Government spokesman Panitan Wattanayagorn said the parties would try to settle the dispute ahead of a 10-day World Heritage Committee (WHC) meeting from Sunday in Paris that will consider the management plan for the ancient temple proposed by Cambodia.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva yesterday held a meeting of the national world heritage committee to discuss guidelines on the Preah Vihear issue, Mr Panitan said. Mr Abhisit instructed the panel to think of the national interest and keep the country from losing its sovereignty and territory.

Mr Suwit yesterday said Thailand had a clear stance on the Preah Vihear issue. It wants the WHC to postpone consideration of the management plan for areas surrounding the World Heritage-listed site until border demarcation work is completed.

He said he was unsure if the WHC would postpone considering Cambodia's insistence on its right to table the plan for the 4.6-square-kilometre disputed area around the temple.

Mr Suwit said Thailand would offer to host the next WHC meeting in Phuket.

He said claims by Cambodia that Prime Minister Abhisit had asked it to withdraw Preah Vihear from the world heritage listing were untrue.

He said the Foreign Ministry would send a letter explaining the matter to Cambodian authorities.

The national world heritage committee will meet today to discuss prerequisites for the WHC meeting, Mr Suwit said.

He said other Unesco member countries would have a better understanding about Thailand's position on the plan after Thai representatives had the opportunity to explain the matter.

Mr Abhisit also said that each side should respect the laws of the other and avoid doing anything that could affect relations. He was referring to reports Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen threatened to arrest Thai officials that encroach on its soil and charge them with spying, as Thailand has done.

Bangkok Post

Embattled opposition leader Sam Rainsy has been ordered to appear at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on June 22 to answer allegations that his pol-itical party did not send its 2006 annual report to the Ministry of Interior on time, sparking the Sam Rainsy Party to threaten a counter-suit.

The ministry filed a complaint against the SRP in August, 2007 for the late report. According to the summons, dated June 6 and obtained by The Post yesterday, the SRP failed to file a timely report on its activities, income and spending, bank-account balance and party inventory.

Khieu Sopheak, spokesman for the Ministry of Interior, said yesterday that the SRP submitted the report, required of all parties, after the deadline. The ministry is demanding that the SRP pay 3 million riel (US$734).

When asked why the complaint was being dug up nearly four years after it was filed, Khieu Sopheak declined to comment, referring questions to the court.

Hing Bun Chea, the deputy prosecutor at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court who signed the summons, could not be reached for comment.

Meanwhile, the SRP has demanded that the ministry rescind the complaint, threatening to sue for defamation.

In a statement on Friday, the SRP said it had submitted the report by a deadline of December 31, 2006, and that both the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Economy and Finance had received it two days later, on January 2.

“The Ministry of Interior’s intention in filing a complaint to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court accusing the SRP of not sending its 2006 annual report to the Ministry of Interior is to disturb and defame the SRP,” the party said.

“The SRP would like to ask the Ministry of Interior to withdraw the complaint … otherwise, the SRP will sue the Interior Minister [Sar Kheng] of defaming the SRP,” the statement said.

Khieu Sopheak said the ministry would not withdraw its complaint, and said the SRP statement only made the ministry more inclined to file additional complaints against the opposition party.

“If [Sam Rainsy] dares to sue the Ministry of Interior, we will file additional complaints,” he said. Khieu Sopheak suggested that Sam Rainsy recognise his mistake and “implore” the ministry to withdraw the complaint.

SRP spokesman Yim Sovann said submitting a report one or two days late was “normal” and that the complaint was a “laughable” ploy.

He countered that the government was often late in responding to questions submitted by SRP parliamentarians, often taking months to reply and sometimes not responding at all.

“In the Constitution, it states that the government must answer in seven days, but sometimes in three months the government has not answered,” he said. “How does the Ministry of Interior think?”

Sam Rainsy, who currently lives abroad in self-imposed exile, would face as long as 14 years in prison from a string of convictions if he were to return to the Kingdom.

