WASHINGTON (REUTERS) - A coalition of labour and human rights groups on Wednesday urged President Barack Obama to suspend free trade negotiations with Vietnam because of concerns over that country's treatment of workers and people who criticize the government.

"President Obama must hold Vietnam accountable for its record on worker and human rights before America rewards the country with greater trading privileges," Teamsters union President James Hoffa said in a statement.

The demand came on the eve of a White House meeting between Obama and Vietnamese President Truong Tan Sang, and as the 18th round of regional free trade talks between the United States (US), Vietnam and nine other countries were wrapping up in Malaysia.

The Obama administration hopes to finish those talks on the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership, or TPP, by the end of the year, and the concerns raised by the Teamsters, the Citizens Trade Coalition and Human Rights Watch were a preview of the likely debate in Congress over the agreement.

They highlighted a report by the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), a group of university administrators, students and other advocates that monitor working conditions in foreign countries.

It describes cases of forced labour and child labour, pregnancy and gender-based discrimination, health and safety hazards and excessive working hours and inadequate wages that the groups said Vietnam should be required to correct before striking a free trade deal with the US.

In addition, Vietnam has jailed an increasing number of dissidents, bloggers and religious leaders in recent years, holding them for long periods without access to family or legal counsel and often subject to torture or other mistreatment, Human Rights Watch said in a recent release.

Representative George Miller, a senior Democrat from California, in a letter to US Trade Representative Michael Froman, said the WRC report showed, "Export industry workers in Vietnam... are routinely denied the basic labour standards that the US requires from its trading partners."

He stopped short of also asking for talks with Vietnam to be suspended but pressed Mr Froman to explain "what steps the administration is willing to take to ensure that Vietnam is able to comply" with labour provisions established by a bipartisan group of US lawmakers in 2007 for trade agreements.

The 12 TPP countries are negotiating commitments to protect workers and the environment as part of the trade pact, but critics fear they won't be subject to the same enforcement rules as business provisions.