|
Editorial | Articles about Cambodia | Khmer |
People Power Can Change Cambodia
SOURN SEREY RATHA
Guest Commentary
Published: March 31, 2008
Source: United Press International
CRANSTON CITY, R.I., United States, The ruling party of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, in another politically motivated ploy to weaken rivals prior to national elections in July, arrested Tuot Saron of the opposition Sam Rainsy Party on March 18. He is now awaiting trial on trumped-up charges.
The authorities were planning to arrest at least two other party officials, whom they accused of intimidating and mistreating members of their own party who want to defect to the ruling Cambodian People's Party.
Rights watchdog Human Rights Watch said that such dubious arrests of opposition officials months ahead of an election "should set alarm bells ringing." Brad Adams, the group's Asia director, said, "This divide-and-conquer strategy is a well-known tactic of Prime Minister Hun Sen to subdue his opponents." He said human rights had been violated in every election cycle in Cambodia.
The only way Cambodians can break Hun Sen's divide-and-rule plan is to unite and launch a People Power initiative. The term typically refers to the popular protest movements in the Philippines that led to the ouster of two presidents, most famously Ferdinand Marcos in 1986. Such a movement should unite all opposition parties and the people of Cambodia to end Hun Sen's authoritarian rule.
People Power is also a social movement that could challenge Cambodia's Constitution and seek greater freedoms and rights for its people. Such collective and united efforts would not only give opposition parties the power to fight the current communist rule, but also the strength to denounce any government that comes to power and fails to act on its election promises of creating social harmony and looking out for the people's welfare.
In the past, Hun Sen has rejected People Power as a possibility. However, the ability of monks to vote is a real concern to the ruling party. Monks form an integral part of Cambodia's social community. They influence the faith and political perceptions of the people, 95 percent of whom are Buddhist.
Holding elections is a good thing, but most government atrocities and human rights violations occur after the elections are over. People Power can police the actions of any party that comes to power. In the current scenario, the legislative and executive branches of the government are controlled by the ruling Cambodian People's Party, which is averse to People Power. There is growing concern within the party that a mass protest movement could arise and depose Hun Sen.
Cambodia's veneer of political pluralism grew thinner in 2007. Last year saw the recurring pillage of Cambodian people's land and other natural resources and the jailing of government critics, independent media, and political dissenters, all under the pretext that the groups were attempting to weaken civil society. The Cambodian authorities have never conducted any serious investigations into these matters. Instead, Hun Sen has continued to arrest officials from opposition parties that voice dissent and organizers who stage demonstrations.
Politics in Cambodia have never fully recovered from the events of 1997. On March 30 that year, a grisly grenade attack at an opposition party rally led by former Finance Minister Sam Rainsy left 16 dead and more than 150 injured. In July of the same year a coup -- described by Cambodians as an executive usurpation of power by Hun Sen against Prince Norodom Ranariddh -- cost hundreds of lives. What remained after the coup was a ruthless pattern of extrajudicial executions aimed at rooting out Ranariddh loyalists. General Ho Sok was fatally shot -- presumed executed within the perimeter of the Interior Ministry building. After elections in 1998, Hun Sen presumably ordered his bodyguards and special police force to open fire on over 10,000 demonstrators gathered in front of the National Assembly.
From 1992 until 2006, almost 4,000 activists and supporters of the FUNCINPEC party -- National United Front for an Independent, Neutral, Peaceful, and Cooperative Cambodia -- Buddhist Liberal Democratic Party, Sam Rainsy Party, and other small parties have been killed. At least 130 families have sought refuge in other countries, while 56 families still await political asylum in sympathetic countries elsewhere.
In 2007, in Preah Vihea province, 317 innocent families were evicted and their houses burned. In Phnom Penh, Chhruoy Changva, and Tonle Basac, military police officers arrested, razed, and burned houses displacing thousands of families. The officers claimed that the land belonged to private companies that would utilize it for public projects. Later, thousands of displaced families were relocated -- or rather dumped at sites outside the capital. These sites lacked drinking water and proper sanitation facilities.
Authorities in Phnom Penh and Battambang province seized all 2,000 copies of the inaugural issue of the monthly "Free Press Magazine" when it was distributed on Nov. 2, 2007. Fearing arrest, the magazine's editor-in-chief, Lem Piseth, and distribution director, Heu Chantha, have been in hiding, according to the Phnom Penh-based Cambodian Center for Human Rights.
Hun Sen has been exemplary in demonstrating how a dictator should cope with the West. He has allowed the development of opposition parties, but murdered their activists. He has allowed opposition figures to emerge, but has not attempted to successfully co-opt them into his regime. He has allowed unions and human rights groups to exist, but prominent individuals within those groups have been killed. When critics or opposition parties increase their efforts to organize rallies and programs for the poor and victims of abuse, political oppression escalates as the elite dig in to defend their interests.
People Power is a challenge, not only to the ruling party but also for the people of Cambodia if they hope to change the leadership and the regime. It is time for Cambodians to conduct a countrywide survey on whether they want to keep the monarchy or become a republic.
Foreign aid, including from the United States, still makes up about 50 percent of Hun Sen's budget. While Hun Sen claims Cambodia is on its way to democracy, what is really happening is the Vietnamization of the country. It's a wake-up call for all Cambodians to gear up for People Power.
