Hoàng Văn Hoan (1905–1991) was a personal friend of Ho Chi Minh, a founding member of the Indochinese Communist Party, and a Politburo member of the Lao Dong Party (Vietnam Workers' Party-VWP) from 1960 to 1976. Hoan was a crucial link between the Democratic Republic of Vietnam and China, ambassador to Beijing 1950-1957, and leader of many delegations to China as Vice Chairman of the DRV National Assembly Standing Committee in the 1960s. He lost much of his influence after Ho Chi Minh's death in 1969, and particularly after the Fourth National Party Congress in 1977, when the Vietnamese Communists shifted to a pro-Soviet position. Like Truong Nhu Tang, who went into exile in Paris, Hoang defected and surfaced in Beijing in July 1979, after shaking off political persecution by the Vietnames