Buôn Ea Pô, Cư Jút — June 17, 2026
In a brutal act of forced eviction that has left a 61-year-old Montagnard woman homeless and without basic necessities, Vietnamese state authorities descended on the home of Mrs. H Nghét Knul on the morning of June 16, 2026, stripping the property of every possession, seizing her vehicle, and demolishing her house with heavy machinery — all without producing legal justification or examining the family’s documents proving over three decades of land ownership.
The Victim
Mrs. H Nghét Knul, born in 1965, is a native Montagnard (Đêga) woman from Buôn Ea Pô, Cư Jút district, in what was formerly Đắk Nông province — territory now administratively consolidated under Lâm Đồng province. Like thousands of indigenous Montagnard families in Vietnam’s Central Highlands, her household has lived on and cultivated the same plot of ancestral land for generations.
A Two-Day Operation Disguised as a Religious Inquiry
The crackdown unfolded in stages that strongly suggest premeditation.
On June 15, 2026, officers from the Đắk Nông Provincial Police (now under Lâm Đồng Province) visited Mrs. H Nghét Knul’s home under the pretext of asking questions about her religious practice. The persecution of Montagnard Christians — particularly those affiliated with independent house churches outside the state-controlled religious framework — is a well-documented pattern in the Central Highlands. Tellingly, the officers made no mention whatsoever of any land dispute or administrative issue during this visit.
On the morning of June 16, 2026, a much larger force returned. The Đắk Nông Provincial Police arrived with a substantial contingent of Vietnamese state officials at Mrs. H Nghét Knul’s home in Buôn Ea Pô. What followed was not an inspection, not a hearing, and not a legal proceeding — it was a complete confiscation:
• Officers seized every item of property inside the home, including high-value belongings.
• They took rice and drinking water, leaving the family with no food or water.
• They confiscated a newly purchased Mitsubishi Xpander vehicle valued at over 500 million Vietnamese đồng (approximately US$20,000).
• They then deployed heavy machinery to demolish the family home itself, leaving Mrs. H Nghét Knul with no shelter.
By June 17, 2026, the authorities had begun dumping stones and sand onto the cleared site — a strong indication that the land has already been earmarked for another purpose, undermining any claim that this was a routine administrative action.
A Land Claim Spanning Three Decades, Ignored
The family’s account exposes the unlawfulness of the operation in stark terms:
• The land has been in the family’s possession for more than 30 years, originally acquired from relatives and never sold to any other party.
• The family holds handwritten documentation of the original transaction, consistent with how rural land transfers were customarily recorded in the Central Highlands before formal titling systems were uniformly enforced.
• The family applied 3 to 4 times for a Land Use Rights Certificate (the official document granting legal recognition of land ownership in Vietnam). Each time, the Đắk Nông Provincial Police obstructed the application and refused to allow the family to complete the process.
When officers arrived on June 16, they refused to examine the family’s documents. The family owes no debts, has no outstanding legal disputes, and to this moment has not been informed of the legal basis for the seizure and destruction.
Part of a Broader Pattern
This case is not isolated. It fits a long and well-documented pattern of state action against the Montagnard people of the Central Highlands, who have faced systemic persecution for decades — particularly on grounds of religious belief, ethnic identity, and ancestral land claims. The strategy is consistent: authorities first probe a household under the cover of a religious “inquiry,” then return with overwhelming force to dispossess the family of land that has been in indigenous hands for generations.
By refusing to issue Land Use Rights Certificates to Montagnard families while simultaneously declaring their handwritten land documents invalid, Vietnamese authorities create a legal limbo that justifies later confiscation — a process indistinguishable in effect from ethnic dispossession.
A Call for International Attention
Mrs. H Nghét Knul is now homeless. Her family has been left in a state of helplessness, with no shelter, no possessions, no transportation, and no recourse within a system whose own officers carried out the destruction.
Montagnards Stand for Justice (MSFJ) calls on:
• The UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR),
• The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF),
• Front Line Defenders, and all international human rights bodies,
to formally document this case, raise it with the Vietnamese government, and demand accountability. Mrs. H Nghét Knul and her family deserve the immediate return of their property, full compensation, and the legal recognition of land rights that has been denied to them and to thousands of other Montagnard families across the Central Highlands.
The international community cannot remain silent as the indigenous peoples of Vietnam’s Central Highlands are stripped of their homes, their faith, and their dignity.
Reported by Montagnards Stand for Justice (MSFJ) — msfjustice.org