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Rong Chhun, a long-time activist and unionist, was sentenced on Wednesday to two years in jail at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, and he and two other defendants were ordered to pay a total 400 million riel, or nearly $100,000, in damages to Cambodia’s border committee.

Chhun was arrested at the end of July last year after issuing a statement that Cambodia was ceding territory to Vietnam along the border in Tbong Khmum province, a racially charged and contentious issue. His arrest sparked weeks of small nationalist protests in his support, leading to several other arrests.

On Wednesday, Chhun was found guilty of incitement to disturb social security alongside Ton Nimol and Sar Kanika, who had protested in support of Chhun but told the court during a trial hearing in February that they were only a tuk-tuk driver and market vendor, not political activists.

Chhun was sentenced to 24 months in jail, while Nimol and Kanika were sentenced to 20 months. Together, the three were ordered to pay 400 million riel, almost $100,000, in damages to the national border committee. They were also handed court fines of 2 million riel each, or about $500.

The three defendants reacted to the court’s decision by shouting that the verdict was unjust.

“It is injustice,” Chhun spoke out in the courtroom. “It is implemented based on a plan and order from the ruler. The court is under the influence of a politician, so the court cannot find justice for me.”

Chhun repeatedly clashed with judges and prosecutors during his trial this year, frequently objecting to the legal basis of the case against him.

Government lawyer Koun Saroeun said by phone on Wednesday that the verdict had restored “honor” to the border committee, though it had asked for higher compensation.

“As the government lawyer representing the committee, we gained back our honor and with this. We can accept it is not a problem,” Saroeun said. “For me, the [award for] damages is not really suitable yet, but we will not oppose or be disappointed over the court’s decision.”

Choem Sophal, 58, the mother of Kanika, said outside the court that her daughter had simply been concerned about injustices in society.

“[We] are the same Khmer. There should be an understanding, and she has not committed any serious mistake. And the word ‘incitement, incitement.’ I hate that word the most, incitement,” Sophal said.

She asked the court to release her daughter so she can come back home and restart her business as before.

Ouk Chhayavy, president of CITA, told reporters outside the court that the verdict was politically motivated.

“The court’s decision to sentence Rong Chhun today is a threat to the younger generation to abandon their studies, stop being aware of the country’s social issues, because those who sacrificed for the nation and society were imprisoned,” Chhayavy said.

She condemned the court system and said these decisions make people lose their trust in the judiciary.

Defense lawyer Choung Chou Ngy said the court had ruled without sufficient evidence.

“There is no exact evidence showing that my clients had committed an incitement offense,” Chou Ngy said. “I will meet with my clients to discuss the right to appeal.”

In February, Khmer Win Party leader Suong Sophorn was also sentenced to 20 months in jail and ordered to pay 2 billion riel, or about $500,000, to the border committee for protesting in support of Chhun last year.

Chhun’s trial began in January, with two more hearings in February and a fourth and final session held after a Covid-19 delay on July 30.

On social media, U.S. ambassador Patrick Murphy said the conviction of “respected union leader Rong Chhun” raised serious questions about freedom of speech protected in the Constitution “and essential to the functioning of a democracy.”

“The judicial system should not be abused to silence peaceful activists,” he said.

British ambassador Tina Redshaw also said on social media that she was “seriously concerned and disappointed” about Chhun’s sentencing.

“Freedom of expression is protected in Cambodia’s constitution and the judiciary shouldn’t be used to curtail it. Strong governments are open to hearing and engaging with a range of views from all of society,” she said.

Updated at 2:15 p.m. with additional comments. Notable Arrests Jailed in 2020 VOD and rights groups have tracked at least 46 controversial arrests this year as of October 23 over a range of issues: alleged “fake news” related to the Covid-19 pandemic, protests and statements made about border demarcations with Vietnam, environmental activism, campaigning related to the outlawed opposition CNRP, and more.

Two journalists were stopped and harassed by Phnom Penh police and security agents on Friday while covering a land dispute between authorities and residents along Boeng Tompun lake.

