According to National Assembly Secretary General Nguyen Hanh Phuc, NA Chairwoman Ngan and high-ranking officials toured to South Korea on December 4-7, 2018 at the invitation of Moon Hee-sang, speaker of South Korea’s Assembly.
National Assembly Secretary General Nguyen Hanh Phuc
The leaders were accompanied by an economic delegation who attended the Vietnam-South Korea Trade and Investment Forum jointly held by the Vietnamese Ministry of Planning and Investment, the South Korean Embassy in Vietnam and the Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
The delegation was allowed to take the same flight with Ngan who had a speech at the forum.
The Ministry of Planning and Investment were responsible for the selection the delegation members.
The economic group’s members just hitchhiked a ride with Ngan to and from South Korea, but did not belong to the National Assembly’s delegation. They were not granted diplomatic visas, Phuc noted. Their accommodation, meals and travel fees for the trip were provided by the Ministry of Planning and Investment, not by the National Assembly.
When the trip ended, nine people were missing for the flight back to Vietnam. After that, the case was reported to the South Korean side for the search to repatriate them.
Two among those have been deported and South Korean authorities have continued to seek the others.
Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung admitted that the economic delegation was arranged by the ministry. He, however, added that each member had been carefully chosen and checked and the ministry had even retained their passports for security reasons when they came to South Korea.
According to Dung, the ministry hired a travel company to arrange their accommodations, meal and transportation when they were in South Korea.
Over the past 30 years, such economic groups have accompanied high-ranking officials’ visits to foreign countries for trade and investment promotion, but this is the first time people have absconded.