The Hero or the Traitor?

By Pang Sokheun
Orginally Posted at: The Son of the Khmer Empire

To show off his muscle as a strong leader, the nationalist, the conpetent and the defender of the nation HunSen has verbally and militarily been ready to attack Thailand at anytime if he has the chance​ without thinking of the consequence. With this, he is entitled as the only HERO of Cambodia by his group.

To maintain such a self-claimed status, he has never listened to suggestions, petitions and complaints from any NGO, Opposition party, and expert on border conflicts with the neighboring countries, esp., with Vietnam-his master.

Clearly, SRP leader Sam Rainsy​​​​​, upon the request of the farmers, uprooted six border posts which illegally installed in their rice fields. His act was not appreciated or cooperated by Hun Xen, but he is condemned and now is under the arrest warrant accusing him of destroying public property and racism.

The three named in the warrants – Prak Chea, 28, Neang Phally, 39, and Prak Koeun, 38 – joined with opposition leader Sam Rainsy in uprooting the posts during a Buddhist ceremony in Chantrea district on October 25, claiming they were placed on their land by Vietnamese authorities.

However, CPP and Vietnam also uprooted many other border posts which claimed to be illegally installed on Cambodian territory as released by SRP Cabinet in its statement on: ”Other border markers surreptitiously removed“, and they contradictorily are not condemned and charged for the same act.

"Sam Rainsy pulled out six wooden poles at border the marker # 185. But subsequently, similar wooden poles at nearby border markers # 184, # 186 and # 187 have also been removed by the authorities themselves. At marker # 184 even the concrete foundations under the wooden poles have been dug out, put onto a tractor and taken back to Vietnam.

As Sam Rainsy has exposed, the poles he pulled out were planted on Cambodian farmers’ rice fields that are private properties with the farmers holding legal land titles to justify ownership of their land. Therefore, since the wooden poles were planted on their private properties without their consent, the farmers were entitled to remove them (the poles) or to ask somebody else to do it for them, which Sam
Rainsy did at marker # 185.

Now realizing they are on weak legal ground in the prosecution of Sam Rainsy and the concerned farmers, the authorities have surreptitiously resorted to do the same thing as Sam Rainsy did, i.e. removing illegally imposed border markers, which is leading to a judicial imbroglio illustrating the political nature of the charges levied against Sam Rainsy."

This act of Viet and puppet CPP is witnessed by Pov Pheap , second deputy chief of Samrong commune in Chantrea district, who said Tuesday that:

“Tthe border markers in question had in fact been removed by Vietnamese authorities on November 16, the same day that Sam Rainsy’s parliamentary immunity was lifted, paving the way for the charges against him.

“Sam Rainsy just pulled out six wooden border poles and they accused him of destroying public property, but when Khmer and Vietnamese authorities came to pull out the others nearby, that was not illegal,” Pov Pheap said.

Through this I think our compatriots will justly judge about this case and give justice to MP Sam Rainsy as well as the three farmers whose lands lost to Youn invader and now are being jailed and condemned by the puppet leader -Hun Sen.