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Escalating corruption & violence in Cambodia's Faux democracy
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Growing political violence and instability has lead Cambodia’s 81 year-old monarch, King Norodom Sihanouk, to create what has become his country’s most popular website, reports BBC News. Unique in all of Asia, norodomsihanouk.info features the King’s sometimes biting, sometimes mocking commentary on the country’s misrule by the regime of former-Khmer Rouge officer, Hun Sen. Sihanouk has often used notes hand-written in Khmer or in French to criticize the regime’s rampant corruption, increasing political violence, deforestation, as well as the issues of his own mortality and the controversy over a successor to his throne.
January 15:
Government corruption in Cambodia’s garment factories – its main export industry - has caused a loss of around 70 million dollars during the year 2000, reports KhmerIntelligence.org. This is equivalent to 7.2 percent of that year's overall value of [garment] exports, according to a report, "Cambodia: textile workers face a gloomy future," published by the Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. The illicit “bureaucratic” activities kept the average wage in the textile industry at $45 per month, when it could have been as high as $98 dollars per month in a corruption-free environment.
January 25:
Thousands of people joined a silent funeral march in Phnom Penh for Cambodian union leader Chea Vichea, who was killed in what the opposition claim was another political assassination, Reuters reports. This is the first mass gathering the government has allowed since a disputed general election in July. Many of the mourners, wearing black headbands, calling Chea Vichea a "worker's hero," were women from the garment factories where he had fought to improve working conditions for nearly five years.
The Associated Press adds that Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party (CPP) won last year's general election but failed to get the two-thirds majority required to govern alone, resulting in a locked power struggle between the CPP and the opposition. Vichea became the latest victim of a series of suspected political killings involving critics of the ruling party of Prime Minister Hun Sen. The recent string of killings linked to the political opposition has created an atmosphere of fear, human rights advocates said. Several opposition legislators, including Sam Rainsy, joined the procession. King Norodom Sihanouk, who said that the murders of prominent persons are multiplying and are "undeniably" linked to politics, gave Chea Vichea a posthumous royal order which recognized his achievements.
January 26:
The opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) claims that five opposition and civil society leaders are on the ''black list'' of Prime Minister Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP), the Japan Kyodo News reports. SRP leader Sam Rainsy, SRP Secretary General Eng Chhay Eang, and Secretary General of the royalist FUNCINPEC party Prince Norodom Sirivudh, are named on the one-page statement. The other two figures are Kem Sokha, director of the Cambodia Center for Human Rights, and Rong Chhun, president of the Cambodian Independent Teachers Association.
February 4:
According to two prominent Cambodian human rights groups, 2003 was Cambodia’s most violent year since the 1998 post-coup elections - with a 52 percent increase in the number of political activists killed from the previous year. Last year, 33 activists were murdered, and high-profile attacks took place against opposition party supporters, including reporter Mr. Chuor Cetharidh, and singer, Miss Touch Sunnich. The Cambodian Center for Human Rights said in its “Report on Civil and Political Rights Violations” that 23 political activists have also been murdered since the July 27, 2003 elections.
January 15:
Government corruption in Cambodia’s garment factories – its main export industry - has caused a loss of around 70 million dollars during the year 2000, reports KhmerIntelligence.org. This is equivalent to 7.2 percent of that year's overall value of [garment] exports, according to a report, "Cambodia: textile workers face a gloomy future," published by the Brussels-based International Confederation of Free Trade Unions. The illicit “bureaucratic” activities kept the average wage in the textile industry at $45 per month, when it could have been as high as $98 dollars per month in a corruption-free environment.
January 25:
Thousands of people joined a silent funeral march in Phnom Penh for Cambodian union leader Chea Vichea, who was killed in what the opposition claim was another political assassination, Reuters reports. This is the first mass gathering the government has allowed since a disputed general election in July. Many of the mourners, wearing black headbands, calling Chea Vichea a "worker's hero," were women from the garment factories where he had fought to improve working conditions for nearly five years.
The Associated Press adds that Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party (CPP) won last year's general election but failed to get the two-thirds majority required to govern alone, resulting in a locked power struggle between the CPP and the opposition. Vichea became the latest victim of a series of suspected political killings involving critics of the ruling party of Prime Minister Hun Sen. The recent string of killings linked to the political opposition has created an atmosphere of fear, human rights advocates said. Several opposition legislators, including Sam Rainsy, joined the procession. King Norodom Sihanouk, who said that the murders of prominent persons are multiplying and are "undeniably" linked to politics, gave Chea Vichea a posthumous royal order which recognized his achievements.
January 26:
The opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) claims that five opposition and civil society leaders are on the ''black list'' of Prime Minister Hun Sen's ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP), the Japan Kyodo News reports. SRP leader Sam Rainsy, SRP Secretary General Eng Chhay Eang, and Secretary General of the royalist FUNCINPEC party Prince Norodom Sirivudh, are named on the one-page statement. The other two figures are Kem Sokha, director of the Cambodia Center for Human Rights, and Rong Chhun, president of the Cambodian Independent Teachers Association.
February 4:
According to two prominent Cambodian human rights groups, 2003 was Cambodia’s most violent year since the 1998 post-coup elections - with a 52 percent increase in the number of political activists killed from the previous year. Last year, 33 activists were murdered, and high-profile attacks took place against opposition party supporters, including reporter Mr. Chuor Cetharidh, and singer, Miss Touch Sunnich. The Cambodian Center for Human Rights said in its “Report on Civil and Political Rights Violations” that 23 political activists have also been murdered since the July 27, 2003 elections.
