Disappearing Vietnamese pupils leave school baffled

The disappearance of 23 Vietnamese students has been described as "baffling" by the language school they attended in Dublin.

In all, 24 students, aged from 16 to 29, arrived in Ireland for a six-week English-language course at the Education Through English school in July. However, they disappeared in ones and twos until just one remained on August 22nd, when they were due to return to Vietnam. A Garda spokesman said foul play was not suspected.

The students were issued with 90-day visas to attend the course, according to a Department of Justice spokesman. He said they were now in breach of their visa regulations because they left the course. The spokesman said the Department was liaising with the Garda Siochana about the disappearance.

Authorities believe many of the students may have gone to England, where there is a large Vietnamese community.

Ms Niamh Walsh, operations manager for Education Through English, said the school had taken the students' passports when they arrived in Ireland and handed them to the authorities when the students disappeared. They had been staying with host families in the Dublin area.

She said some students disappeared for a weekend not long after they arrived. The host families and school were very concerned but all the students returned after the weekend. When they disappeared again, the families and the school assumed they had gone away for the weekend. However, two students failed to return on this occasion.

"They then disappeared in dribs and drabs, so it was not immediately obvious," Ms Walsh said. Eventually, just one girl remained. She told the school she knew nothing about her classmates' disappearance. She plans to continue studying in Ireland until her visa expires in October.

"It's very disconcerting," Ms Walsh said. "The host families have been very worried." This was the first time Education Through English had taken Vietnamese students.

She said she could not say if the school would refuse to take any more Vietnamese students, but she expected the authorities to treat further applications with great caution. All students came to Ireland through one Vietnamese agency.

She said she was concerned about the younger students, some of whom had very little English. "They were not hardened people. They were very nice, very pleasant people."

The Department of Justice spokesman said disappearance on such a scale was rare. "We had 30,000 registered aliens last year and the vast, vast majority of them complied with the regulations," he said. The spokesman said the Vietnamese students had complied with all rules.

Last October a Romanian choir disappeared after arriving in Ireland for the Sligo Choral Festival. Over 30 of the missing choristers quickly applied for asylum. The Department of Justice fast-tracked the applications, but none was successful.