--
(Sourn Serey Ratha is chief of mission of the Action Committee for Justice and Equity for Cambodians Overseas, based in Rhode Island, United States. He was born to a farmer's family in Cambodia, earned B.A degrees in law and sociology in Phnom Penh and an M.A. in international policy from Mara University of Technology in Malaysia. He has been a social activist for his country on the national and international levels since 1997. ©Copyright Sourn Serey Ratha.)Labels: hun sen, MARCH 30 1997, Sam Rainsy, Sam Rainsy Party, Sourn Serey Ratha
Cambodia: Infamous Grenade Attack Still Unpunished
Sam Rainsy following the grenade attack
A wounded Chea Vichea (L) sitting next to Sam Rainsy following the attack
Scene of the carnage following the grenade attack on 30 March 1997
FBI Should Revive Probe of Alleged Perpetrators Promoted by Hun Sen
Source: Human Rights Watch - http://hrw.org/english/docs/2008/03/30/cambod18404.htm
(New York, March 30, 2008) – The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) should reopen its long-stalled investigation into the grisly grenade attack on an opposition party rally in Phnom Penh 11 years ago that left at least 16 dead and more than 150 injured, Human Rights Watch said today. The FBI investigation, which made significant progress in 1997, has been effectively abandoned.
On March 30, 1997, a crowd of approximately 200 supporters of the opposition Khmer Nation Party (KNP), led by former Finance Minister Sam Rainsy, gathered in a park across the street from the National Assembly to denounce the judiciary’s corruption and lack of independence. In a well-planned attack, four grenades were thrown into the crowd, killing protesters and bystanders, including children, and tearing limbs off street vendors. The grenade attack made headlines and provoked outrage around the world. On June 29, 1997, the Washington Post wrote:
"In a classified report that could pose some awkward problems for U.S. policymakers, the FBI tentatively has pinned responsibility for the blasts, and the subsequent interference, on personal bodyguard forces employed by Hun Sen, one of Cambodia’s two prime ministers, according to four U.S. government sources familiar with its contents. The preliminary report was based on a two-month investigation by FBI agents sent here under a federal law giving the bureau jurisdiction whenever a U.S. citizen is injured by terrorism. ... The bureau says its investigation is continuing, but the agents involved reportedly have complained that additional informants here are too frightened to come forward."
"The FBI was close to solving the case when its lead investigator was suddenly ordered out of the country by the US ambassador, Kenneth Quinn," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "The FBI has damning evidence in its files that suggests that Prime Minister Hun Sen ordered the attack, but it has refused to fully cooperate with congressional inquiries or follow through on its initial investigation. Instead of trying to protect US relations with Cambodia, it should now finish what it started."
The FBI investigated the attack because Ron Abney, a US citizen, was seriously injured in the blast, which the United States at the time deemed to be an "act of terrorism." Abney had to be evacuated to Singapore to treat shrapnel wounds in his hip.
Instead of launching a serious investigation, then co-Prime Minister Hun Sen announced that the demonstration’s organizers should be arrested and instructed police not to allow them to leave the country. (To read an Agence France-Presse account published at the time, please visit: http://hrw.org/english/docs/2006/03/28/cambod13086.htm).
On the day of the attack, Hun Sen’s personal bodyguard unit, Brigade-70 (B-70), was, for the first time, deployed at a demonstration. Photographs show them in full riot gear. The police, which had in the past maintained a high-profile presence at opposition demonstrations to discourage public participation, had an unusually low profile on that day. Officers were grouped around the corner from the park, having been ordered to stay away from the park itself. Also for the first time, the KNP had received official permission from both the Ministry of the Interior and the Phnom Penh municipality to hold a demonstration, fuelling speculation that the demonstration was authorized so it could be attacked.
Numerous eyewitnesses reported that the persons who had thrown the grenades were seen running toward Hun Sen’s bodyguards, who were deployed in a line at the west end of the park near the guarded residential compound containing the homes of many senior Cambodia People’s Party leaders. Witnesses told United Nations and FBI investigators that the bodyguard line opened to allow the grenade-throwers to escape into the compound. Meanwhile, people in the crowd pursuing the grenade-throwers were stopped by the bodyguards at gunpoint and told they would be shot if they did not retreat.
"This brazen attack, carried out in broad daylight, ingrained impunity more than any other single act in recent Cambodian history," said Adams. "But that appears to have been one of its purposes – to send the message that opposition supporters can be murdered without ever facing justice."
In a June 1997 interview with the Phnom Penh Post, Hing Bun Heang, deputy commander of Hun Sen’s bodyguard unit and operationally in charge of the bodyguards at the park on March 30, 1997, threatened to kill journalists who alleged that Hun Sen’s bodyguards were involved. Hing Bun Heang has since been promoted as deputy director of Hun Sen’s cabinet and, in September 2006, appointed as supreme consultant to Cambodia’s Senior Monk Assembly and assistant to Supreme Patriachs Tep Vong and Bou Kry.
The bodyguard unit B-70 remains notorious in Cambodia for violence, corruption, and the impunity it enjoys as the de facto private army of Hun Sen. According to a 2007 report by the nongovernmental organization Global Witness, "The elite Royal Cambodian Armed Forces Brigade 70 unit makes between US$2 million and US$2.5 million per year through transporting illegally logged timber and smuggled goods. A large slice of the profits generated through these activities goes to Lieutenant General Hing Bun Heang, commander of the prime minister’s Bodyguard Unit."
In one notorious case in 2006, two soldiers from B-70 shot a Phnom Penh beer promotion girl in the foot for being too slow to bring them ice. They were arrested by military police, but released hours later by their commander. A representative of the commander said the victim would be paid $500 compensation by B-70, but no criminal investigation or prosecution ensued.
"Instead of investigating the senior officer in charge of the bodyguard unit implicated in the 1997 grenade attack and who threatened to kill journalists reporting on it, Hun Sen has promoted him,” said Adams. “Apparently, Hun Sen considers such a person qualified for a senior position in the country’s official Buddhist hierarchy."
Given the serious and credible allegations of the involvement of the Cambodian military in the grenade attack, Human Rights Watch expressed concern that the United States has increased military assistance and training to the Cambodian military before it completed its investigation into the 1997 attack.
