Cambodia: Judicial harassment of Mr. Chan Soveth

Chan Soveth (Photo: Ir Channa, RFI)

URGENT APPEAL - THE OBSERVATORY

KHM 004 / 0812 / OBS 075
Judicial harassment
Cambodia
August 16, 2012

The Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT), requests your urgent intervention in the following situation in Cambodia.

Description of the situation:

The Observatory has been informed by reliable sources of a citation to appear in court issued against Mr. Chan Soveth, Senior Investigator and Deputy Head of the Monitoring Section of the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (ADHOC).

According to the information received, on August 9, 2012, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court issued a citation summoning Mr. Soveth to appear before an investigating judge on August 24, 2012.

Mr. Soveth was charged with “providing assistance to the perpetrator” of a “crime” under Article 544 of the Cambodian Criminal Code, and faces an imprisonment sentence of one to three years and a fine of two million to six million Riels.

Exact details behind this charge have not yet been disclosed by the government, but they appear to be connected to a long-standing land dispute in Kratie province. On May 16, 2012, the government sent in hundreds of armed security personnel, supported by helicopters, to evict villagers who were living in an area in Kratie province marked for development by a Russian company. During the eviction, Ms. Heng Chantha, a 14-year-old girl, was shot dead. Government officials later justified the operation by claiming the villagers, some of whom are members of the Independent Democrats Association, were part of a secession movement. ADHOC released a statement on May 17 and condemned the killing of the young girl[1]. It is believed that the charges against Mr. Soveth are linked to his sheltering of a land activist involved in this issue. The court citation was signed on August 9, 2012, just eight days after Prime Minister Hun Sen made accusatory references in a nationally televised speech to an unnamed “human rights worker” for his role in providing assistance to villagers in relation to this land dispute.

Kem Sokha: The CPP returns to its harassment tactics

24th March 2008
By San Suwit
Radio Free Asia
Translated from Khmer by Khmerization
on the web at http://khmerization.blogspot.com

The President of the Human Right Party (HRP) indicated that the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) has returned to the old tricks of harassing political activities conducted by various political parties, as it had practiced in the past.

Mr Kem Sokha, who had a meeting with his party members at Bek Chan village, Ampil Teuk commune, Kampong Trolach district, Kampong Chhnang province on Sunday, told Radio Free Asia that his meeting has a legal permission, including a request for an intervention made to provincial officials, yet there are still harassments perpetrated by a group of people from the Cambodian People’s Party without any intervention from the authority to stop them.

Mr Kem Sokha said: “The local authority is using the same old type of harassment against political activities conducted by other political parties, such as the Human Right Party which is having a meeting with the people and they played loud music with amplified speakers about 100-metre from our meeting. The higher up, such as the prime minister, has appealed for a free and fair election, free of harassment and free of intimidations, but the local authorities are still continuing (to practice these kinds of things), so we don’t know whether what they did was trying to make their leaders lose face or whether they did these things because their leaders said one thing and asked them to do another thing. And we have contacted the provincial authority, the secretary of the Kampong Cham Municipality laughed at Mr Keo Remy who made a phone call to him. He said that he cannot do anything as today is Sunday. He just said nonsense like that, as if the top leadership asked them to organize these kinds of harassment. So, it’s like the top leadership said one thing and the local authority is doing a different thing.”

Despite many people came to his political meeting, Mr Kem Sokha has said that, according to his reports from his party members at Ampil Teuk commune, the CPP-biased local authority has forbidden many other people from joining the meeting on Sunday.

It should be noted that in the past few consecutive months at the beginning of 2008, Prime Minister Hun Sen made speeches to the people in almost every province which have been broadcast on state-owned and private media to the people throughout the country. In his speeches, other than indirect attacks on the leaders of other political parties, the prime minister has also declared about his stance in relation to the election results, including his appeals for a free, fair and acceptable election.

The prime minister said: “I will transfer power at the new Office of the Council of Ministers to a new power-holder (election winner) in order to preserve the political stability and after that I am free to travel. No problem, I can play golf. There won’t be any problem. But I don’t think the situation will be that bad. But it will depend on the will of the people. We will leave it to the people to decide, but don’t say that I am campaigning for the election. But I wanted to take this opportunity to appeal for a free, fair, transparent, violence-free and acceptable election. And any action that was hatched out of violence and intimidation is an action that destroys the good reputation of the royal Cambodian government and the people of Cambodia, as well as destroying the hard-earned achievements of the royal government.”