CPP government ‘paranoid,’ says Rainsy

Sam Rainsy has been uncharacteristically quiet in recent months. Speaking Tuesday to the Bangkok Press Club, he did his best to make up for missed opportunities.

Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy says grassroots activists, politicians, and village leaders have been killed, jailed, and forced into hiding for disagreeing with the ruling party.

He says the government of Prime Minister Hun Sen is attempting to silence growing discontent over land confiscation and most Cambodians not benefiting from the growing economy.

Sam Rainsy says part of the problem is that many of Cambodia’s leaders like Hun Sen are former Khmer Rouge, the brutal communist government that ruled in the 1970s and was responsible for the deaths of up to two million Cambodians.

“They still have the Khmer Rouge mentality,” he said. “They do not tolerate critics and they are paranoid. They see enemies everywhere around them and they take preemptive moves to eliminate their enemies or potential enemies by killing them, by silencing them.”

Trying to saddle Hun Sen with the atrocities of the Khmer Rouge is fundamentally dishonest. Faced with an impossibly corrupt, U.S.-installed Lon Nol regime, a majority of Cambodians supported the Khmer Rouge at the time. Rainsy wouldn’t know that, though. He moved to France in 1965 at age 16.

Remembering March 30, 1997

Human Rights Watch plays “Where Are They Now?” with the principals of the infamous grenade attack.

Twelve years after a grenade attack on an opposition party rally that killed at least 16 people and wounded more than 100, the Cambodian government has still taken no steps to bring the perpetrators to justice, Human Rights Watch said today. Human Rights Watch criticized the recent promotions of officials suspected of involvement in that attack.

[...]

On the day of the grenade attack, Prime Minister Hun Sen’s personal bodyguard unit, Brigade 70, was, for the first time, deployed at a demonstration.

[...]

The commander of Brigade 70 at the time, Huy Piseth, who ordered the deployment of Brigade 70 forces to the scene that day, is now undersecretary of state at the Ministry of Defense. Hing Bunheang, who was deputy commander of Brigade 70 at the time and who threatened to kill journalists investigating the case, was promoted to deputy military commander of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) in January 2009.

And so it goes.

Malicious software from the Sam Rainsy Party ANZ

This can’t be good, right? The almighty Google says that the “Sam Rainsy Party ANZ” web site “may harm your computer.” Further explanation from Google says:

Strange behavior and malicious software: Results labeled ‘This site may harm your computer’

We want our users to feel safe when they search the web, and we’re continuously working to identify dangerous sites and increase protection for our users. This warning message appears with search results we’ve identified as sites that may install malicious software on your computer:

Just Google “Tioulong Saumura.”

Mrs Rainsy speaks

Tioulong Saumura, the wife of Sam Rainsy, responds to accusations that she kidnapped a defecting member of the Sam Rainsy Party. Trying to summarize her response would be a disservice.

There really is no other way to frame the unfolding scenario: This is a CPP-orchestrated campaign of harassment and intimidation against Tioulong Saumura. The wife of the leader of the country’s primary opposition party has been threatened with arrest on clearly bogus charges.

In August, when the spineless international community and assorted pencil-pushing diplomats profess Cambodia’s July national elections “free and fair,” ask them how they sleep at night.

Sam Rainsy’s Mein Kampf

Sam Rainsy tells the story of his struggles in a new book, “Rooted in the Stone: My Struggle for the Revival of Cambodia,” scheduled for release in French this month, and in English and Khmer later.

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.

Rainsy’s penchant for flowery French-style prose aside, “Rooted in the Stone” should make for interesting reading. It’s probably the best chance outsiders will get to peek inside the mind of Sam Rainsy. And even if the book is nothing but a 300-page hagiography — a notion the book’s intro does little to dispel — that too would reveal a lot more about Sam Rainsy than most people think they know.

Any judgment of the book is best reserved until after the thing is published. But it’s really hard not to wonder about that title. It seems extremely unlikely that Sam Rainsy wouldn’t be aware of the political allusions drawn with a book whose title includes the words “my struggle.” Surely friends or editors along the way must have suggested choosing a different title. For a politician whose schtick includes the unabashed stirring of racial politics in a country still dark under the cloud of genocide, drawing parallels to one of the 20th century’s greatest racist, homicidal maniacs seems more than just a bit unwise.

Sam Rainsy’s wife faces arrest?

File this under “rumors on the Internet,” for now.

Rumor came out as Cambodian ruling party has planned to arrest former Sam Rainsy Party MP Tioulong Saumura, wife of opposition leader Sam Rainsy. This news came out in Phnom Penh as ruling party Cambodian People Party and main opposition party Sam Rainsy Party have prepared for the political crisis between CPP and SRP faceoff at the upcoming election.

