Handling cases of foreigners illegally entering border areas

The occurrence of foreigners traveling for day trips without carrying identification documents and without permits from the competent authorities to enter border areas, as in this situation, is quite common, particularly in border areas of provinces adjacent to China in general and in Lang Son province in particular. Foreigners traveling for day trips without identification documents and without permits from the immigration authorities to enter border areas is a violation of the law.

To be specific, Article 5 of the 2014 Law on Entry, Exit, Transit, and Residence of Foreigners in Vietnam stipulates:

Prohibited Acts

1. Obstructing foreigners and related agencies, organizations, and individuals from exercising their rights, fulfilling their obligations, and responsibilities as prescribed by the law on entry, exit, transit, and residence of foreigners in Vietnam.

2. Imposing procedures, documents, and fees contrary to the provisions of this Law and other relevant laws; harassing and causing difficulties in the procedures for entry, exit, transit, and residence of foreigners in Vietnam.

3. Illegally entering, exiting, transiting, and residing in Vietnam; forging or using forged documents to enter, exit, transit, and reside in Vietnam.

4. Providing false information and documents to enter, exit, transit, and reside in Vietnam.

5. Taking advantage of entry, exit, transit, and residence in Vietnam to act against the Socialist Republic of Vietnam; infringing upon the lawful rights and interests of agencies, organizations, and individuals.

6. Buying, selling, renting, letting, borrowing, lending, erasing, and modifying the contents of documents that are valid for entry, exit, and residence to enable foreigners to enter, exit, transit, and reside in Vietnam.

Additionally, depending on the severity and actions of the individual, administrative penalties may be applied under Article 18 of Decree 144/2021/ND-CP:

1. Warning or a fine ranging from 300,000 VND to 500,000 VND for foreigners traveling within the territory of Vietnam without carrying passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents, documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, and residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards.

2. A fine ranging from 500,000 VND to 2,000,000 VND for any of the following acts:

a) Failing to report to the competent authorities about the loss, damage of passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents, documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, and residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards;

b) Providing false information to obtain, extend, restore the validity of or report the loss of passports, laissez-passers; providing false information to obtain internationally valid travel documents; documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards;

c) Foreigners entering areas requiring permits without such permits or traveling beyond the permitted scope and duration;

d) Failing to present passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents, documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, and residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards when requested by the competent Vietnamese authorities; failing to comply with the requests of the competent Vietnamese authorities regarding body, vehicle, item, place inspections for administrative violation evidence;

dd) Foreigners using temporary residence certificates, extending temporary residence, temporary residence cards, not renewing permanent residence cards in Vietnam beyond a period of under 16 days without permission from the competent authorities.

3. A fine ranging from 3,000,000 VND to 5,000,000 VND for any of the following acts:

a) Crossing the national border without completing exit and entry procedures as prescribed by the law;

b) Destroying, erasing, modifying, or altering the appearance and contents of passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents, documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards;

c) Gifting, donating, renting, letting, pawning, receiving pawned passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents; documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards;

d) Allowing others to use passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents; documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards to perform acts contrary to the law;

dd) Using passports, laissez-passers, internationally valid travel documents; documents issued to foreigners for entry, exit, residence in Vietnam, or ABTC cards of others to enter, exit, transit, reside or for performing other illegal acts;

e) Foreigners using temporary residence certificates, extending temporary residence, temporary residence cards, not renewing permanent residence cards in Vietnam beyond a period of 16 days to under 30 days without permission from the competent authorities;

g) Foreigners granted permanent residence cards who change their address but fail to report for reissuance; foreigners entering a border-gate economic zone, coastal economic zone on a visa exemption basis going to other locations in Vietnam without a Vietnam visa as required by law;

h) Tourist accommodation establishments, such as hotels, failing to connect to the internet or computer network with the Immigration Department of the provincial, centrally-run city public security to transmit temporary residence declarations of foreigners;

i) Tourist accommodation establishments housing foreigners overnight but failing to declare temporary residence or failing to update temporary residence information as prescribed; foreigners failing to provide or providing false information to tourist accommodation establishments for temporary residence declarations as prescribed by law.

Respectfully!