Norwegian in dreaded prison: – No one can guarantee that he is not being tortured

While Norway signs a free trade agreement with Vietnam on Sunday, a Norwegian man is held in one of the country's most notorious prisons. Here is what we know about the B34 facility.

NOTORIOUS: The white wall says that the inmates are to "rehabilitate themselves". Inside the walls of the B34 prison in Ho Chi Minh City sits the Norwegian man. His lawyer fears for what may happen to him in there. Photo: Vietnam's Ministry of Public Security

Published 18.10.2026 09:54

On Sunday morning, Norway signed a free trade agreement with Vietnam.

The same day marks exactly one month since Norwegian Thuan Duc Nguyen (52) and two other pro-democracy activists disappeared in Cambodia, and later turned out to have been taken to the border, arrested and placed in custody in Vietnam.

IMPRISONED: Thuan Duc Nguyen came to Norway as a 15-year-old in 1989. He has a background as a pharmacist, naval officer and organisation leader, and is described as a caring family man who is engaged in church work. Photo: Private

His lawyer in Norway, Maria Hessen Jacobsen of Elden, believes Norway should have postponed signing the agreement.

– Zero tariffs on Norwegian salmon is all well and good. But the abduction of Norwegian citizens is something we cannot accept, she says. In a letter to the government, she and lawyer Aleksander Hatlem asked how they could enter into the agreement now.

– The cell is very hot from March to December. There is no fan, and only one weak light bulb, Australian Chau Van Kham tells TV 2.

As State Secretary Astrid Bergmål signs her name to the agreement on Sunday, the Norwegian is still held in a notorious prison in Ho Chi Minh City.

Kham knows the B34 prison better than most. In 2019 he was himself held in custody there.

Kham describes in detail the conditions in which the Norwegian is imprisoned – and why the prison has a reputation for torturing inmates.

– Very stifling

On Friday, TV 2 was able to share details from the Norwegian embassy's report after its visit to Thuan Duc Nguyen in his cell in B34. The Norwegian's family expressed concern that he is not receiving the insulin injections he needs.

But it is not only the medication that is difficult in B34, where the Norwegian Thuan is charged with terrorism for his work for democracy in Vietnam.

The cell is divided into two small rooms. The first is three square metres, and has a small window and a door with a grated opening at the bottom. This room is closed off if the guards believe the prisoner has committed a disciplinary violation.

– When the other door is closed, the room becomes very stifling for two people. No daylight comes in, Kham explains.

This is how he describes the cell:

"The area is 3 × 4 metres, divided into two rooms: The first room is 3 × 1 metres with a window of 0.8 m², and a door with a grated opening at the bottom of 0.1 × 0.8 metres.

The second room is connected to the first via a door that can be closed if one is deemed to have committed a disciplinary violation (such as not following the rules or not complying with demands for an explanation/interrogation).

This room is 3 × 3 metres, has a hatch for passing in items of 4 dm², two stone benches to sleep on (1 × 2 metres each), a squat toilet (without a seat) and a water container.

When the other door is closed, the room becomes very stifling for two people. No sunlight gets in."

Such a violation can be not following the rules, or not complying with demands for an explanation and interrogation.

In the second room two people live in nine square metres. The room has two stone benches, one metre wide, that one sleeps on. The toilet has no seat, and one must squat.

The room also has a water container.

Political prisoners are placed in cells with criminal prisoners, in what Kham describes as a deliberate strategy.

– This person is placed there by the prison one hundred per cent to act as a snitch and informer for the investigators, he explains.

Lawyer Jacobsen says they are aware of similar information.

– We only know that Thuan is held with a Vietnamese fellow inmate. At the same time, we have read reports from people who have been held in there, and that makes us very, very worried, she says.

Tells of torture

The lawyer says the Norwegian is not receiving any legal assistance – contrary to international standards.

– When he cannot speak to a lawyer or the embassy without surveillance or an agenda, then we have no reliable information about how he is doing. No one can guarantee that he is not being tortured, she says.

A 2018 report to the UN describes in detail how prisoners are tortured in the Vietnamese prison system, including specifically in pre-trial custody.

Prisoners are beaten with belts, kicked with heavy boots, slammed into walls or given electric shocks.

They are given drugs, hung from the ceiling by handcuffs, held with their heads under water or forced to sit for long periods in uncomfortable positions. Some prisoners say they have been stripped naked and harassed.

– Yes, torture happens when the investigators' demands are not satisfied by the prisoner's statement, says Chau Van Kham about what it was like in B34 when he was held there in 2019.

– You can be moved to the hottest cells. Subjected to frequent inspection of the room, banned from buying extra food, banned from meeting relatives, or they close the door, so that two people live in six square metres, he says.