Human Rights Watch called on the US to ensure that it is not providing any assistance or training to current or former members of B-70 or other Cambodian special military units with records of human rights abuse. In an effort to solidify counterterrorism cooperation, the FBI in 2006 awarded a medal to the Cambodian Chief of National Police Hok Lundy for his support in the US "global war on terror." Hok Lundy was chief of the national police at the time of the grenade attack and has long been linked to political violence.
"No credible explanation has ever been offered for the deployment or behavior of Hun Sen’s bodyguards on March 30, 1997," said Adams. "Their actions may reach the highest levels of the Cambodian government, yet the FBI investigation has been dropped. The fact that the US is providing military assistance instead of investigating the grenade attack shows that it is effectively complicit with the Cambodian government in abandoning any hope for justice for the victims of this horrific attack."Labels: Chea Vichea, IRI, MARCH 30 1997, Ron Abney, Sam Rainsy, SRP
Tributes Flow for 'Killing Field' Hero Dith Pran
New York Times photographer Dith Pran, who survived the Cambodian 'killing fields', on assignment in 2006 (file photo) (AFP/Getty Images: Michael Nagle)
Tributes flow for 'killing field' hero Dith Pran
By Paula Kruger
Source from: http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/31/2203854.htm
His life's story was brought to the world in the award-winning film The Killing Fields, about the brutal Cambodian regime of the Khmer Rouge.
Today, friends and colleagues are paying tribute to photojournalist Dith Pran, who died last night in a New Jersey hospital.
Among those praising his courage and integrity is the former New York Times journalist Sydney Schanberg, who still describes Mr Pran as his brother and credits him with saving his life during the Cambodian civil war.
Mr Schanberg, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, was driving from New York to New Jersey to be with the family of Mr Pran when he spoke to The World Today.
It was Mr Schanberg's New York Times article "The Death and Life of Dith Pran" that inspired the award-winning film The Killing Fields.
Theirs has been a gripping relationship in both film and real life.
Mr Schanberg says he hired Dith Pran in 1972 as a translator and journalist during the confusion of Cambodia's civil strife.
"He was maybe the smartest reporter that I ever met. He was terrific guy. I mean, he was very, very special and he was also very playful and funny when we were at our free times, and he had this smile," Mr Schanberg said.
"You've probably seen some pictures with his smile. He had a smile that would light up a skyscraper."
But Mr Schanberg said it did not surprise him that Mr Pran was a happy person, despite the scars.
"It seemed appropriate with him because he was taking everything seriously," he said.
"He was just showing that you had to live and move on and do ordinary things in the middle of chaos and insanity - which was the war - and it was a good lesson."
Surviving the Khmer Rouge
Mr Schanberg says his strongest memory of Mr Pran will be the day he saved the lives of three journalists with quick-thinking, fast-talking and a lot of bravado.
Mr Pran managed to get them into the safety of the French embassy in Phnom Penh.
But when the foreign journalists were ordered to leave the country, Mr Pran was exiled to the 'killing fields', the forced labour camps in the Cambodian countryside where he endured four years of starvation and torture.
He eventually managed to escape and made his way to a refugee camp on the border with Thailand. It was there that Mr Schanberg was finally reunited with his friend.
"Pran came around the corner from the long-house and he was wobbling because his legs were weakened," Mr Schanberg said.
"He had suffered from malnutrition and everything. And he had a gap in his teeth. He was really wobbling and he saw me and then he started to run on those wobbly feet.
"Finally, I started to run and he threw himself - just as you saw in the movie - they did that just exactly as it happened.
"He threw his legs around me and we just held each other for what seemed like many minutes and we had a - I asked him if he could forgive me and that's in the film too.
"He just said right away, he said, 'nothing to forgive, nothing to forgive'. We were brothers in Cambodia and we were now brothers again out and that's the way we will stay.
Mr Pran moved to the United States and began working with the New York Times as a photojournalist in 1980.
He was still working with them last year when he was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.
In an interview with the newspaper recorded earlier this month, Mr Pran describes how he wants to be remembered.
"My job want to remember that please, everybody must stop the killing field," he said.
"One time is too many. If they can do that for me, my spirit will be happy."
Mr Pran will be cremated at a Buddhist ceremony in New Jersey later this week.
--> Website: http://www.dithpran.org/Labels: Dith Pran, Journalism, the Killing Field
Cambodian Minister Asks Vietnam 'To Assist' in Maintaining Security in Election
Cambodian Minister Asks Vietnam 'To Assist' in Maintaining Security in Election
SEP20080328021006 Phnom Penh Agence Kampuchea Presse (Internet Version-WWW) in English 27 Mar 08
Vietnamese President Reiterates Good Ties With Cambodia
Phnom Penh, March 27, 2008 AKP --Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Defense Minister Tea Banh was received last Tuesday in Hanoi by Vietnamese State President Nguyen Minh Triet.
The State leader told Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Tea Banh that the Party, State and people of Viet Nam have always prioritized the task of working together with Cambodia and Laos for a developed Indochinese peninsular.
General Tea Banh thanked Viet Nam for its great assistance in the past struggle to overthrow the Pol Pot genocidal regime and the current national development, Viet Nam News Agency (VNA) reported.
"The mature of the Cambodian Defense Ministry today is partially thanks to experiences drawn from Vietnamese experts on voluntary missions," VNA quoted Tea Banh as saying.
He also called on the Vietnamese Defense Ministry to assist and share experiences in maintaining security and public order in an effort to ensure Cambodia's legislative elections, scheduled for July, are a success.
General Tea Banh began a four-day official visit to Viet Nam on Mar. 24 at the invitation of Defense Minister General Phung Quang Thanh.
The Cambodian high-level military delegation embarked on talks with a host delegation led by Defense Minister Gen. Phung Quang Thanh immediately after a welcoming ceremony.
The two sides agreed to continue joint patrols at sea and exchange information on search and rescue operations. Talks also focused on the work of locating and repatriating remains of Vietnamese volunteers who died on Cambodian soil.
