Tran Vu Linh

Before Tran Vu Linh left Vietnam in February 2019 to join overseas human rights and democracy training courses, he handed over three of his bank accounts (Vietcombank, VP Bank, Eximbank, and his SIM cards associated with the accounts) to the co-founders of the Liberal Publishing House. 

In the summer of 2019, his accounts were reportedly frozen; the likely reason was that these bank accounts were affiliated with the Liberal Publishing House’s online publications. Linh and the co-founders contacted the banks and were told that they would double-check on the issue and reply later; they never did. Due to security concerns, and as Linh was overseas at that time, the Liberal Publishing House had no other options and could not reactivate those bank accounts. 

The incident involving his bank accounts reportedly led to a further escalation in harassment against Linh and his family members, as Linh told The 88 Project. Linh has been informally accused of conducting propaganda against the State, and he has been pressured by local authorities via his family members to get him to return to Vietnam. His family has also been subjected to intimidation, police summons, workplace discrimination, dismissal (his mother was fired from differrent jobs five times since 2020), and identification card denial (for six relatives who share the household book with Linh).