More violent torture also takes place, he explains.

– If you are a domestic prisoner, you can be beaten. If the prisoner is an overseas Vietnamese and resists, they will use the cellmate to beat you, he says.

– Or move you to new rooms many times a month, he says.

Isolation

Kham further says that one is locked in the cell 24 hours a day. In the embassy's report from the visit to B34, it states that Thuan Duc Nguyen is allowed to go out into a yard for three to four hours each day.

– Health is unsafe, and it is easy to be poisoned in staged incidents, Kham warns.

Thuan Duc Nguyen is diabetic, and needs insulin which he does not receive in prison. The family also says he has donated one of his kidneys to an older brother, and that he needs medication for this as well.

According to the embassy report, the Norwegian sleeps little in prison. The Australian former inmate confirms this impression.

– It is impossible to sleep. It took almost a whole year to get used to it because of back pain and heat. You only have one thin mat, a mosquito net and a thin blanket, he says.

He says one can exercise inside the cell, but that the body becomes very weak anyway due to lack of sunlight and basic nutrition.

– You are mentally constantly tense throughout the investigation. It is always uncertain what tricks and methods the investigators will use next, says Kham.

– It is terrible. But you can get through it when you believe you are doing righteous work for those who are less fortunate, and for your fellow human beings, he adds.

Poor food and soap

B34 has been used for many years to hold political prisoners, and is located on the outskirts of Ho Chi Minh City.

The prison is run by the Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security. It is part of a larger complex of buildings, which also houses the offices of Vietnamese police and intelligence agencies.

The embassy's report states that Thuan Duc Nguyen receives two meals a day from the prison, and that he can order extra food, fruit, milk and clothes as needed. This must be paid for from a personal account.

The former political prisoner Kham has no kind words for the food.

– It lacks nutrition, and is prepared unhygienically, he says. To get food from outside you must pay yourself – but you lose that right if you refuse to give a statement.

You have to arrange breakfast yourself, says Kham. The same applies to laundry and personal hygiene.

– Soap is handed out for showering and laundry, toothpaste, a toothbrush and a face towel. But the quality is very poor. The lowest in Vietnam, he says.

– Have zero trust

Lawyer Maria Hessen Jacobsen says the Norwegian embassy in Hanoi requested written documentation from the prison for the information it received during its visit to B34.

She herself places hardly any trust in what the Vietnamese authorities say actually being true.

– I think I have zero trust in the information that is presented. They have a history of presenting incorrect information. He hardly sleeps, and he has a poor diet, she says.

She says the short-term goal is to ensure that Thuan Duc Nguyen is safe in prison. Getting him out may take a long time.

– Right now it is his health that is most important, so that he lasts until the process of getting him released is complete. In the longer term, getting him back home to Norway is an overriding goal, she says.

The Vietnamese Ministry of Public Security has stated in an email to TV 2 that Thuan Duc Nguyen is being investigated for terrorism "in accordance with Vietnamese law" for his work in the democracy organisation Viet Tan.

Since 2016, the organisation has been on Vietnam's terrorist list. The family of Thuan Duc Nguyen is clear that all accusations of terrorism are "fabricated stories and evidence".

This is the Foreign Ministry's response

The Norwegian delegation that signed a free trade agreement with Vietnam on Sunday promised in advance that it would raise the case with the authorities.

On Sunday, the Foreign Ministry repeats the same promise to TV 2, and says it takes the case "extremely seriously".

"It is a high priority for the Foreign Ministry, and State Secretary Astrid Bergmål is raising the case at a high level in several meetings with Vietnamese authorities during her visit to Vietnam this weekend," says press spokesperson Thea Finstad at the Foreign Ministry.

These are the questions TV 2 has put to the Foreign Ministry:

It was communicated in advance that the Norwegian delegation would raise the case of the Norwegian man Thuan Duc Nguyen, who is imprisoned in Ho Chi Minh City.

• How did you raise the issue, and with whom?

• What answer did you receive from the Vietnamese authorities?

• Was it ever considered for Norway to postpone the signing in order to put pressure on Vietnam in this case?

"The Norwegian side has expressed, among other things, a clear expectation that the embassy be given regular consular access, and that he receive legal assistance and proper medical follow-up."

Thuan Duc Nguyen was arrested together with an Australian and a Vietnamese citizen. Australian authorities have promised that they too are working to secure the release of their citizen Tran Hiep.

"But I must be careful about what I say publicly," Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong has told ABC.

In Norway, no cabinet ministers have yet commented on the case. It is the ministry that has responded on behalf of Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide.

The article has been updated