The two sides agreed on further exchanges of visits and stronger co-operation in personnel training between military hospitals and institutes from the two countries in order to fulfill high-level commitments to "good neighborliness, traditional friendship, comprehensive and long-term co-operation." --AKP
[Description of Source: Phnom Penh Agence Kampuchea Presse (Internet Version-WWW) in English -- Official government news agency run by the Information Ministry. Caters mostly to foreign audiences with occasional news items taken from foreign sources; root URL as of filing date: http://www.camnet.com.kh/akp]Labels: Election, Vietnamese, Vietnamese influence, Vietnamese interference
STATEMENT ON 11TH ANNIVERSARY OF GRENADE ATTACK
03/27/2008
STATEMENT ON 11TH ANNIVERSARY OF GRENADE ATTACK.
Ron Abney, Cochran, Georgia,USA
ronabney@hotmail.com
DID THOSE KILLED ON MARCH, 30 1997 DIE IN VAIN?
What a sham and a farce the investigation of this tragic event has become. Every year we call on the Cambodian Government to investigate. We’re asking the Hun Sen government to re-open a case which he never really opened.
The FBI found out within weeks of the attack that it was planned and carried out by Hun Sen’s own private guards and covered up by Hun Sen’s top police enforcers. What a crime was committed that day. We shouldn’t be vague about culpability when we ask for a new investigation. So let’s be real.
Did those slaughtered on 3/30/97 die in vain? Even today Hun Sen is the supreme and ultimate puppeteer of all that happens in Cambodia. He decides who will be exiled and who will be allowed back in the country. He decides how far each opposition party can go in criticizing has government. He makes sure the NEC is loaded with yes men who will validate the results of the election. He decides who will be jailed and who will be released. He decides the fate of pro-democracy party commune leaders who speak out and try to organize. His forces bribe opposition part officials to join CPP. And as we saw on 3/30/97 he decides when opposition goes too far.
He is a master of intrigue. He has told the world for years that his government will bring the Khmer Rouge leaders before his court for trail. How is that trial going by the way? These KR leaders are dying right and left of old age while the corrupt judicial system in Phnom Penh makes a farce out of a situation so tragic it still rips the heart out of those who suffered at the hands of Pol Pot.
Cambodia hasn’t really changed. Everything looks shinier and tourists who fly from their own country to Bangkok or Hong Kong to Siem Reap and its five-star hotels and then back to their homes talk of how wonderful to see all the changes. They should travel about an hour from Siem Reap in any direction and see what has happened to the homeless who used to pack the streets of that great city.
Those gathered on 3/30/97 only asked for justice and political freedom. If they were alive today they would still be begging for basic human rights and the same freedom and opportunities that CPP officials enjoy.
In Cambodia everybody votes but nobody counts.
--> More on CAMDISC including LIST OF VICTIMS WHO DIED AT THE DEMONSTRATION IN FRONT OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY ON 30 MARCH 1997Labels: MARCH 30 1997, Ron Abney, Sam Rainsy, Sam Rainsy Party, SRP
Sam Rainsy: Rooted in the Stone - My Struggle for the Revival of Cambodia
Translated from French by Luc Sâr
By Sam Rainsy
Ravaged by genocide, coveted by powerful and predatory neighbors, submitted to a corrupt nomenklatura, choked by a neo-feudal regime, Cambodia is a martyr country, and no one knows this better than Sam Rainsy. Born into a patrician family in Phnom Penh, close to King Norodom Sihanouk, a young Rainsy knew opulence and the decline when his father, a major politician, was brutally dismissed and had to live in hiding before being assassinated.
Taking refuge in Paris, the Sam family resigned themselves to live as poor immigrants. However, they never lost their hope or dignity. A gifted student, Rainsy undertook brilliant studies that led him to become an important financier specializing in mergers and acquisitions for the luxury industry…
But, how could one be happy earning money and making money for others, when one’s country is sinking in cruelty in the hands of a regime practicing mass murder? From humanitarian action in Paris for the victims of the Khmer rouge regime to election campaigns on the spot, following the fall of the communist regime, Rainsy and Saumura, his wife, launch themselves into political action, taking over the torch from their respective fathers, both of whom were signatories of the 1954 Geneva agreements on Indochina.
However, for these two westernized Cambodians, their return home was rough. Facing with difficulties, aggressions, and even assassination attempts, Rainsy countered them with Buddhist-like pacifism, while constantly seeking for calm and compromise. Becoming the Minister of Economy under Hun Sen’s first mandate government, he was able to bring order to the State finance, and this earned him more hostilities. It was in the opposition that he found his calling when he founded a democratic and liberal party involved in the defense of freedom. Facing the unleashing of violence prompted by such provocation, Rainsy maintains his bearing, unperturbed and smiling, unshakable and frugal, just like those trees deeply rooted in the stones of the Angkor temples.
In April 2008, Sam Rainsy’s 300-page-long autobiography detailing his struggle for the revival of Cambodia, “Rooted in the stone,” will be published in France by Calmann-Lévy. This book can be pre-ordered through SRP-France at a cost of euro 20, or euro 22.97 including shipping.
The Khmer and English version of the book will be published in the following months.
For additional information, please contact munysara@aol.com
or call the following telephone number in France: +33 6 19 31 42 98 or +33 6 13 06 77
====================
Des racines dans la pierre - Mon combat pour la renaissance du Cambodge
Sam Rainsy
Ravagé par un génocide, convoité par des voisins puissants et prédateurs, mis en coupe réglée par une nomenklatura corrompue, asphyxié par un régime néo-féodal, le Cambodge est un pays martyr. Nul ne le sait mieux que Sam Rainsy. Né dans une famille patricienne de Phnom Penh proche du roi Norodom Sihanouk, le jeune Rainsy connaît l'opulence, puis la déchéance lorsque son père, un homme politique de premier plan, est brutalement limogé et doit passer dans la clandestinité avant de finir assassiné.