Phnom Penh Post

An official for the Sam Rainsy Party says that recent rhetoric about the opposition in a speech by Prime Minister Hun Sen may signal a willingness to find a political solution to the exile of the country’s main opposition leader.

Cambodia is gearing up for local elections in 2012 and parliamentary elections the year after, but the Sam Rainsy Party has been operating with its leader abroad and facing criminal charges he says are political.

Hun Sen has previously said he will not broker a compromise to bring Sam Rainsy back, but Yim Sovann, a spokesman for the Sam Rainsy Party, said Thursday that a speech the premier gave earlier this week may signal a shift in that position.

He noted that Hun Sen had told students at a graduation ceremony on Monday that Cambodians must solve their problems peacefully, among Cambodians.

“We must talk mutually,” he said, “which is better than chopping and stabbing.”

“Each country must have democracy, pluralism, and allow the establishment of parties, give the to set up NGOs and to have press freedom,” he said.

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy remains in self-imposed exile and is facing 12 years in prison on charges he says are political if he returns.

Cheam Yiep, a lawmaker for the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, said Sam Rainsy’s return ahead of elections could be possible.

“So far there has been tolerance and forgiveness from [Prime Minister] Hun Sen, who has been sympathetic,” he said.

However, he noted, Sam Rainsy is now engaged in a campaign to file charges against Hun Sen in international courts.

Sam Rainsy has said he considers military campaigns led by Hun Sen in the 1980s led to unnecessary deaths of civilians near the Thai border, as government troops fought the Khmer Rouge.

Koul Panha, executive director of the Committee for Free and Fair Elections, said he hoped Sam Rainsy will be allowed to return, which would signal a type of “maturity” in Cambodia’s democratic system.

“This is the process of a good culture, or good behavior, for politicians to compromise and mutually and politically forgive each other,” he said.

He added that the charges against Sam Rainsy—linked to his uprooting of border markers near Vietnam in 2009—are not serious and can likely be ironed out.

VOA News

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy says he is preparing to file more complaints against Prime Minister Hun Sen, similar to allegations he has already made in a New York court.

“I have met my lawyer to prepare lawsuits against Hun Sen for killing many people on several occasions,” Sam Rainsy told VOA Khmer in an interview last week, without elaborating. “He was involved in these crimes, including crimes against humanity.”

Sam Rainsy alleges Hun Sen was responsible for the deaths of people sent to clear forests along the Thai border in the 1980s, where they met with malaria and other diseases and land mines.

“I would like to appeal to all people in Cambodia or overseas who lived through K5, who witnessed the events, or who fell victims themselves, to come together now,” he said.

There are no official figures on how many people died curing the K5 campaign. Sam Rainsy’s complaints follow victory for him in a French court in a defamation case brought by Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, who had alleged Sam Rainsy had unfairly claimed he had led a Khmer Rouge camp.

Sam Rainsy said his victory in that case “opens the way for me to file more complaints. This time not against Hor Namhong, but Hun Sen.”

Sam Rainsy said he plans to file his first complaint in a court in Geneva later this month.

The opposition leader remains in self-imposed exile and faces a raft of criminal prison sentences related to demonstrations on the Vietnamese border in 2009. With elections approaching in 2012 and 2013, Hun Sen has said there will be no political settlement of those cases.

Sam Rainsy said “modern technology” allows him to maintain daily contact with his supporters. But he added that his party was working to pressure the current government to secure his return ahead of elections.

Observers have noted that without the presence of the main opposition leader, the upcoming elections may not be perceived as free or fair.

VOA News

Prime Minister Hun Sen has warned the leader of the Sam Rainsy Party that documents relating to secret talks held between the premier and its leader after 2003 are in existence.

