China's authorities have been accused of snatching three exiled dissidents while they were travelling in Vietnam.

The activist organisation, China Democracy Party, said the three were abducted by Chinese security forces along the border of China and Vietnam on 26 June and have not been heard of since.

The security forces lured them away and then caught them like fish on hooks

Wang Xizhe, China Democracy Party

Wang Bingzhang, Yue Wu and Zhang Qi are being held at a secret location in China, the group said.

The Chinese Foreign Ministry says it knows nothing about the case.

Earlier this week, the US State Department confirmed the disappearance of Mr Wang, who is based in the United States.

Meeting with labour activists

The two men and one woman arrived in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi on 16 June to discuss a fledgling labour movement with Chinese labour leaders, according to Wang Xizhe, co-chair of the China Democracy Party.

"The security forces lured them away and then caught them like fish on hooks," Mr Wang said.

Fang Yuan, another member of the party, said he had last heard from Mr Wang on 26 June.

"Wang called me and told me there was a possibility he would try to enter China," Mr Fang said.

He said the disappearance of the dissidents was "testament to the desperate lengths the government will go to stop the evolution of democracy in China".

The three are all based outside China:

• Wang Bingzhang has been jailed twice in China for speaking against the government; he organised the Chinese Alliance for Democracy in New York
• Yue Wu, who lives in Paris, was a labour leader in the 1989 pro-democracy protests in Beijing's Tiananmen Square
• Zhang Qi was granted political asylum in the US in 2001; she is the leader of Zhong Gong, a banned health and meditation sect, and has been wanted by the Chinese Government since 1999

The reports of their detention come three months after US-based dissident Yang Jianli was caught in the south-western province of Yunnan after entering China on a friend's passport.

He has not been heard from since.