Réfugiés à Paris, les Sam vont se résigner à une vie d'immigrés pauvres. Mais jamais ils ne perdront l'espoir ni la dignité. Elève surdoué, Rainsy fera des études brillantes qui lui permettront de devenir un financier de haut vol, spécialiste des fusions-acquisitions dans l'industrie du luxe...
Mais comment se contenter de gagner de l'argent et d'en faire gagner, quand son pays s'enfonce dans la barbarie aux mains d'un régime qui pratique le meurtre en masse ? De l'action humanitaire à Paris en faveur des victimes des Khmers rouges aux campagnes électorales sur le terrain après la chute du régime communiste, Rainsy et sa femme Saumura se lancent dans l'action politique, reprenant le flambeau de leurs pères respectifs : ceux-ci n'étaient-ils pas co-signataires des accords de Genève sur l'Indochine en 1954 ?
Mais pour ces deux Cambodgiens occidentalisés, le retour au pays est rude. Aux difficultés, aux agressions, aux attentats, même, Rainsy oppose un pacifisme d'essence bouddhique, cherchant avec constance l'apaisement et le compromis. Ministre de l'Economie du premier gouvernement Hun Sen, il parvient à mettre de l'ordre dans les finances de l'Etat, ce qui lui vaut de nouvelles inimitiés. Mais c'est dans l'opposition qu'il trouvera sa voie, en créant un parti démocrate, libéral et attaché à la défense des libertés. Devant le déchaînement de violence que déclenche une telle provocation, Rainsy maintient le cap, impavide et souriant, inébranlable et frugal, à l'image de ces arbres qui poussent dans la pierre des temples d'Angkor.
Au mois d'avril 2008, un livre autobiographique de Sam Rainsy relatant son combat pour la renaissance du Cambodge, intitulé "Des racines dans la pierre", paraîtra en France aux éditions Calmann-Lévy. Vous trouverez ci-joint la couverture du livre ainsi qu'un résumé de son contenu (300 pages).
Vous pouvez d'ores et déjà commander ce livre auprès de PSR-France qui vous le remettra en main propre au prix de 20 euros (prix public) ou vous l'expédiera par la Poste au prix de 22,97 euros.
Les éditions en khmer et en anglais paraîtront dans les mois suivants.
Prière de contacter munysara@aol.com ou
+33 6 19 31 42 98 ou +33 6 13 06 77 00Labels: Sam Rainsy, Sam Rainsy Party, SRP
Cambodia's Dysfunctional Democracy
March 26, 2008
By LAO MONG HAY
UPI Asia Online
Column: Rule by Fear
HONG KONG, China - Cambodia is bound to a set of obligations under the international agreements that were concluded in 1991 to end the war in the country. Cambodia has undertaken, among other things, to adopt democracy, to observe and respect human rights and to be governed by the rule of law.
The country's Constitution, which emanates from a U.N.-organized constituent election in 1993, incorporates all of its international obligations and provides for all basic institutions for a parliamentary democracy and the rule of law. It is a constitutional monarchy with a separation of powers. It has an independent and impartial judiciary whose duty is to protect the rights and freedoms of its citizens.
Cambodia has since then abandoned communism, embraced a market economy and become a more open society. However, communist legacies have stalled the creation of institutions for parliamentary democracy and the rule of law worthy of their names and their functioning. The government is not accountable to the National Assembly, for example, when the prime minister and other government ministers flout their constitutional duties and spurn the assembly's summons to answer its questions.
The government and, through it, the prime minister, currently Hun Sen, have effective control over all state institutions, including the king, the Constitutional Council, the National Assembly and the judiciary. Hun Sen's power is all the stronger when he has effective control of his ruling party, the Cambodian People's Party, a former communist party whose discipline has remained as strict as ever.
Party members are appointed to all positions of responsibility in all state institutions -- the army, the security forces, the civil service, the National Election Committee, and even the legal profession. Hun Sen and the CPP have the support of rich businessmen through cronyism, and he and other leading CPP members have built up strong personal relationships among themselves and rich businessmen through the marriages of their children or through business connections.
The dysfunctional institutions for parliamentary democracy and the rule of law, and the concomitant concentration of power, that have been created by this phenomenon have led to an abuse of power and position, corruption, inequality before the law and impunity for the rich and powerful.
Many crimes throughout the years, especially the notorious ones in which top officials are widely known to have been involved, have remained uninvestigated. Almost all such perpetrators have escaped punishment for their crimes. These notorious crimes include, for example, the killing and injuring of peaceful demonstrators in 1997, the killing of some 40 senior rival party members in a coup a few months later, the killing of a famous actress in 1999, labor union leaders in 2004 and 2007 and evictees in 2007 and the attempted murder of female singers in 2003 and 2007.
Many powerful and rich people have abused their power and position and are known to have been involved in land-grabbing, which is a major issue that has put at least 150,000 people at risk of being evicted, according to a survey. Hun Sen has publicly acknowledged that land-grabbers are officials of his ruling party and people in power. In recent years, land-grabbers have used members of the security forces to forcibly evict people from their homes and lands, beating them, destroying their properties and arresting them if they resist. According to one NGO, at least 5,585 families in 2007 were evicted, and nearly 150 people were arrested, one-third of whom are still in prison in 2008.
In February 2008, the Cambodia national police commissioner allegedly ordered the punishment of a police officer who refused to follow an order to cede his land to a senior government minister in a land dispute. This police officer was allegedly illegally arrested, tortured and denied medical treatment.
In the same month, the son of an advisor to a top leader of the country shot at a metal frame builder whose nephew had a brawl with that advisor's other son, but the bullet missed the builder. The builder's nephew was arrested, yet both of the advisor's sons were not. The advisor used his position to arrange with the police and the court for an out-of-court settlement and for the dropping of all charges against his sons, which is illegal under Cambodian law.