Cambodia Daily Newspaper’s letter to the editor accused that she has detained one of the SRP political activist to prevent her leaving to the current ruling party. Accuse made while she wasn’t in Cambodia but government accepted the case of her illegal detention against her party activist that she did not make it.

She is now in Paris and will be back tomorrow, and would get arrested upon her return to Cambodia.

No telling if this is true. But if it is, it sounds like an incredibly bad idea. Stay tuned.

Campaign watch

Human Rights Watch today calls a spade a spade.

Politically motivated criminal charges against at least three opposition party officials are part of a ruling party campaign to weaken political rivals prior to national elections in July 2008, Human Rights Watch said today.

The authorities last week arrested Tuot Saron, an official of the opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP), and sought the arrest of at least two other SRP officials. Human Rights Watch fears that additional SRP officials may also be arrested imminently.

“Dubious arrests of opposition officials months ahead of an election should set alarm bells ringing,” said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “This divide-and-conquer strategy is a well-known tactic of Prime Minister Hun Sen to subdue his opponents.”

Is anybody listening?

CPP threatens human rights groups

This is beyond outrageous.

Sok Pheng, a recipient of Hun Sen’s nomination reward as government advisor for his defection from the SRP, issued a warning to human rights organizations in Cambodia not to provide help to SRP officials accused by the CPP of illegal detention of Tim Norn, a former SRP commune councilor from Kampong Thom who defected to the CPP with Sok Pheng. The Cambodia Daily reported that Sok Pheng’s statement was read on local Cambodian TV stations, calling human rights organizations not to help Men Vannak, SRP Sralao commune councilor, and Thorn Rithy, deputy chairman of the SRP Kampong Thom province council. The Cambodia Daily quoted Sok Pheng as writing: “If the human rights groups protect [the SRP officials] it means that they have actively participated in the abuse against the people’s rights.”

Getting paid

VIA KI: In a story about Sam Rainsy and striking factory workers, a story translated from Kampuchea Thmei says this about factory workers demands.

In the morning of 28 January 2008, opposition leader Sam Rainsy, accompanied by Phnom Penh SRP MPs Ho Vann and Nou Sovath, visited the Phnom Penh Garment City Ltd. where 400 striking workers were demanding (1) for a $6.83 monthly food supplement, and (2) that they be paid in cash salary rather than factory tickets.

Paid in factory tickets? What? More details, please.

If this is just a bad translation for “checks,” then it’s a really, really bad translation. But that seems unlikely. Nobody complains about getting a check as long as it doesn’t bounce. The chances seem much greater that this is some half-clever racket to gyp factory workers out of their monthly pay packets.

Or not. Who knows? Maybe in a subsequent issue the Kampuchea Thmei might be kind enough to let the rest of the world in on their little secret.

Revisiting the grenade attack on Sam Rainsy

Ten years ago tomorrow, Sam Rainsy came this close to karking it. Instead, one of his body guards jumped in front of the grenade blast. Rainsy escaped unharmed. The body guard was dead at the scene.

A decade later, Human Rights Watch is still demanding that someone take the case seriously.

A New York-based human rights group urged the FBI on Thursday to reopen a probe into a grenade attack that killed more than a dozen Cambodians and wounded an American a decade ago.

The Human Rights Watch appeal came a day ahead of the 10th anniversary of the grenade attack on a peaceful demonstration led by opposition leader Sam Rainsy on March 30, 1997.

“This brazen attack carried out in broad daylight ingrained impunity in Cambodia more than any other single act in the country’s recent history,” Brad Adams, Human Rights Watch’s Asia director, said in a statement.

The statement also “urged the U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation to reopen its investigation of the attack.”

No one has been arrested over the assault that killed at least 16 people and wounded 114 others, when four grenades were tossed into a crowd of anti-government demonstrators outside the Cambodian National Assembly in the capital, Phnom Penh.

At the very least, it’s nice to see that somebody is still raising some Cain about this. Even if it is all for nothing.

Conscription

VIA Mongkol: Regardless of where one might stand on the conscription issue, Sam Rainsy’s continued insistence that the new law is some sort of underhanded CPP ploy to mask the country’s slack job growth borders on ridiculous.

However, opposition leader Sam Rainsy warned that the new law would help the government hide one of its major failures – unemployment.

“Every year, around 300,000 young people reach the age of 18 and cannot find jobs,” he said.

“In order to control these young jobless people, they are forcing them to enrol in the army,” he told reporters.

