Attorney General charges Vietnamese with agent activity and kidnapping

Five years after the spectacular kidnapping of a Vietnamese businessman from Berlin, the Federal Public Prosecutor has brought charges against a suspect. The indictment is on secret service agent activity and aiding and abetting the deprivation of liberty, as announced in Karlsruhe on Thursday. There had been an arrest warrant against the man since 2017. In June he was extradited from the Czech Republic.

The case is about the fate of businessman Xuan Thanh Trinh: In July 2017, he and his companion were forcibly dragged into a van in an operation by the Vietnamese secret service in Berlin and then taken to Vietnam against his will. There he was subsequently sentenced to life imprisonment for alleged mismanagement and embezzlement.

The now accused Ahn T. L. is accused of having been involved in spying on the victims in advance and of having participated in the kidnapping himself as a driver. Before being extradited to Germany, T. L. was last in Prague.

In fact, other Vietnamese are said to have been involved; The federal prosecutor spoke on Thursday to employees of the Vietnamese secret service and employees of the Vietnamese embassy in Berlin as well as several Vietnamese nationals living in Europe.

Thanh's kidnapping had severely strained relations between Germany and Vietnam. At the time, the Federal Foreign Office spoke of “kidnapping”. Because of the case, a planned partnership agreement with Vietnam has been put on hold.

In connection with the proceedings against Thanh in Vietnam, doubts about the rule of law of the actions of the authorities had been expressed by his lawyer, among others. There were also accusations against the government in Hanoi of wanting to eliminate an adversary for political reasons. Another person involved in the kidnapping had already been sentenced to several years in prison in Berlin in 2018.