Earlier in January the bodyguards of a powerful person were caught on camera grabbing and assaulting the driver of a truck who failed to stop in time to make way for the car of their boss to drive through a busy section of a national highway on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. Yet no investigation has been reported, although the story with the photo of the assault has been published in a leading national newspaper.
Louis Antoine Léon de Saint-Just, a French revolutionary leader in the 18th century, said that France had too many laws but too few institutions and that despotism would not decline until there were more institutions. Cambodia seems to have sufficient laws and institutions to counter despotism, but law enforcement is defective due to defective institutions.
It is time for the Cambodian government to correct defects in law enforcement and the country's institutions. The Cambodian National Assembly, as the representative of the nation responsible for the formation of the government, should exercise its power to make this government accountable to it. The judiciary should uphold its independence and impartiality and protect the rights and freedoms of all Cambodian citizens. Its members should not be affiliated to any political party, as almost all of them are at the moment.
All other institutions, including the army, the security forces, the civil service, the National Election Committee and the legal profession, should uphold their political neutrality and their impartiality. Above all, the government and the ruling party should respect the independence, political neutrality and impartiality applicable to the country's institutions.
--
 (Lao Mong Hay is currently a senior researcher at the Asian Human Rights Commission in Hong Kong. He was previously director of the Khmer Institute of Democracy in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, and a visiting professor at the University of Toronto in 2003. In 1997, he received an award from Human Rights Watch and the Nansen Medal in 2000 from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees.)
Labels: Abuse of power, Cronyism, Dysfunctional democracy, Hun Sen's control of power, Lack of justice, Land-grabbing by the rich and powerful, Lao Mong HayLabels: CPP, eviction, hun sen, landgrabbing, LAO MONG HAY
Cambodia thanks Vietnam for military assistance
Last Updated: Wednesday, March 26, 2008 10:46:46 Vietnam (GMT+07)
Source: VNA
Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Tea Banh Tuesday thanked Vietnam for its past assistance in overthrowing the genocidal Pol Pot regime and its current help in developing Cambodia.
At a meeting with President Nguyen Minh Triet in Hanoi, General Tea Banh, who doubles as the country’s Defense Minister, said “the maturity of the Cambodian Defense Ministry today is partially thanks to … Vietnamese experts on voluntary missions.”
Triet said Vietnam always held cooperation with Cambodia and Laos as a high priority in developing the Indochinese peninsula.
Tea Banh began a four-day official visit to Vietnam Monday at the invitation of Vietnamese Minister of Defense General, Phung Quang Thanh.
During their meeting Tuesday, Banh and Thanh agreed to cooperate on locating and repatriating the remains of Vietnamese volunteers who died on Cambodian soil.
Banh asked the Vietnamese Ministry of Defense to share its experiences in maintaining security and public order and help Cambodia ensure the success of the country’s legislative elections in July.
The leaders agreed they would meet again in the future to strengthen cooperation in personnel training between military hospitals and institutes.
The two sides also agreed to continue joint sea patrols and exchange information on search and rescue operations.
Source: VNALabels: Election, Vietnamese, Vietnamese influence, Vietnamese interference
Sok Kong: I am a Vietnamese
20 March 2008
Translated from Vietnamese by Wanna
Originally posted at: http://www.xwanna.com
Original article in Vietnamese: “Tôi là người Việt Nam!"
Maybe some people are still skeptical about who is Sok Kong? Now, believe me and believe him (Sok Kong)!
Oknha Sok Kong said...
Tôi sinh ra ở Prey Veng. Ba mẹ tôi là người VN, tôi được sinh ra ở CPC. Năm 1975 sang VN làm ruộng ở Đồng Tháp. Lúc đó tôi 23 tuổi. Năm 1979 tôi trở lại CPC
Translation: I was born in Prey Veng. My parents are Vietnamese, I was born in Cambodia. In 1975, I backed to VN and do farming at Don Thap province. I was then 23. In 1979, I returned to Cambodia
Tôi giàu con lắm, có đến sáu đứa: ba trai, ba gái. Con trai đầu làm việc ở TP.HCM, con trai thứ hai quản lý khách sạn và xí nghiệp may số 1, con trai thứ ba quản lý xí nghiệp may 2, ba đứa con gái còn đi học ở Úc.
Translation: I have many children, including 6: 3 sons, 3 daughters. My eldest son works at HCM(Ho Chi Minh) city; My second son is a manager of a hotel and garment factory Number 01; My third son is a manager of garment factory Number 02; My three daughters are all studying in Australia.
Trước đây vì một số lý do tôi không muốn ai biết mình là người VN. Còn bây giờ thì không. Tôi là người VN. Tôi vinh dự về điều đó!
Translation: In the past, from some reasons, I don't want anyone to know that I am a Vietnamese. Now, it's NOT. I am a Vietnamese. I'm proud of that.
Learn more about Sok Kong via Cambodian Information Center - SearchLabels: Sok Kong
US State Department Examines Cambodian Rights Record
UNPO
Looking back over the past year the US State Department has found repeated instances of intimidation and violence against Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks and citizens. The report goes on to show the lack of rights in both Cambodia and Vietnam, with religious rights bearing the brunt of abuses reported.
Below is an excerpt from the US State Department Human Rights Report for Cambodia in 2007:
Political activists continued to be the victims of killings. On February 27 [2007], Eang Sok Thoeurn, a Khmer Kampuchea Krom monk, was found dead […] in the Tronum Chhroeung Monastery in Kandal Province. The deceased monk was discovered the morning after he participated in a demonstration in front of the Vietnamese embassy in Phnom Penh for the rights of Khmer Kampuchea Krom persons living in Vietnam. Police quickly declared the death a suicide and disposed of the body without further investigation. NGOs and Khmer Kampuchea Krom groups suspected the killing was politically motivated.
