Pastor Y Nuen Ayun was taken from Dak Lak for saying what happens to his church

On 8 October 2025 the Dak Lak provincial police detained Pastor Y Nuen Ayun of the Montagnard Evangelical Church of Christ. The accusation was that he had spread false information about religious practice in the Central Highlands and defamed the authorities by describing how his members are treated.

Where things stand

Y Nuen Ayun is a pastor of the Montagnard Evangelical Church of Christ, one of the highland congregations that has declined to dissolve itself into the State-sanctioned church. On 8 October 2025 he was detained by the Security Investigation Agency of the Dak Lak provincial police.

The stated grounds were that he had spread false information about religious practice in the Central Highlands, and had defamed local authorities in describing the harassment of his church members. He was held under Article 116 of the 2015 Penal Code.

What we are reporting, and what we are not

The detention, the agency, the date and the article are on the record. What we cannot report is what was said to him in custody, or on what evidence the accusation of falsehood rests, because none has been published.

Why it matters

Article 116 makes a criminal offence of an act of description. A pastor reports that his members are harassed; the report itself becomes the crime. Where that holds, no account of what happens to a highland church can be given safely from inside the highlands — which is the point of it.

Sources

• CIVICUS Monitor, Vietnam: Regime targets human rights defenders working on minority, indigenous, land and environmental rights despite UN review
• International Christian Concern, Montagnard Pastor Gets 7-Year Prison Sentence in Vietnam