SUSSEX BUSINESSMAN DETAINED IN VIETNAM

THE BRIGHTON ARGUS

A businessman who has been under arrest in Vietnam for the past six years has had his trial postponed because of bad weather.

Sussex’s Peter Laking was accused of defrauding two business partners out of £143,000 in 2004 – an offence he denies – but is still waiting for his trial to go to court. Until this happens he is under strict bail conditions which ban him from leaving the Vietnamese capital of Ho Chi Mion City in the south of the country. The 62-year-old has not been back to his home in Midhurst since his arrest in 2004.

He has suffered a number of strokes and is now understood to be very ill.

Campaigning group Fair Trials International previously criticised Mr Laking’s treatment, after it was claimed he slept for months on a tiled, prison floor.