[…]
On June 30 [2007], Khmer Kampuchea Krom monk Tim Sakhorn, head of a pagoda in the Kirivong District of Takeo Province for more than 10 years, disappeared. Previously, on orders of the country's top Buddhist leader, Great Supreme Patriarch Tep Vong, monks from Phnom Penh had defrocked Tim Sakhorn, after which unidentified persons believed to be attached to the MOI [Ministry of Interior] pushed him into a vehicle and drove away. The defrocking order stated Tim Sakhorn "broke the solidarity" between Cambodia and Vietnam by using pagodas to spread propaganda that affects the dignity of Buddhism. The monk was known locally for providing food and shelter to Khmer Kampuchea Krom coming from Vietnam. The MOI stated that Tim Sakhorn volunteered to go to Vietnam after he was defrocked, and ministry officials produced a document stating this intent. While signed by Tim Sakhorn, the handwritten document appeared not to be in his writing. On August 2 [2007], Tim Sakhorn reappeared in court custody in Vietnam, held on charges of destroying political solidarity. In September [2007] the Information Ministry stated that the Cambodian consulate in Ho Chi Minh City was investigating Tim Sakhorn's condition in detention. On November 8 [2007], a Vietnamese newspaper reported that a court in Vietnam convicted Tim Sakhorn of undermining solidarity between Cambodia and Vietnam and sentenced him to one year in prison.
[…]
On February 27 [2007], police and military police dispersed 60 Khmer Kampuchea Krom Buddhist monks demonstrating at the Vietnamese embassy in Phnom Penh during a state visit by the Vietnamese president. Demonstrators assembled to support Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks in Vietnam who had been defrocked and arrested, urging their release and reinstatement as monks. The next morning one monk protester was found dead […] On March 16, police and local authorities in Kandal Province prevented the deceased monk's Khmer Kampuchea Krom community members and monks from holding his funeral.
[…]
On April 20 [2007], police and municipal authorities dispersed 80 Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks assembled at the Vietnamese embassy trying to deliver a petition in protest of alleged Vietnamese government rights abuses of Khmer Kampuchea Krom living in Vietnam. The protesters decided to go to another embassy to present the petition. On the way a group of unidentified, non-Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks and laypersons aggressively intercepted the demonstrators and attempted to disperse them. In the ensuing scuffle, one of the Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks was injured. Authorities did not intervene in the confrontation and did not conduct an investigation. On December 17 [2007], 40 monks sought again to deliver a petition to Vietnamese embassy officials for the release of Tim Sakhorn and other Khmer Kampuchea Krom monks imprisoned in Vietnam, and also for the return of land that they claimed the Vietnamese government seized from Khmer Kampuchea Krom persons in southern Vietnam. Police attempted to disperse the crowd, but the monks refused to disband, and violence broke out […] A local NGO reported that six monks were injured; police stated that some of the police sustained minor injuries.
[…]
Note:
Please use the link below to access the full report:
US State Department Human Rights Report for Cambodia (2007)
Source
US State DepartmentLabels: UN Human Rights Report, US State Department
Report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for human rights in Cambodia, Yash Ghai
-786906.jpg)
Excerpt from Report of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for human rights in Cambodia, Yash Ghai
CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
99. Year after year, the Special Representative’s predecessors and others have addressed the problems of the legal and judicial system in Cambodia and made numerous recommendations, to no avail. The Government has no incentives for reform, as the international community continues to make large financial contributions regardless of widespread violations of human rights.
100. A distinguished Cambodian legal scholar recently commented that “the Government is the least serious about the legal and judicial programme”. The World Bank shelved a project because of “a lack of senior-level commitment to the implementation of a concerted legal and judicial reform agenda within the Executive and Judicial branches of the Government”. Another donor has said that numerous plans and councils on good governance are “little more than a studied attempt to tell donors what they want to hear”.
Recommendations to the Government
101. The Government has primary responsibility for the rule of law. The Special Representative would stress the following recommendations, many of which were made previously:
- The Government must respect the independence of all prosecutors and judges, including those (and defenders and administrative staff) within ECCC.
- The Government must devote more resources to the justice sector. Efforts to train lawyers and to recruit prosecutors and judges should continue and the aim should be for everyone to be within easy reach of a court and for delays in proceedings to be minimized.
- The Government should appoint a committee drawn from Government, the BAKC, human rights NGOs and local and foreign experts, to advise on the organization of legal aid. Its recommendations should be implemented speedily.
- The Government must promote respect for the rule of law within the State and society. It must set the example, as guardian of the Constitution and the law. Laws must be implemented fairly and fully and effective remedies for the violation of rights ensured, if people are to trust the notion of rule of law.
- The Government must urgently enact laws on demonstrations and anti-corruption, ensuring that they comply with the Constitution and human rights standards.
- The Government must protect the rights of indigenous persons and others who, due to illiteracy, customary practices and expectations, communal forms of organizations etc., are not familiar with the law or its procedures, the rules for making of economic transactions or with the market economy. Steps must be taken to ensure that State authorities, including communes, are no longer involved in transactions of dubious morality or law that undermine the rights of these communities and individuals.
- The Government must do all it can to stop forced evictions. It must never be complicit in unlawful evictions. Internationally accepted guidelines must be observed, including the principles that nobody should be made homeless as a result of development-based evictions, the full and informed consent of those targeted for eviction. Evictions should be carried out only in exceptional circumstances, and solely for the purpose of promoting the general welfare in a democratic society. The use of force should be prohibited. No one should be imprisoned in relation to protecting their rights to land and housing and anyone detained in this context should be released. A moratorium on forced evictions should be declared, to allow the determination of the legality of land claims to be made in an objective and fair manner.
- The Government must establish an independent authority to receive complaints about maladministration by the State (including institutions of justice). A Human Rights Commission fully established on the Paris Principles could be given this task.