That same day, dozens of Meanchey district authorities used bulldozers and other heavy machinery to clear the homes of about 11 families along the reservoir in the city’s Boeng Tompun 1 commune, one week after ordering the homes be dismantled to make way for a private development. Government officials say the southern Phnom Penh lake is state-owned, but the body of water has become a development hotspot due to large-scale infilling and leasing to outside firms.

An Vichet, a freelance journalist working with CamboJA who was covering the home demolitions, said police confiscated his smartphone and press card and ordered him to delete all images he’d taken of the site.

“I was asked to show a press card and delete all photos,” he said. “They took my press card away and asked me to leave the place immediately or there would be a problem, saying this is their area, so no photography was allowed.”

Vichet said the encounter was a serious violation of press freedom and a restriction on journalists’ work.

“This activity of authorities is not hidden, it is in public, so journalists just have the role to capture the images and disseminate information to the public,” he said.

VOA Khmer reporter Lors Liblib, who also covered the dispute, said about 50 authorities took part in demolishing people’s homes.

“I was taking pictures when people were angry with the authorities,” he said. “Then [police] pointed at me, ordered for me to be arrested and my cell phone confiscated, and deleted all the pictures.”

Liblib said then authorities ordered him to leave the place, otherwise they will take other legal action.

“For me, I think this is a threat to the freedom of the press and they may want to hide this from the public,” he said.

The Cambodian Journalists Alliance Association (CamboJA) denounces the Meanchey district police and security agents for confiscating the identification cards of the reporters and calls on authorities to immediately stop such violations.

CamboJA executive director Nop Vy said in a statement that “the use of any forms of restrictions is a violation of the press law and the Constitution — that is unacceptable”.

“We call on the authorities to immediately stop the acts of harassment, intimidation and threats against journalists, and instead cooperate and pay respect to the role of journalists in order to prove that the government truly pays attention to and respects the rights of citizens, especially the right to information,” he said.

However, Phnom Penh deputy Governor Keut Chhe said the authorities’ actions against the reporters had been legally permitted.

“If we look at the instructions of the Ministry of Information, in the operation locations of authorities, journalists do not have immunity to enter the location,” he said. “Professional journalists must follow the instructions and the law, because it does not mean journalists have the right to access during the operation. It is understandable that the authorities have just deleted the image.”

Families affected by the reservoir project

Friday’s conflict played out in a similar fashion to many land disputes in the capital, where space is at a premium and new construction a booming business.

On February 20, 2018, the Council of Ministers issued a decision to provide 35 hectares of Boeng Tompun to a private company, reportedly Phnom Penh Precast Plants, to prepare the area for commercial and residential development. The company also said it would provide green space and restore the reservoir, which is dwindling in size as developers fill it with sand and earth.

Some residents say they have lived there for more than 30 years with recognition from local authorities.

Sou Chetra, 42, told CamboJA he has lived there since 1991 and that the authorities destroyed people’s houses without providing them with compensation.

“We have sent papers to the commune, district and cadastral department but have received no response. I am so hopeless now,” he said. “Please give us our land and our home, don’t hurt us. Authorities don’t need to feed us, we can live our way, just give us back [our property].”

Sari Vannda, 34, who works as a food delivery driver in Phnom Penh, said he did not know why his home was being demolished but that authorities had given him one week to move.

“Authorities just come and destroy our house by showing one paper. It’s our land and houses that we have lived in since our grandmother,” he said. “They want us to move, I don’t know how to deal with it. My family will have no place to live during COVID-19.”

Keut Chhe said after the government gave the private firm the right to develop the land, the company was obligated to offer compensation to affected families. Since the affected land is along the reservoir, authorities say it is state property and do not provide any compensation for lost property. Chhe denied that the affected homes were there for as long as residents said they were.

“The houses near the lake were just built after 2018, while those families will not receive compensation as they live on the state property,” he said. “We need to restore the reservoir to avoid flooding in the city.”

Still, it is believed that past decisions from the government did require the private firm involved in the Friday demolitions to pay compensation to displaced people at a rate set to the square meter of land lost. It’s not clear how or when those payments will be made.

Information Ministry spokesman Meas Sophorn did not comment.

