BBC journalist barred from leaving Vietnam and interrogated repeatedly | Vietnam
In a press freedom case that came to light during a Vietnamese leader’s high-profile visit to the UK, Vietnamese authorities banned a BBC reporter from leaving the country and subjected them to days of interrogation.
According to a source with knowledge of the situation, the Vietnamese citizen journalist, who lives and works in Thailand, returned to his home country in August to renew his passport.
A source who spoke on condition of anonymity said police interrogated them for several days and asked questions about their journalism while their passports were reinstated.
The journalist’s friends hope their case may be raised by British prime minister Keir Starmer, who is hosting the Vietnam leader’s general secretary Tô Lâm, who arrives in the UK on Tuesday.
After being approached for comment, the BBC confirmed that one of its journalists “has been unable to leave Vietnam for several months due to authorities confiscating his identity cards and renewed passports”.
“During this time, our journalist was subjected to several days of interrogation by the authorities. The BBC correspondent was in Vietnam for routine passport renewal and to visit his family,” the media outlet said in a statement.
“We are deeply concerned about the health condition of our journalist and call on the authorities to allow them to leave immediately and provide them with renewed passports so they can return to work,” the statement said.
Vietnam remains a highly restrictive environment for journalists who cannot operate freely in the country’s one-party state controlled by the Communist Party. Local media is highly censored and dissidents are regularly imprisoned.
In May, the print edition of the Economist, which featured Tô Lâm on the cover, was banned in the country as part of a series of media censorship actions by authorities.
Phil Robertson, director of Asian Human Rights and Labor Defenders, said that while Lâm was in London, the journalist should have been met with “clear and unrelenting demands” to be given his passport and allowed to fly to Bangkok immediately.
“Failure to act now will likely result in this journalist being arrested, or worse, falling into the hands of Vietnam’s public security ministry,” he added. “Prime Minister Starmer needs to make clear to General Tô Lâm that UK-Vietnam relations cannot be strengthened because of blatant violations of media freedom and human rights.”
Authorities in Vietnam have little tolerance for dissent and maintain tight control over the media; press freedom group Reporters sans Frontières ranks it among the worst in the world for media freedoms – 173rd out of 180 countries on the index. The group describes Vietnam as “one of the world’s largest prisons for journalists.”
The Vietnamese government has been approached for comment.