The disclosure, made at a graduation ceremony at the Royal School of Administration in Phnom Penh yesterday, follows a leak of a recording late last month of a 2007 discussion involving Human Rights Party. On the recording, its president Ken Sokha can be heard asking Hun Sen for assistance in securing use of the Olympic Stadium for a party conference.

The SRP, the Kingdom’s largest opposition party, seized on the recording as evidence of alleged collusion between the two parties and said that flagging negotiations on an SRP-HRP merger would be halted as a result.

Yesterday, Hun Sen insinuated that evidence of a three-hour talk conducted after 2003 with Sam Rainsy was also in existence.

Hun Sen said Sam Rainsy met him at his Takhmao home, in Kandal province, to talk over a potential amendment to the constitution.

The amendment to reduce the required parliamentary majority needed to govern outright from two thirds to 50 percent plus one was passed in 2006 – effectively reducing the CPP’s need for a coalition partner.

“With Sam Rainsy [there are] plenty [of documents]. If they were leaked, there would be a bunch,” Hun Sen said yesterday, adding he had held many “secret conversations” with Sam Rainsy and Kem Sokha in the past.

“Sam Rainsy – don’t forget what you have talked with me [about],” he said.

SRP spokesman Yim Sovann yesterday dismissed any talk of “secret deals” between the SRP and the CPP stating that he was “not interested” in the Prime Minister’s statement.

He claimed that the premier was attempting to create an atmosphere of suspicion around the SRP, but party supporters would see through it.

Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights, said the comments seemed to be a political ‘‘game’’ that would “not make [for] strong development of the nation”.

 

Phnom Penh Post

Kandal provincial police have arrested a 28-year-old man on suspicion of killing a popular opposition activist earlier this week.

Police say they arrested Lim Veasna, a father of two in Kien Svay district, Thursday evening with traces of blood on his clothes, and said they had suspected him because he belongs to a group of drug users.

They are still looking for two more suspects and are assuming a motive of robbery in the Wednesday killing of Ouk Chhan, 64, a Sam Rainsy Party activist and likely candidate commune council in 2012.

But Sam Rainsy Party officials said Friday they believe the true killer or killers remain at large.

“It was politically motivated, and the Sam Rainsy Party will follow up closely and request that the authorities find the real murderers,” said Chan Cheng, an opposition lawmaker for Kandal province.

Eav Sam Roeun, chief of Kandal police, said an investigation was ongoing. “We are searching for two more, to show and reply to the political allegations”, he said.

Am Sam Ath, lead investigator for the rights group Licadho, said the murder could have been a coincidence and a robbery. “We will continue to investigate and to verify,” he said.

The murder occurred during a fact-finding visit by the UN’s rights envoy to Cambodia, Suriya Subedi, who declined to comment on the killing without further investigation.

VOA News

One man was arrested yesterday following the beating death of a Sam Rainsy Party commune official in Kandal province, amid competing claims from police and the opposition party over whether the killing was politically motivated.

The 64-year-old Ouk Chhanteak, second commune councillor in Kien Svay district’s Chhoeu Teal commune, was bludgeoned to death at around 10pm on Wednesday evening as he returned home from patrolling the area, SRP officials said. His body was reportedly dumped roughly one kilometre from the site where he was attacked, with his motorbike, camera and telephone having been stolen.

Kien Svay district police chief Pa Sam Eth said yesterday that one of three suspects in the case had been arrested yesterday afternoon, adding that police believe the incident was a robbery that was unrelated to politics.

“The suspect we arrested already admitted in front of us that he and another two men really robbed the victim for his motorbike,” Pa Sam Eth said. “Now we know the identities of the other two and we are investigating to arrest them.”

The SRP alleged, however, that the murder was connected to Ouk Chhanteak’s work on behalf of the opposition. “The murder was related to [a] political case because Mr Ouk Chhantak was the most popular SRP second commune councillor in his commune and would become a commune chief in [the] upcoming commune election [in] 2012,” the SRP cabinet said in a statement yesterday.