Am Sam Ath, deputy director of the rights group Licadho, said no one rejects infrastructure development under peaceful conditions, but that the impact of projects on citizens must be considered, particularly during the COVID-19 crisis.

“The best choice is peaceful negotiation rather than damage or violence that can affect people,” he said. “To evacuate people is not advantageous based on previous instances, especially during COVID-19. It is a high tragedy for people while they are affected by COVID-19 and then their home is destroyed.”

Sam Ath also said journalists should be allowed to cover without intimidation all public activities by authorities.

“Journalists have the right to report, take photos and video without any barrier,” he said. “[Raising barriers] violates freedom of press and it seriously abuses the rights of journalists.”

An online journalist says he received an anonymous call that he took to be a threat after reporting on land clearing in Siem Reap province.

Sous Chamroeun, head of CHR TV Online, claimed in a July 27 report that a local businessman had cleared hundreds of hectares of state-owned protected forest in Chi Kreng district’s Lveng Russei commune.

He said he received an anonymous call soon after telling him to remove the story and saying they would file a complaint against him. The caller said the land had been bought from citizens.

“They threatened me. First, he said that if you do not delete it, you will have a problem. Second, he said that he will file a complaint about this to the minister of information. He said that my name has not been properly registered as a journalist,” Chamroeun said.

Chamroeun said he had recorded the conversation, but declined to share it as he was waiting to see if there are further developments before filing a complaint to authorities.

A phone number for the businessman named in Chamroeun’s article, Kong Vun, who has a local electricity distribution business among his interests, was answered by a woman who would only say that she was an employee of the electricity firm.

Lveng Russei commune chief Loung Phorn said people had previously cleared land in the area before selling it to a company he could not remember, which then sold it to Vun.

Information Ministry spokesperson Meas Sophorn said he had not received information about the case.

Two land dispute representatives have been fined about $1,000 each for Facebook posts showing a crowd of protesters in a Svay Rieng rice field, a gathering deemed by authorities to be a violation of Covid-19 measures.

“They came to gather more than 200 people in two places,” said Svay Chrum district governor Hem Sarith.

Action would be taken against any gathering that did not have the permission of authorities, Sarith said. “We wear face masks, practice social distancing and avoid gatherings,” he said.

Since late last week, the government has ordered a ban on gatherings of more than 10 people across the country for two weeks in a bid to prevent the spread of the Delta variant.

But a series of Facebook posts by Yous Sophorn on Monday showed villagers and children gathered in fields holding up banners, many without masks. A caption said: “On August 2, authorities came to ask people to give thumbprints to take 900 riel per square meter, but they didn’t accept. Where’s the place that has such a land price?”

The land dispute dates back to 2008, when the Ministry of Water Resources and Meteorology, together with local authorities, decided to use the area to create a reservoir. Since then, residents — who say they have farmed the land since the end of the Khmer Rouge era in 1979 — have sought appropriate compensation so that they can buy new land for farming.

Sophorn was among the two representatives who received a 4 million riel fine on Wednesday.

She said local officials were refusing to solve the problem for residents, instead persecuting them for raising the issue. She did not thumbprint the document ordering her to pay the fine, and she would not stop resisting, Sophorn said.

“I would like to request the government, especially Samdech Hun Sen, to intervene with the subordinate officials to solve the problems for the people. Otherwise, it will be prolonged even more. And the authorities have always accused the people of anything. They have always thought of accusing us without finding any way to solve it for the people to survive,” she said.

En Soth, who was also fined, said authorities were only making people more angry. About 30 people gathered outside the commune hall as Sophorn, Soth and a third representative were summoned for questioning on Wednesday.

“Where is the suitable compensation?” she said. “They said they would not take the people’s land. … If it is development on the tears of people, please do not do so, I do not want it. I want development with a decent exchange. Do not use power to oppress the people. I totally disagree.”

Four protesters seeking compensation from Phnom Penh’s new international airport development have been put in Covid-19 quarantine without cause, allege their wives, who accuse authorities of trying to silence the protests.

