China.

The court in Hanoi convicted the 63-year-old of “abusing democratic freedoms to infringe upon the interests of the state” by posting 13 articles on Facebook, according to the Vietnam News Agency (VNA).

According to VNA, Huy Duc did not intend to oppose the Communist Party or the state, but admitted some content violated its interests, for which he took responsibility and was “very sorry”, VNA reported.