Cambodia<\/a> and the fabricated charges issued by the Vietnamese communist authorities to cover up an act of transnational repression\u201d.<\/p>\nIt is not clear if the third person is a Viet Tan member as well.<\/p>\n
Tran Hiep, a 50-year-old Vietnamese Australian democracy campaigner, was due to return to Bangkok, Thailand, to reunite with his wife Chloe Dang after a short trip to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, to meet with human rights defenders.<\/p>\n
Earlier, his wife implored the federal government to find him and bring him home after he failed to board his flight.<\/p>\n
He had not communicated with his wife since 18 September, leaving her worried for his safety.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy family and I are really worried about his safety, and we just only want to know where he is and what happened to him,\u201d Dang said from Bangkok airport before boarding a flight to Melbourne.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy husband deserves protection, and I really hope the Australian government will continue to put pressure on Cambodia to do an investigation to find out where he is right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hiep, a freelance IT professional who founded the Australian Alliance to Combat Human Trafficking, was travelling with another human rights activist Nguyen Duc Thuan, who is also Vietnamese and holds a Norwegian passport.<\/p>\n
The pair travelled to Cambodia to meet with dissident Vietnamese activists for training.<\/p>\n
Tran Hiep has not communicated with his wife since 18 September<\/p>\n
Vietnam in recent years has ramped up its crackdown on dissidents, with more than 55 activists arrested under broad criminal laws in 2025.<\/p>\n
Viet Tan urged the Norwegian and Australian authorities to ask for access to the Hiep and Nguyen, to \u201censure their wellbeing and access to needed medication\u201d.<\/p>\n
It said the pair had \u201cno intention\u201d of entering Vietnam and the claim they had done so illegally was a \u201cblatant fabrication\u201d to cover up their abduction.<\/p>\n
\u201cViet Tan is particularly concerned that To Lam\u2019s police state is using its security apparatus to pursue and repress activists and foreign nationals even beyond Vietnam\u2019s borders,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n
\u201cMeeting with, exchanging ideas with, and supporting human rights defenders, democracy activists, and civil society is a peaceful form of advocacy to advance
freedom, democracy, and human rights in Vietnam.\u201d<\/p>\n
Civil society groups and United Nations human rights experts have repeatedly warned of growing co-operation between Vietnamese authorities and neighbouring governments targeting advocates.<\/p>\n
Viet Tan, a pro-democracy diaspora political party, had earlier described the pair\u2019s disappearance as concerning given previous cases involving Vietnamese dissidents vanishing in neighbouring countries and subsequently appearing in custody in Vietnam.<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir disappearance is not an ordinary \u2018missing person\u2019 incident. Both men are long-time human rights advocates and Viet Tan members,\u201d the organisation said.<\/p>\n
Dang, 36, said fretting over her husband\u2019s whereabouts had taken a psychological toll.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s been 11 days and I\u2019m really in the dark,\u201d she said, choking back tears.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know where he is and how he\u2019s doing \u2013 it\u2019s driving me crazy.<\/p>\n
\u201cEverything is really uncertain.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Australian government confirmed consular officials were in contact with Dang but declined to comment further.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade is providing consular assistance to the family of an Australian reported missing in Cambodia,\u201d a department spokesperson said on Monday.<\/p>\n
The families of the missing men have filed an appeal with the UN working group on enforced or involuntary disappearances.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Vietnamese authorities have detained three activists, including an Australian, on what have been described as \u201cfabricated\u201d charges. The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":909152,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-909151","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909151","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=909151"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/909151\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/909152"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=909151"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=909151"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=909151"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}