A local official, however, says the men were quarantined because they were in contact with a Covid-positive person when they submitted a petition at Prime Minister Hun Sen’s cabinet office in the capital.

The dispute in Kandal province has been tense for months since bulldozers attempted to clear farmers’ land. Protesters have camped out on the disputed area to stand guard, and have held a cursing ceremony against the developers, Cambodia Airport Investment, a joint venture between the Civil Aviation Secretariat and the Overseas Cambodia Investment Corporation, the prominent firm behind Phnom Penh’s Koh Pich island and several other projects. Last month, news publisher Los Seng said he was being pressured by authorities to stop reporting on the airport dispute.

Bat Sok Khoeun, 49, a resident of Kandal Stung district’s Boeng Khyang commune, said district police, commune police and commune officials arrived on Monday and gave the four protesters — including her husband — no choice but to enter Covid-19 quarantine for 14 days.

They had just returned from submitting a petition to Hun Sen’s cabinet, Sok Khoeun said.

She said the explanation for quarantine was unclear, and there was no documentation. “First, the doctor came and said that those who submitted the petition were positive. After talking longer and longer, the doctor said he came to take them to quarantine out of fear that they are positive.”

Hum Sokhem, 45, whose husband was also taken into quarantine, said she couldn’t help but feel suspicious. She demanded that authorities release the protesters and stop using Covid-19 as a way to prevent protests.

“They didn’t test anything. They came to accuse us of having Covid,” Sokhem said. “I’m just worried that they were being mistreated in connection with the land dispute with the company.”

Kandal Stung district governor Ouch Savoeun said the quarantine was purely for health precautions.

The four people were in contact with someone positive with Covid-19 when they went to file a petition at the Prime Minister’s cabinet office, Savoeun said.

“We did not arrest people. We followed administrative rules related to health work. We did not tie them up. We went to invite them to conduct quarantine because they had contacted a Covid-19 positive person,” Savoeun said. “We tested and took their sample. I’ve told them that in relation to gatherings, do not gather at all. Protests and settlements, it has been resolved.”

The protesters have been demanding compensation in line with market values — as much as $120 per square meter — rather than the offered $8, determined before the airport project was announced.

Van Sophat, a coordinator for the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, said some authorities appeared to be using Covid-19 as an excuse to ban land protests.

“The company and the authorities have used the pretext or taken the opportunity of Covid-19 to disperse, to deprive the people of the right to assemble and the right of expression in protecting their land. It only makes them more vulnerable. It is a very serious human rights violation,” Sophat said.

The new international airport, spanning 2,600 hectares in Kandal and Takeo provinces including an associated satellite city development, is slated to open in 2023.

A Cambodian court on Monday sentenced nine activists, including a lawmaker from the outlawed main opposition party, to prison terms ranging from 12 to 20 months on incitement charges for issuing pro-democracy petitions last year, the daughter of one of the defendants said.

Police arrested the seven opposition activists in October and December 2020 on incitement charges for staging a protest in front of the Chinese Embassy in the capital Phnom Penh last Oct. 23, the 29th anniversary of the singing of the Paris Peace Agreement, marking the official end of the Cambodian-Vietnamese War.

During the demonstration, they tried to submit petitions to the embassies of China, France, and the United States, saying that Cambodia had violated the democratic principles set forth in the Paris Peace Agreement.

Shortly after the arrests, Prime Minister Hun Sen publicly accused lawmaker Ho Van, an opposition official now living in California, of instigating the protests.

Shortly before the verdict was announced at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, one of the detained activists, Lim San, complained about the violation of detainees’ rights, lack of treatment for ill prisoners, and verbal abuse by guards in Prey Sar Prison where she is serving pre-trial detention, said her daughter Phan Sat.

The judge ignored her comments and read the verdicts for former Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) lawmaker Ho Vann and activist San Seihak, who is now living exile in Thailand, to 20 months in prison for instigating incitement to cause serious social unrest, Phan Sat said.

Four activists — Hong An, Lim San, Yoy Sreymom, and Ton Nimol — were each sentenced to 18 months in jail for incitement to commit serious social unrest, she said. The three other activists — Pai Ren, Sann Srey Neat, and Sat Pha, were sentenced to 12 months in prison on the same charges.

