Vietnamese authorities have arrested a 15-year old Vietnamese boy a second time for his alleged involvement in blocking and injuring police who tried to evict his family from their home in the southern part of the country, the boy’s younger sister said Friday.
About 10 plainclothes police officers apprehended Nguyen Mai Trung Tuan in his uncle’s home in Ninh Thuan province on Thursday and turned him over to authorities at a detention center in Long An province in the Mekong Delta region of southern Vietnam, Nguyen Mai Thao Vy told RFA’s Vietnamese Service.
“At 5 p.m., 10 policemen in civilian clothing suddenly arrested my brother,” she said. “A stranger passed by at that time and called my family. At 7 p.m., Ninh Thuan provincial police took my brother to the Long An police station. They just announced this morning that my brother had been arrested.”
Tuan can be sentenced for to two to seven years in prison, she said.
Police first arrested Tuan on April 14 along with his parents, Nguyen Trung Can and Mai Thi Kim Huong, at their home in Thach Hoa district in Long An province, where they resisted and allegedly attacked authorities who were trying to forcibly evict them and take their farmland.
Those who had witnessed the event did not cite a reason for the family’s eviction.
Authorities in Vietnam often evict people from their homes to make way for development projects.
When the family refused to let police enter their home, a clash ensued, resulting in injuries on both sides in which several people were burned by acid.
Police arrested 12 people, including all family members and others at the scene who opposed their eviction, severely beating some of them.
Tuan, however, was later released, because he was a minor.
Nguyen Mai Thao Vy, the family’s only child who was not arrested and is living with an aunt, said authorities have not let her visit her parents.
“They did not let me do anything,” she said.
“I will go to see if I can visit my brother tomorrow,” she added.
Reported by RFA’s Vietnamese Service. Translated by KaLynh Ngo. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.