“The Sam Rainsy Party would like to appeal to the authorities at all levels to take action to arrest the murderers.”

Chan Cheng, an SRP lawmaker representing Kandal, said Ouk Chhanteak had always “worked to serve the people without taking money”.

“Three days before his murder, he said the SRP was not worried about the upcoming election because he will be elected commune chief,” Chan Cheng said. “He is very popular in Chhoeu Teal commune.”

Chan Cheng added that Ouk Chhanteak’s killers had not removed a pair of rings from his fingers, expressing doubt that the case was a simply a violent theft. But Pa Sam Eth said the missing motorbike was clear evidence of a robbery, dismissing Chan Cheng’s allegations.

“It is his right to say that, but based on our assessment, we see that this case is a robbery,” Pa Sam Eth said. “We are not indifferent and we are going to find the murderers.”

Men Makara, an investigator based in Kandal for the local rights group Adhoc, said an investigation is required before a determination is made on whether or not the killing was politically motivated.

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY SAM RITH

Phnom Penh Post

Human Rights Party president Kem Sokha has accused the ruling Cambodian People’s Party of leaking a recorded conversation between himself and Prime Minister Hun Sen in retaliation for his refusal to collaborate with the CPP.

Phnom Penh Post

LOWELL -- A Cambodian opposition leader and two other members of parliament will be in Lowell Saturday to discuss ongoing human-rights abuses in Cambodia.

Sam Rainsy, leader of the Sam Rainsy Party and generally considered the main rival to Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen, will appear with fellow SRP legislators Tok Vanchan and Tioulong Sumura, Rainsy's wife, on Saturday, from 5 p.m. to midnight at the Sunny Da Restaurant, 450 Chelmsford St.

Rainsy, formerly a member of the Cambodian National Assembly, has most recently been living in self-imposed exile in Australia. In March, the Cambodian Supreme Court upheld Rainsy's conviction on charges of inciting racial discrimination and uprooting border markings with neighboring Vietnam.

Shortly after the court's ruling, the National Assembly released a statement revoking Rainsy's "rights, privileges and membership as member of parliament."

The conviction upheld by the Supreme Court carries with it a two-year prison sentence and, when combined with an unrelated 10-year sentence for publishing a false map of the border with Vietnam.

Since 2009, Rainsy has maintained he was leading demonstrations on the Cambodian-Vietnamese border to protest what he believes is Vietnamese encroachment on Cambodian land.

A Rainsy Party spokesman criticized the National Assembly decree as a political move by a parliament dominated by MPs from Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party. In the past, the Rainsy

Hun Sen, 59, has held power in Cambodia for a quarter-century and, according to some, has vowed to remain in power until he is 90 years old.

Rainsy plans to discuss those issues, as well as what he calls ongoing human-rights abuses in Cambodia, suppression of the Cambodian media and the future of the country.

For more information, email Chhan Touch atchhantouch@comcast.net.

Lowell Sun

National Assembly President Heng Samrin has called on the Ministry of Labour to resolve a dispute over severance pay involving roughly 4,000 workers from the June Textile factory, which burned down in March.

In a letter dated Friday, Heng Samrin and Khoun Sudary, a parliamentarian and chairwoman of the National Assembly’s human rights committee, told Labour Minister Vong Soth that they had received a request from the workers to intervene in the case.

Former Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Mao Monyvann has boasted that the majority of SRP district and commune officials in Kampong Cham province will follow him in defecting to the Human Rights Party, the latest snipe in the recent bickering between the duelling opposition parties.

Mao Monyvann, who formerly held a seat in the National Assembly representing Kampong Cham province, announced his resignation from parliament in March. Later that month, he staged a press conference to criticise what he said was the nepotistic leadership of the SRP, prompting SRP officials to vote for his ouster from the party.

Shortly thereafter, he joined the HRP, and he said yesterday that dozens of SRP officials in his former constituency of Kampong Cham would soon follow his lead. The SRP currently has 394 commune councillors, eight district councillors and six provincial councillors in Kampong Cham, he said.

