Pham Thi Lan, wife of independent journalist Nguyen Tuong Thuy, was banned from leaving the country on April 18 when she arrived at the Moc Bai Border Gate in Tay Ninh Province to travel to Cambodia with her family. Lan confirmed the travel ban with the Voice of America (VOA) Vietnamese language service after she returned to Hanoi on April 19.

During livestreaming on her Facebook account, Lan said that the Vietnamese Border Police had said she received a travel ban due to “national security” reasons. “I'm an old woman who only cares for my grandchildren and does housework all day long. Does that have an impact on national security?” she asked.

VOA said Vietnam’s Immigration Department of the Ministry of Public Security and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs did not respond to their request for comment. Journalist Nguyen Tuong Thuy, a member of the Independent Journalists Association of Vietnam (IJAVN), is serving an 11-year prison sentence on the charge of “distributing anti-state propaganda.” He is held at An Phuoc Prison, Binh Duong Province, more than 1,500 kilometers (932 miles) from his home in Hanoi.

The travel ban imposed on Pham Thi Lan occurred before Vietnam began its fourth cycle of the Universal Periodic Review (UPR), a universal human rights assessment process of the United Nations Human Rights Council, in early May in Geneva, Switzerland. In this process, various stakeholders will discuss and propose recommendations for Hanoi to improve its human rights record and uphold other international commitments regarding civil liberties, including the freedom of movement of its citizens.