~ Le Vięt Nam, aujourd'hui. ~
The Vietnam News

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Australian national wanted in Vietnam on child sex charges

HANOI - Police in Vietnam are hunting for an Australian national suspected of sexually abusing children in the communist country, state media said on Saturday. The man, whose identity could not be immediately confirmed, was denounced by a US aid worker who accused him of abusing orphans aged eight and nine in central Quang Nam province late last year, the Ho Chi Minh City police newspaper reported.

Australian police said the suspect “was in the past charged with sexual abuse of children... so they issued a search warrant and sent it to Vietnam and other countries,” the paper said. Interpol Vietnam and the Australian embassy in Hanoi said they could not confirm the report. Vietnamese police believe the man has visited the country four times since June 2003, the report said, adding that he may at some point have travelled to Cambodia. If confirmed, the case would be the third in four months of a foreigner wanted in Vietnam for child sex offences.

A court in southern Vietnam on Friday convicted former British glam rocker Gary Glitter of sexually abusing two underage Vietnamese girls and sentenced him to three years in prison. The faded 1970s pop star had been arrested in November in Ho Chi Minh City. In early January, Austrian national Peter Mueller, accused of sexually abusing children both at home and in Vietnam, was turned over to Austrian police after being taken into custody in Ho Chi Minh City on December 26.

Agence France Presse - March 4, 2006.