“They are contacting me so that they can defect to the HRP as well. Sixty percent of them will decide to join the HRP soon,” he claimed.

When Mao Monyvann left the SRP in March, he criticised what he said was the excessive control wielded over the party by the families of lawmakers Yim Sovann and Eng Chhay Eang. SRP officials in Kampong Cham have since said they agree with these sentiments, Mao Monyvann said.

“They said my defection is good – they dislike SRP leaders who think too much about nepotisim,” he said.

The SRP and HRP, which currently hold 25 and three seats in the National Assembly respectively, have long floated talks of a merger to form a united front against the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, which holds 90. Merger talks have broken down in the past few months, however, amid recriminations traded  between the two parties.

Sovann Pisakha, an SRP lawmaker who replaced Mao Monyvann in Kampong Cham, said yesterday that he had seen no evidence of a mass defection brewing in the province.

“My grassroots leaders believe in the SRP and Mr Sam Rainsy,” Sovann Pisakha said.

Phnom Penh Post

With speculations about a possible return of the ousted premier Thaksin Shinawatra, possibly to neighboring Cambodia, during the general election, the Cambodian information minister insists he has no knowledge of any such plan.

In an article posted yesterday on the Phnom Penh Post website, Information Minister Khieu Kanharith was asked whether ousted prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra will be permitted to enter Cambodia during the Thai general election in which his sister is the Pheu Thai Party’s leading candidate for the premiership.

Khieu stated that he has not received any requests from Thaksin regarding his possible entry into Cambodia.

Cambodian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Koi Kuang also insisted that he has not received any information regarding Thaksin either.

He declined to further comment on the issue.

In a statement at the Cambodian Cabinet meeting last Friday, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said that he will not allow foreigners or foreign political organizations to use Cambodia as a base to attack or overthrow the government of any foreign country.

Thaksin is known to have close ties with Hun Sen and the appointment of Thaksin to an economic advisor post by Hun Sen sparked a conflict between the two countries up until when Thaksin resigned from the position.

TAN Network

Human Rights Party President Kem Sokha said yesterday he had urged United States Foreign Affairs officials to monitor upcoming elections in Cambodia next year and in 2013, during a three-week tour of 17 American states. During the trip to drum up party support ahead of commune elections next year and National Assembly elections in 2013, Kem Sohka said US Foreign Affairs official Adam N. Davis hadn’t confirmed whether or not the US would send observers, as he had requested. US embassy spokesman Mark Wenig said yesterday that it was too early to say whether his government would deploy observers.

Phnom Penh Post

The wife of a royalist general who was killed in the 1997 coup has filed a complaint with the national Anti-Corruption Unit, saying a group of officials and judges conspired to sell her husband’s land after he died.

Chea Kim, the wife of Ho Sok, who was a Funcinpec secretary of state at the Ministry of Interior and a three-star general, says 29 government officials and six judges worked together to sell 13 hectares of land in Kandal province in 1998.

Ho Sok and other Funcinpec generals and officials were either killed in fighting or executed during the two-day coup in July 1997, as then co-prime minister Hun Sen’s Cambodian People’s Party seized power.

In her May 6 complaint, obtained by VOA Khmer, Chea Kim states that the Supreme Court overturned a 2007 decision that awarded the land to her.

Chea Kim names Yos Sokhourn, a Supreme Court judge, and five other judges, as conspirators in the alleged land theft.

Yos Sokhourn said “no one” complained after the court decision and declared the case “over.”

“So now why does Ho Sok’s wife file a complaint against us?” he said.

Chea Kim also names as one of the conspirators Prak Savuth, a former Kandal deputy governor and the current chief of the provincial council.

Contacted Wednesday, Prak Savuth declined to comment, saying he was in a private hospital for a medical check up.