The judge told the seven activists, who were fined two million riel (U.S. $483) each, that they could file appeals if they were dissatisfied with the verdict.

Phan Sat, who attended the trial, said that the judge’s ruling was unfair. She maintains that her mother was acting legally during the protest and demanded that the court drop the charges and release all the activists.

“I want [her] to appeal because I do not agree with the verdict,” she said. “My mother is innocent. She had done nothing wrong.”

RFA could not reach defense lawyer Sam Sokong for comment.

He previously said that his clients’ protests are a guaranteed form of freedom of expression under Cambodia’s constitution and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The multinational treaty states that everyone has the rights to hold opinions without interference and to freedom of expression.

Civil society groups say that those who participated in the peaceful protest in front of the Chinese embassy were expressing their opinion.

Heng Kimhong, head of the research and advocacy program of the Cambodian Youth Network (CYN), urged the court to reconsider the convictions and sentences and said that unjust detentions would seriously affect human rights.

“Perhaps because they [the defendants] understood that since China was an important signatory to the 1991 Paris Peace Agreement that upheld human rights, democracy, and freedom of expression, they had gathered in front of the Chinese Embassy to demand that [China recognize Hun Sen's violations of the pact],” he said. “Their protests and demands are not a crime.”

Cambodia’s Supreme Court dissolved the CNRP in November 2017, two months after the arrest of its leader Kem Sokha for his role in an alleged scheme to topple Hun Sen’s government. The ban, along with a wider crackdown on NGOs and the independent media, paved the way for the ruling Cambodian People’s Party to win the country’s 2018 general elections.

Former CNRP lawmakers, political opposition activists, their relatives, and their supporters still face backlashes. Since early 2020, more than 80 political, environmental, and social activists, including a popular rapper, have been imprisoned on incitement charges as Hun Sen’s government seeks to silence its critics.

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Three environmental activists convicted earlier this year on incitement charges related to a planned protest have been handed a new charge of ‘plotting’ by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court in connection with an ongoing case against four other activists.

The trio, members of the environmental group Mother Nature, have been in prison since September 2020, when they were arrested for planning a one-woman march to raise awareness of the impact of filling in lakes for development in the capital. In May, they were sentenced to 18 to 20 months.

Rights group Licadho said Thon Ratha, Long Kunthea, and Phuon Keoreaksmey were handed an additional charge of plotting and questioned by the Municipal Court this week. If found guilty, they could face up to 10 years in prison. Licadho said their lawyers were not informed ahead of time and so the activists appeared at court without representation.

Sam Chamroeun, who represented the three in their last case, said Ratha was questioned on Monday, Kunthea was questioned on Tuesday and Ms Keoreaksmey was questioned on Wednesday, but said they refused to talk without their lawyers present.

“I just knew that they were summoned to be questioned but they did not answer yet because they are waiting for their lawyer [to defend them],” Chamroeun.

Attorney Sam Sokong said that all three activists were summoned for questioning over the new charges, which are connected with a second case involving activists who were arrested in June and charged with plotting and insulting the king, after reportedly taking photos of sewage being released into the Tonle Sap River near the Royal Palace.

Environmental activists Sun Ratha and Yim Leanghy were arrested on June 16 and later charged with both plotting and insulting the king. Another activist, Ly Chandaravuth, was charged only with plotting. All three youths are now in pretrial detention at Prey Sar prison’s CC1 and CC2. Mother Nature co-founder and Spanish national Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson, who remains abroad, was also charged with plotting and insulting the King. The case has been widely condemned as politically motivated, and represents just the latest in a series of cases against Mother Nature — which has long drawn the government’s ire.

Phnom Penh Municipal Court investigating judge Im Vannak, declined to comment, referring questions to the court spokesman, who could not be reached.

Am Sam Ath, deputy director of Licadho, said the charges were clearly aimed at silencing criticism among others.

“That additional charge for them is a threat and [aimed to] pressure environmental activists and other youths who want to join to protect the environment,” he said, adding that the government should support those trying to better Cambodia.

