Police in Vietnam have detained three of the six suspects on their special wanted list for committing the deadly terrorist attacks on two local administration offices in the Central Highlands province of Dak Lak last month. 

The three suspects, Y Ju Nie, Nay Tam, and Nay Yen, aged 49-55, were detained on Saturday afternoon while they were hiding in a commune bordering Laos in Dak Lak’s Ea Sup District, the provincial police reported the same day.

These men, all local residents, are among the six suspects on the most wanted list for their involvement in the terrorist raids by two armed groups on the headquarters of the People’s Committees of Ea Tieu and Ea Ktur Communes in Cu Kuin District on June 11.

The attackers, armed with guns and other weapons, killed nine people, including four police officers, two commune officials, and three civilians.

They also injured two people, took three residents hostage, and destroyed many facilities at the two administration offices.

Police are hunting for the three remaining wanted suspects, namely Y Khing Lieng, Nay Duong, Y Hoal Eban, also locals.

Police have so far detained and prosecuted more than 90 suspects in the case on charges of “terrorism aimed at opposing the people’s administration” under Article 113 of the Vietnamese Penal Code, according to police sources.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ spokeswoman Pham Thu Hang on July 7 rejected claims that these deadly attacks were driven by ethnic discrimination.

Hang made the rejection at a press conference in Hanoi when she was asked by Hong Kong’s Phoenix Radio about the ministry’s reaction to such claims on social media.

“We absolutely reject such erroneous claims,” the spokesperson stressed and affirmed that these lethal raids were organized crimes that would be strictly handled in accordance with the law.

She also cited Major General Pham Ngoc Viet, director of the Department of Homeland Security under the Ministry of Public Security, as saying at an anti-terrorism conference recently held by the United Nations that the deadly attacks in Dak Lak were an organized terrorist activity aimed at state entities, officials, and civilians.

Viet also stated that one of the arrested subjects is a member of a U.S.-based organization who had received instructions to infiltrate Vietnam and perform the raids. 

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