Police in Vietnam’s Central Highlands have arrested a member of the Montagnard community on charges of collecting one-sided information and reporting it to other members of the ethnic minority group living abroad in order to oppose the government.
Police investigators in Dak Lak province announced the arrest of Y Po Mlo, 63, last Thursday on charges of "undermining the solidarity policy" under Article 116 of the criminal code.
Government officials “repeatedly educated, reminded and brought Y Po Mlo to self-criticism” for contacting and receiving instructions from U.S.-based Montagnard Y Mut Mlo, the Ministry of Public Security reported.
Y Mut Mlo was sentenced in absentia to 11 years in prison on terrorism charges in connection with a fatal attack on two administration offices in Dak Lak province on June 11, 2023.
The Ministry of Public Security also said that from last year until his arrest, Y Po Mlo used his Facebook account to contact and receive instructions from Montagnards seeking asylum in Thailand, including Y Min Alur, Y Thanh Eban and Y Pher Hdrue, and to pass on the information to other Montagnards in Dak Lak.
It accused the three Thai-based Montagnards and U.S.-based Y Mut Mlo of being members of FULRO. The group, also known as the United Front for the Liberation of Oppressed Races, existed from 1964 to 1992 and campaigned for the autonomy for minority groups in Vietnam such as the Monganards, Cham and Khmer. Vietnam has branded it a “terrorist organization.”
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Montagnard means “mountain people” in French and is a term used by French colonizers for about 30 indigenous tribes living in Vietnam’s Central Highlands.
Many Montagnards are Christian and say they have suffered discrimination from local and national authorities over issues such as land rights and freedom of religion.
Not terrorist organizations
Radio Free Asia contacted two of the three Thai-based Montagnards but they deny having any connection with Y Po Mlo.
“I don't know where this person is or what he looks like,” Y Min Alur told RFA Vietnamese. “I’m in Thailand, where I speak out about the issue of religion and human rights, about issues such as religious oppression by the Vietnamese Communist Party and taking land from our ethnic people.”
Alur, 49, is a follower of the Evangelical Church in Phu Yen province. He fled to Thailand to seek asylum because of religious persecution and is waiting to be resettled in a third country. He said he was not a member of FULRO because the organization was dissolved in 1992.
“Those who speak out about the Vietnamese Communist Party’s suppression of religion are all considered FULRO,” he added.
Another Thai-based Montagnard, Y Pher Hdrue, said the claim that Y Po Mlo had connections with FULRO members was a “baseless and ridiculous” accusation “just to create an excuse for arrest and repression.”
When police searched Mlo’s home they seized a number of documents related to Thai-based “Montagnards for Justice” and the U.S.-based “Montagnard Support Group,” according to Vietnamese media.
Montagnards Stand for Justice, or MSFJ, founding member Y Phic Hdok said members of the group are not terrorists and have no connection to FULRO.
He called the government’s claims about Mlo’s international connections with Montagnard support groups “baseless slander.”
“After verifying with MSFJ members in Thailand, we confirm that we do not know who Y Po Mlo is and have never worked with him," he said.
U.S.-based Y Phic Hdok, said his group collects information on human rights violations and religious repression against ethnic minorities in the Central Highlands and reports it to international human rights organizations and the United Nations.
He said he was concerned that Vietnam’s government arbitrarily arrested people, forced them to confess to trumped-up charges and labeled MSFJ a terrorist organization. Hdok said this proves that Vietnam had not improved on human rights and did not respect the law and international conventions on rights.
He said the government’s action was transnational repression, and it created false evidence to discredit MSFJ, and it plotted to extradite group member Y Quynh Bdap, from Thailand to Vietnam.
Special Rapporteurs speak out
In a joint letter sent to the Vietnam government on June 14, 13 special rapporteurs from the U.N. human rights mechanism spoke out about the repression of Montagnards in Vietnam and of organizations and individuals in Thailand.
The letter was made public on Aug. 14 after the Vietnam government failed to respond and labeled MSFJ a terrorist group following the Dak Lak attacks on June 11, 2023.
The group’s founding member, Y Quynh Bdap, was convicted in absentia by a court in Dak Lak and sentenced to 10 years in prison for “terrorism.” Bdap, who sought asylum in Thailand in 2018, was arrested by Thai police on July 11 at Vietnam’s request and is being tried for overstaying his visa, facing deportation to Vietnam.
The U.N. human rights experts said that labeling MSFJ a "terrorist organization" went against the requirements of due process and judicial protection under international human rights law.
The rapporteurs said MSFJ was an organization that protected the rights of indigenous people.
They also expressed concern that the Vietnamese government appeared to be continuing its cross-border repression by sending police to Thailand to seek the extradition of Y Quynh Bdap, other MSFJ members and other Vietnamese there.
Referring to an incident on March 14, the rapporteurs said Vietnamese police entered boarding houses in two places in Thailand where Montagnards were staying and “threatened, harassed and coerced the refugees to force them to return to Vietnam against their will."
The U.N. experts said the persuasion and intimidation of Vietnamese seeking asylum in Thailand in March was part of an intensified campaign of discrimination, repressive surveillance, security controls, harassment and intimidation against Montagnards in the Central Highlands. They said the 2023 attacks were the pretext for this escalation.
Discrimination and repression against Montagnards contravenes Vietnam's international commitments on human rights and could fuel resistance among indigenous minorities in the Central Highlands, the experts stressed. They cited cases of Montagnard religious leaders being imprisoned or dying in suspicious circumstances, such as Y Bum Bya, who was found hanging from a tree in a cemetery near his home after going to meet police on March 8 this year.
RFA Vietnamese emailed the Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a request for comment on the Special Rapporteurs' letter, but did not receive a response by time of publication.
Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn.