Meas Sokchea and Sebastian Strangio
The Phnom Penh Post
A COALITION of civil society groups has criticised the filing of new criminal charges against opposition leader Sam Rainsy, calling for a “political solution” to the current row with the government.
On Friday, government lawyers filed two more charges against the embattled Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) president, accusing him of falsifying public documents in order to prove Vietnamese encroachment into Svay Rieng province.
“In Phnom Penh we have charged him with two offences. The first is involved with falsifying public documents, and the other is for spreading disinformation,” Ky Tech, a government lawyer, said on Sunday. If found guilty on both counts, he said, Sam Rainsy could face up to 18 years in prison.
On Friday, the Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee (CHRAC), a coalition of 23 local NGOs, said the new lawsuits had shined a light on the shrinking of the country’s democratic space, calling for all parties to come together in a spirit of “national reconciliation”.
“CHRAC … urges our political leaders to mutually respect each other and negotiate with political maturity in order to address national issues,” the statement read.
The new charges come after Svay Rieng provincial court sentenced Sam Rainsy to two years in prison in absentia on January 27 in relation to an October incident in which he joined villagers in uprooting six temporary border markers in Chantrea district. Villagers alleged that Vietnamese authorities planted the posts in their rice fields.
In January, the SRP released what it described as “unprecedented evidence” that four Vietnamese border markers in Svay Rieng sit well inside Cambodia’s legal territory as defined by French and American maps.
CHRAC’s chairman, Hang Chhaya, said that using the court for an endless procession of lawsuits was useless and added that a political resolution would allow people to “live in peace”. “This is intimidation – it affects the democratic process,” he said.
“We must guarantee safety for people so that they can live in peace. Resorting to the courts for lawsuits like this is useless.”
When contacted on Sunday, SRP spokesman Kimsour Phirith said that, despite what he described as intimidation on the part of the ruling party, the opposition was not scared and would continue voicing concerns about the Vietnamese border.
“Their aim is to remove Sam Rainsy from the country so that he does not disturb their affairs which were done already. This is a political issue, not a criminal issue as they are saying,” he said.
Some observers said the new lawsuits were aimed at preventing the SRP leader from participating in the 2013 elections. “I think it’s a kind of threat, to give an example for other people who dare to do the same thing,” said Son Soubert, a member of the Constitution Council and an independent political analyst, comparing the attacks on Sam Rainsy to the treatment of Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.
“The government, for the interests of all Cambodian people, should seriously dialogue with the opposition. Instead of listening to that foreign country, they should listen to their own compatriots.” He added: “There should be a serious investigation of all the maps by a neutral party.”
The Vietnamese border issue last prompted a government crackdown in 2005, when critics came out in opposition to the government’s border-demarcation treaty with Vietnam – the basis, along with a 1985 treaty, for the current demarcation efforts.
Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights, said the government’s offensive against Sam Rainsy was an indication that the situation on the eastern border was still a sore issue for Prime Minister Hun Sen even after the 2005-06 crackdown.
He also said it had distracted attention from Hun Sen’s own border stand-off with Thailand observing that the filing of the charges was bookended by two visits by Hun Sen to address soldiers at the Thai border and rally support for the military. “I’m sure the government is not happy that the issue is back again,” Ou Virak said.
On Friday, government lawyers filed two more charges against the embattled Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) president, accusing him of falsifying public documents in order to prove Vietnamese encroachment into Svay Rieng province.
“In Phnom Penh we have charged him with two offences. The first is involved with falsifying public documents, and the other is for spreading disinformation,” Ky Tech, a government lawyer, said on Sunday. If found guilty on both counts, he said, Sam Rainsy could face up to 18 years in prison.
On Friday, the Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee (CHRAC), a coalition of 23 local NGOs, said the new lawsuits had shined a light on the shrinking of the country’s democratic space, calling for all parties to come together in a spirit of “national reconciliation”.
“CHRAC … urges our political leaders to mutually respect each other and negotiate with political maturity in order to address national issues,” the statement read.
The new charges come after Svay Rieng provincial court sentenced Sam Rainsy to two years in prison in absentia on January 27 in relation to an October incident in which he joined villagers in uprooting six temporary border markers in Chantrea district. Villagers alleged that Vietnamese authorities planted the posts in their rice fields.
In January, the SRP released what it described as “unprecedented evidence” that four Vietnamese border markers in Svay Rieng sit well inside Cambodia’s legal territory as defined by French and American maps.
CHRAC’s chairman, Hang Chhaya, said that using the court for an endless procession of lawsuits was useless and added that a political resolution would allow people to “live in peace”. “This is intimidation – it affects the democratic process,” he said.
“We must guarantee safety for people so that they can live in peace. Resorting to the courts for lawsuits like this is useless.”
When contacted on Sunday, SRP spokesman Kimsour Phirith said that, despite what he described as intimidation on the part of the ruling party, the opposition was not scared and would continue voicing concerns about the Vietnamese border.
“Their aim is to remove Sam Rainsy from the country so that he does not disturb their affairs which were done already. This is a political issue, not a criminal issue as they are saying,” he said.
Some observers said the new lawsuits were aimed at preventing the SRP leader from participating in the 2013 elections. “I think it’s a kind of threat, to give an example for other people who dare to do the same thing,” said Son Soubert, a member of the Constitution Council and an independent political analyst, comparing the attacks on Sam Rainsy to the treatment of Myanmar democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.
“The government, for the interests of all Cambodian people, should seriously dialogue with the opposition. Instead of listening to that foreign country, they should listen to their own compatriots.” He added: “There should be a serious investigation of all the maps by a neutral party.”
The Vietnamese border issue last prompted a government crackdown in 2005, when critics came out in opposition to the government’s border-demarcation treaty with Vietnam – the basis, along with a 1985 treaty, for the current demarcation efforts.
Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights, said the government’s offensive against Sam Rainsy was an indication that the situation on the eastern border was still a sore issue for Prime Minister Hun Sen even after the 2005-06 crackdown.
He also said it had distracted attention from Hun Sen’s own border stand-off with Thailand observing that the filing of the charges was bookended by two visits by Hun Sen to address soldiers at the Thai border and rally support for the military. “I’m sure the government is not happy that the issue is back again,” Ou Virak said.
13 comments:
18yrs in jail for pulling sticks that cost about $1? How about those Viets that caught cutting down trees in Cambodia, spent 2 nights in jail.
Sam Rainsy could be sentenced up to 18 years in prison, Ky Tech said.
Democratic Kampuchea Pol Pot Khmer Rouge Regime
Members:
Pol Pot
Nuon Chea
Ieng Sary
Ta Mok
Khieu Samphan
Son Sen
Ieng Thearith
Kaing Kek Iev
Hun Sen
Chea Sim
Heng Samrin
Hor Namhong
Keat Chhon
Ouk Bunchhoeun
Sim Ka...
Committed:
Tortures
Brutality
Executions
Massacres
Mass Murder
Genocide
Atrocities
Crimes Against Humanity
Starvations
Slavery
Force Labour
Overwork to Death
Human Abuses
Persecution
Unlawful Detention
Cambodian People's Party Hun Sen Khmer Rouge Regime
Members:
Hun Sen
Chea Sim
Heng Samrin
Hor Namhong
Keat Chhon
Ouk Bunchhoeun
Sim Ka...
Committed:
Attempted Murders
Attempted Murder on Chea Vichea
Attempted Assassinations
Attempted Assassination on Sam Rainsy
Assassinations
Assassinated Journalists
Assassinated Political Opponents
Assassinated Leaders of the Free Trade Union
Assassinated over 80 members of Sam Rainsy Party.
"But as of today, over eighty members of my party have been assassinated. Countless others have been injured, arrested, jailed, or forced to go into hiding or into exile."
Sam Rainsy LIC 31 October 2009 - Cairo, Egypt
Executions
Executed over 100 members of FUNCINPEC Party
Murders
Murdered 3 Leaders of the Free Trade Union
Murdered Chea Vichea
Murdered Ros Sovannareth
Murdered Hy Vuthy
Murdered Journalists
Murdered Khim Sambo
Murdered Khim Sambo's son
Murdered members of Sam Rainsy Party.
Murdered activists of Sam Rainsy Party
Murdered Innocent Men
Murdered Innocent Women
Murdered Innocent Children
Killed Innocent Khmer Peoples.
Extrajudicial Execution
Grenade Attack
Terrorism
Drive by Shooting
Brutalities
Police Brutality Against Monks
Police Brutality Against Evictees
Tortures
Intimidations
Death Threats
Threatening
Human Abductions
Human Abuses
Human Rights Abuses
Human Trafficking
Drugs Trafficking
Under Age Child Sex
Corruptions
Bribery
Embezzlement
Treason
Border Encroachment, allow Vietnam to encroaching into Cambodia.
Signed away our territories to Vietnam; Koh Tral, almost half of our ocean territory oil field and others.
Illegal Arrest
Illegal Mass Evictions
Illegal Land Grabbing
Illegal Firearms
Illegal Logging
Illegal Deforestation
Illegally use of remote detonation bomb on Sokha Helicopter, while Hok Lundy and other military officials were on board.
Lightning strike many airplanes, but did not fall from the sky. Lightning strike out side of airplane and discharge electricity to ground.
Source: Lightning, Discovery Channel
Illegally Sold State Properties
Illegally Removed Parliamentary Immunity of Parliament Members
Plunder National Resources
Acid Attacks
Turn Cambodia into a Lawless Country.
Oppression
Injustice
Steal Votes
Bring Foreigners from Veitnam to vote in Cambodia for Cambodian People's Party.
Use Dead people's names to vote for Cambodian People's Party.
Disqualified potential Sam Rainsy Party's voters.
Abuse the Court as a tools for CPP to send political opponents and journalists to jail.
Abuse of Power
Abuse the Laws
Abuse the National Election Committee
Abuse the National Assembly
Violate the Laws
Violate the Constitution
Violate the Paris Accords
Impunity
Persecution
Unlawful Detention
Death in custody.
Under the Cambodian People's Party Hun Sen Khmer Rouge Regime, no criminals that has been committed crimes against journalists, political opponents, leaders of the Free Trade Union, innocent men, women and children have ever been brought to justice.
Khmers should not accept to be looked down like this, we must apply the real democracy, we must not allow band of bandits continue to, lie, steal, cheat, betray anymore.
I am not side with any politician. I just read some news about this East border issue, but I didn't get it. How can the rice field owner get two years jail term when they just pulled the sticks planted on their rice field? It is their own properties! Sam Rainsy assisted them to pulled out the sticks, why it was a problem? He got the permission from the land owner to do that.
HELLO ALL KHMER.... CAN YOU SEE THAT, HUN SEN PROMISE NOT TO LOSS AN INCH OF LAND TO THE NEIGHBOUR COUNTRIES, BUT THE TRUE WAS THOSE POST WERE PLANTED ON CAMBODIA RICE FIELD. WHAT DOES IT MEAN HERE? WHY EVERYTIME WHEN SOMEONE STANDS UP TO CONTEST THE BORDER WITH VIETNAME, HUN SEN IS SO MAD. DOESN'T IT TELL YOU SOMETHING HERE? DON'T YOU SEE THAT HUN SEN IS STILL SERVING VIETNAME? DON'T FORGET, I HEARD THAT THERE ARE AT LEAT 5 MILLIONS OF VIETNAMESES IN CAMBODIA NOW. PLEASE WAKE UP ALL KHMER AND OPEN YOUR BIG EYSE TO SEE THIS MATTER. DON'T LET CAMBODIA TO BECOME CHAMPA II.
of course, it draws criticism from sam rainsy supporters. so one-sided, really!
all politicians should strife for a balance in their political thinking, meaning too extreme is not good and too passionate is not so good either, a balance is better, really!
Dear cambodians
It is the right time to write to KY Tech for relevant map and the details of accusation he is representing.
Here is how and when the cpp shows its true color--the communist mentality comes into play. It can't prove that the SRP maps are fake, yet the cpp uses this baseless accusation otherwise. Historically, the cpp has used propaganda/lies to steer khmer people opinion and to manipulate political game in cambodia. This tactic isn't going to work anymore in today's cambodia. The cpp needs to prove to the khmer public that SRP maps are infact fake if it wants to win over this case.
7:24AM, Hun Xen government is incompetent and will not proof Mr. Sam Rainsy wrong because they are the one who is wrong. All they do is used power. They accuse and used their corrupted court system to prosecute people.
Khmers should not accept that Hun Sen etablishes dictatorship in our country anymore, we are already out from there why we should go back to that darkness ?
It's too little too late for a political solution to Xam RainXy case.
When Xam RainXy has uprooting the border stakes in Svay Rieng province to promote his political stunt and recently, he has misinformation and false public document, aim to damage the Cambodian government's reputation why the so called CHRAC has never came out to make any comment about it? Only when Xam RainXy is under siege, CHRAC shameless calls for political solution!
CHRAC should let Xam RainXy takes this issue to International Court which he's often said al along in the media and we should wait and see how far Xam RainXy can go?
Last time, PM Hun Sen forgave Xam RainXy for defamation because CPP needs SRP helps to change Constitution, but now, it's different story. The CPP no needs SRP. So, Xam RainXy is a fugitive for the rest of his life.
Khmer in Sydney CBD
9:42am, you're better off sticking with your day job than trying to be armchair politician on ki media. It is very revealing that even your nick 'khmer in sydney CBD' is as lame as your attempt to discredit Mr Rainsy through your post.
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