BANGKOK: Laos should release a prominent rights activist who went missing this month, an international human rights group said yesterday, although authorities there have said they do not know where he is or who was responsible for his disappearance.
Sombath Somphone, 60, disappeared on December 15 in the Lao capital, Vientiane, after being stopped by police while driving his jeep from the development agency he founded, human rights groups said.
“Circumstances surrounding the case including security camera footage, indicate Lao authorities took him into custody, raising concerns for his safety,” New York-based Human Rights Watch said in a statement.
“The Lao government needs to immediately reveal Sombath’s location and release him,” said Brad Adams, the group’s Asia director.
The United States has also voiced concern about the disappearance of Sombath, who received the Ramon Magsaysay Award for community leadership in 2005 and worked to promote education and development in poverty-stricken Laos. The award is often described as Asia’s equivalent of the Nobel Prize.
The landlocked Communist country has little tolerance for dissent and this month expelled the director of a Swiss development organisation for criticising the country’s one-party regime in a letter to donors.
Reuters