A police official with knowledge of the case, who requested anonymity, said Prak Savuth had “masterminded” a land grab after Ho Sok was shot in 1997.

Another official accused in the case, Ieng Moly, a former information minister, said Wednesday he had legitimately bought the land eight years ago and subsequently sold it. He would consider a defamation suit against Chea Kim for accusing him of theft, he said.

Officials at the Anti-Corruption Unit, which has made a number of arrests and at least one high-profile prosecution under new anti-corruption legislation, declined to comment or could not be reached Wednesday.

Source: VOA News

Leaders and supporters of the opposition Human Rights Party met in Philadelphia on Friday, marking the fourth anniversary of the party and planning for upcoming commune elections in 2012.

In an interview with VOA Khmer after the meetings, party president Kem Sokha said the party will campaign next year on providing more public services to local communities and mitigating discrimination against people of different political beliefs. HRP officials will also seek to eliminate bribes for public services, he said.

“We will create effective and efficient mechanisms, by providing services across the country to meet the needs and demands of local people,” he said. “We will install computers and generators in all the communes led by [the Human Rights Party] to help speed up the processing of people’s documents.”

More broadly speaking, Kem Sokha said Cambodia faces three main threats, what he called “foreign invasion,” dictatorship and poverty.

In national elections, scheduled for 2013, Kem Sokha said the party decided to focus on national integrity and reducing illegal immigration. Cambodia’s current immigration law goes unheeded, due to “foreign influences” that his party is not influenced by, he said.

The party would also like to amend the constitution and set a two-term limit on the office of prime minister. The Human Rights Party already practices such a term limit, he said.

Meanwhile, party lawmakers will also seek better separation of the branches of government while also promoting the agricultural sector, he said.

Education for the young is another priority, he said.

“We will set up a loan system for those who want to go to university and make technical schools available for those who do not want to go to university, so that they have skills to work,” he said. “These are only possible if corruption is eliminated. HRP has a strategy to eliminate corruption from the top. We aren’t going to go the way the party in power has. Asset declaration must be made publicly, not in a closed envelope.”

The Human Rights Party currently holds three seats in the National Assembly, well behind the leading opposition Sam Rainsy Party, which has 26. However, party leader Sam Rainsy is facing a prison sentence at home and remains in self exile abroad, which observers note could present organizational and political difficulties for the party.

Talk of alliance between the two opposition parties has surfaced occasionally since the last election, in 2008, but neither side has been able to fully agree with the other.

Kem Sokha said that “even if we cannot merge” the parties should not “color one another.”

“I appeal to all people not to be hopeless,” he said. “We are still able to work together, once we have set a democratic system. The HRP has been working on this and has implemented it. So you can join us.”

Source: VOA News

Mr. Eng Chhay Eang (pictured), former Secretary General of the Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) and the party strongman, has resigned as an MP for the Battambang constituency where he had served for several terms already.

It is not sure what prompted him to resign, but he was known to be under tremendous pressures after he was publicly attacked Mr. Mao Monivan for nepotism and cronyism. Mr. Mao Monivan had resigned as an MP and was then expelled from the party for his public outburst against Mr. Eng Chhay Eang and the party spokesman, Mr. Yim Sovan.

Mr. Eng Chhay Eang was instrumental in strengthening the party's rural base and in the setting up of party branches across the country. He is politically astute and earned high praises from Mr. Sam Rainsy for his intelligence and management skills. He was once touted as a possible successor to Mr. Sam Rainsy as a party president due to his political shrewdness. However, he was heavily criticised for his heavy-handedness against internal criticism and has often been considered as a liability to the party due to his past gambling addiction.

Mr. Eang Chhay was replaced by Mr. Vann Narith.

At the same time, Mrs. Long Sakhorn, an MP from the ruling Cambodian People's Party, has also tendered her resignation as an MP for the seat of Prey Veng and she was replaced by Mr. Pov Samy.

By Khmerization
Source: everyday.com.kh