- The Government must respect the duty and right of civil society to promote and protect human rights and observe United Nations resolutions on the rights of human rights defenders. No restrictions should be placed on reasonable activities of local communities and non-governmental associations.
- The Government must deal fairly with specific cases brought to its attention in recent reports of the Special Representatives and human rights organizations, including the circumstances in which the Venerable Tim Sakhorn disappeared. These steps should include justice for the alleged killers of union leader Chea Vichea and bringing to justice his real killers.
Recommendations to civil society actors
102. The Special Representative stresses the important contribution of civil society (including non-governmental organizations, lawyers, universities, think tanks and other educational and research institutions) to the common effort to establish the rule of the law. He encourages them to pursue their efforts, with determination, patience and courage, in a spirit of openness, dialogue and cooperation with the government authorities. They should continue to provide people with information about human rights, institutions and remedies, and with a voice when the administration, lawmakers and the judiciary do not listen. Discussion with the people about the Special Representative’s reports and feedback should be encouraged.
103. Educational institutions and NGOs should engage the public, through seminars, media and publications, on the procedures and practices as well as the rulings and judgements of ECCC, to create awareness of the meaning and importance of the rule of law.
Recommendations to the international community, including United Nations institutions
104. To be seriously considered and implemented by the Government, the recommendations of the successive Special Representatives need to be endorsed and supported by foreign Governments and international agencies.
- The international community should set up or facilitate the setting up of an independent expert commission to review the working of the legal and judicial system, to make recommendations, and to report annually to the international community and the Royal Government of Cambodia, one month ahead of the consultations between the Government and the donors and lenders. The commission should develop effective and realistic criteria to assess progress, paying particular attention to the enforcement of the law and the independence of the prosecution and judges. The report should form the basis of consultations.
- Foreign Governments or agencies providing assistance in drafting laws must ensure that the law they are proposing is consistent with human rights. This raises no difficulties in respect of Cambodia’s sovereignty. This is also an international obligation of each and every Member State of the United Nations, under the Charter and under the treaties they have ratified.
- Foreign embassies, collectively or bilaterally, should engage the Government in dialogues on human rights and urge the Government to stop the most egregious violations. They should emphasize that respect for human rights is an essential basis of the partnership between them and the Cambodian State and people, and for the pursuance of a development process that places human beings and environment at its heart, rather than unlimited profit and greed, at its heart.
- Since the Constitutional Council has stated that human rights treaties are binding, it is necessary that the decisions of the treaty bodies and of international and foreign courts and tribunals should be taken into account when applying the law. This approach would reinforce the impact that ECCC is expected to have on improvements in the Cambodian legal and judicial system. OHCHR should translate and disseminate major interpretations and conclusions of the treaty bodies.
Note: The chief monk of Phnom Denh pagoda in Takeo Province and an ethnic Khmer from Southern Viet Nam was defrocked on the order of the Chief Patriarch on grounds that his activities in providing shelter to monks from the Khmer Krom minority in Viet Nam fleeing alleged religious persecution had undermined good relations between Cambodia and Viet Nam. He was then driven away by unidentified persons and his whereabouts were unknown until August when he appeared in custody in Viet Nam.Labels: UN Human Rights Report, Yash Ghai
Media Environment Tipping: Groups
By Chiep Mony, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
18 March 2008
The loss of an opposition newspaper has further tilted Cambodia's media environment in favor of the ruling party, damaging the free-and-fair potential of this year's national election, rights groups and opposition officials said Tuesday.
Publisher Thach Keth, who had made Sralanh Khmer, or Love Khmer, an opposition paper, announced Monday he was throwing his support behind the ruling Cambodian People's Party, effectively eliminating the paper from the dwindling opposition voice.
That left two newspapers and one local radio station as tacit supporters of the Sam Rainsy Party, further tipping media bias toward the CPP, officials said.
Boay Roeuy, editor-in-chief of Sralanh Khmer and a member of the Sam Rainsy Party, said Tuesday that currently there remain only two local newspapers and local radio station that support the Sam Rainsy Party: papers Moneaksakar Khmer, or Khmer Conscience, and Khmer Mchas Srok, or Khmer Homeland Owner; and radio FM 93.5.
The Sam Rainsy Party also rents time on Beehive Radio to air its one-hour, daily Voice of Candlelight program, he said.
He was not worried that even though the Sam Rainsy Party will have less newspapers now, he said, citing the 2003 national election, when the Sam Rainsy Party had less newspapers than the competition, CPP and Funcinpec, but still earned enough votes for 24 parliamentary seats.
Hang Chakra, publisher of Khmer Mchas Srok, who is not overtly politically affiliated, said his newspaper has been suspended for two weeks while he was busy abroad, but he expected it to start publishing again on Thursday.
The next issues will support the Sam Rainsy Party more vigorously than before, he said, adding that he was still satisfied with Sam Rainsy's leadership and was confident the party would not collapse due to recent defections.
Sok Sovann, president of the Khmer Journalist Democracy Association, which formed in 2002, said that publishers have a right to politicize newspapers, just as voters have a right to cast ballots.
All of TV, and most of radio and newspapers are biased toward the CPP, putting the system out of balance, Ouk Virak, president of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, said Tuesday.
Local radio is barely independent, including Beehive Radio and FM 95.5, a radio station based in Siem Reap, he said.
"When we don't have independent media, we see the result of democracy is not good, because the people cannot receive all kinds of information," he said.
A biased media system is unfair for national elections, as political parties are not granted access to the media, he said.
Eng Chhay Eang, secretary-general of the Sam Rainsy Party, said Tuesday that if the media system is biased to one party, elections cannot be free and fair, because the media is an important part of the election process.
"We appeal to the donor countries to put pressure on the government because we don't want the government to do as it will," he said. "Unless the media is balanced, the election can't be free and fair."Labels: Election
|
|
|
|
|