The new military conscription law is expected to enlist between 5,000 and 10,000 new recruits per year. But even if it were double that — say 20,000 recruits — the notion that 280,000 is somehow magically better than 300,000 simply makes no sense. Implying that this constitutes some devious CPP plan to game the country’s unemployment numbers even less so.

Great expectations

Recent allegations made against the government by disgraced police chief Heng Pov have prompted both Ron Abney and Sam Rainsy to ask the United States to reopen its investigation into the March 30, 1997, grenade attack in which Abney and more than 100 others were injured and at least 16 killed.

In a written request to the FBI Abney includes a transcript of Heng Pov’s recent statement and urges the Bureau to rededicate itself to finding justice for those injured and killed in the attack.

I urge you to read this transcript carefully as the facts are very similar to those of participants, bystanders and your own FBI report on what exactly happened that tragic day. The testimony leads directly to Hun Sen’s top police official, Mr. Hok Lundy and to the Prime Minister himself.

I am forwarding my request to you to Senators John McCain; Saxby Chambliss and Mitch McConnell. As the American who was injured that day by the Cambodian Government’s’ hand and on behalf of the families of the surviving Cambodians killed that day, I urge you to re-open your files regarding the investigation so all of us can begin to get some closure on this tragedy.

Other than as a symbolic act of protest against the Hun Sen government, it’s not exactly clear what either man hopes to gain by such a request. In terms of actually adding to the record of what was previously known about the attack, Heng Pov’s statement contributes virtually nothing of substance.

But even if it did, getting at the truth has never really been the problem — it’s what to do about it. As R. Jeffrey Smith put it at the time:

Hun Sen, 46, is the most powerful man in Cambodia today, with a military force of about 1,000 men at his personal disposal, and diplomats here say that even if the charges are proven, he will not leave office without a fight. The chance of obtaining a fair trial for those involved in the bombing is also considered slim, because Hun Sen’s party controls both the Interior Ministry and the judiciary.

That leaves Washington with few viable options for resolving the bombing case without destabilizing the Cambodian government.

That is why the FBI report in 1998 deliberately pointed no fingers and the whole bloody affair got quietly swept under the carpet. Political expediency, as usual, trumped any high-minded notions of truth and justice.

To think that things are that much different today than they were nine years ago seems a bit self-deluded, and is unlikely to end in anything but more disappointment.

Right hand, upside face

The game of full-contact judicial twister is on. As quoted in the Cambodia Daily today, Kar Savuth, Duch’s (pronounced ‘Doyk’) lawyer, opened the contest by saying that it would be impossible for his client to receive a fair trial because the judges and prosecutors were victims of Khmer Rouge atrocities.

Which is not only a good point, but a legally salient one. Kar, however, gave no indication as to whether he would file a change-of-venue motion, or even if the rules of the Extraordinary Chambers would allow such a thing.

But that is not the point. The point is this: The Sam Rainsy Party, with a sixth sense for the media spotlight, is no doubt watching in horror as the KRT takes center stage and the SRP slowly gets written out of the media storyline.

But not without a fight, as the Daily tells it, or a laugh at the Sam Rainsy Party’s expense (or much editing, apparently):

Also on Thursday, Sam Rainsy Party Acting President Kong Korm said he would file a formal complaint with the tribunal laying blame on China, Vietnam and the Hun Sen’s ruling CPP for the regime.

He said he would ask the tribunal to dissolve the CPP and bring China and Vietnam to the International Criminal Court in the Hague so discover if they were implicated in the crimes of the regime.

Asked about Kong Korm’s allegation, Hun Sen’s adviser Om Yentieng replied: “He might have a mental problem.” He declined further comment.

Is Sam Rainsy high?

The recent Sam Rainsy Party proposal for determining the results of village chief elections is not really the kind of thing a “democracy advocate” should be caught saying in public:

The Sam Rainsy Party will boycott the national village chief elections if the CPP does not agree to share a set number of the positions with the SRP, regardless of the outcome at the polls, SRP officials said Tuesday.

SRP lawmaker Eng Chhay Eang said he no longer believes the party can succeed in the elections, which started in May. He alleged that the CPP has bribed Funcinpec commune councilors to vote for CPP village chiefs, and said he feels that the CPP will not recognize SRP village chiefs if they are elected.

More or less, democracy champions the idea that votes get counted. Do the Sam Rainsy people not get that? While fears that the CPP will corrupt the results may be legitimate, corrupting them back in Sam Rainsy’s favour regardless of the vote count hardly qualifies as a solution.

If that’s the case, then why go through the charade of voting in the first place?