“We saw that the US and the US ambassador in Cambodia also requested the government to release them because they understand that it is not a crime and it is freedom of expression and activity to join the [fight to protect the] environment,” said Sam Ath.

Chak Sopheap, executive directive of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights said they strongly condemn the arrests and charges.

“The charges of plotting and lèse-majesté are a blatant illustration of the dangerous and restrictive environment in which activists in Cambodia operate and of the RGC’s [Royal Government of Cambodia] relentless efforts to stifle critical voices in the country,” she wrote in a message.

“CCHR deplores that imprisonment is an increasingly common price to pay for speaking out for human rights in Cambodia. We, therefore, urge the RGC to immediately release all the activists jailed for conducting their legitimate work, including members of the Mother Nature environmental group, and to unconditionally drop all the charges against them.”

A journalist working for Siem Reap Breaking News and arrested on Wednesday was charged with incitement and violations of the Covid-19 Law, the latter punishable by up to three years in prison.

Kouv Piseth, 32, was arrested by provincial military police in Battambang city on Wednesday for alleged incitement. The military police said the arrest was linked to Facebook posts from Piseth, but did not specify exactly what the journalist had said or done on the social media platform to warrant the arrest.

Duong Saron, a spokesperson for the Battambang court prosecutor’s office, confirmed on Friday that Piseth has been charged with incitement, under Article 495 of Criminal Code, as well as Article 11 of the controversial Covid-19 law for “obstruction of measure enforcement.”

While incitement carries up to two years in prison, the Covid-19 law violation carries a six-month to three-year prison sentence for intentionally obstructing or deterring the implementation of measures taken to curb the spread of the virus. It also carries a potential fine of about $500 to $2,500.

Chea Chanreaksmey, a spokesperson for the Battambang Provincial Court, did not say exactly how Piseth obstructed Covid-19 measures.

“Regarding the case, the investigating judge decided to place him in pretrial detention yesterday. Regarding the crime, I did not get more detail about the charges because it is in the process of investigation,” Chanreaksmey said.

In a June 27 Facebook post, Piseth questioned whether Chinese vaccines had been evaluated by the World Health Organization and if the vaccines should be used in Cambodia.

“Have the Chinese vaccines been evaluated by the WHO yet? If it has not, it should not be brought to inject because it has not been recognized,” the post said.

In May and June, the WHO approved the emergency use of the Sinopharm and Sinovac vaccines. The Cambodian government started using both vaccines before their formal approval.

Piseth had other Facebook posts accusing Prime Minister Hun Sen of acquiring assets in the country by betraying the nation — an accompanying image has mansions and arrows pointing to forests, a gold mine, an island and other resources.

Rights groups have criticized the Covid-19 Law for being broad and for having severe prison sentences for violations. The incitement charge has been used by the judiciary as a catchall to prosecute any expression of dissent.

Phnom Penh police said last month that 11 people had been charged and jailed in the city under the law at the time, mostly for obstructing the implementation of lockdown rules.

The Cambodian Center for Independent Media (CCIM) and the Cambodian Journalists Alliance (CamboJA) are deeply concerned that VOD reporters have been repeatedly stopped and intimidated by authorities while they are carrying out their professional duties.

On June 18, 2021, Prek Pnov district authorities with more than 10 members led by the district governor stopped and threatened a VOD videographer from the Cambodian Center for Independent Media who had gone to capture a temporary stopping place for Vietnamese people’s floating houses and fish farms after they were evacuated by authorities from a number of locations in Phnom Penh. In addition, the authorities also took photos of the videographer and his press card, and made a threat that he would be in trouble if any photos or videos were published.

This case came just a week after VOD reporters were blocked and threatened in a separate incident. On the morning of June 11, a VOD reporter and a videographer went to report the delivery of petitions by about 10 women, all wives of former CNRP activists, to the European Union. Daun Penh district authorities, with about 60 guards and officials, banned the reporters from taking photos and videos, warning that their equipment would be confiscated and they would be sent to the district hall if they dared to do so.

The Observatory has been informed about the denial of bail to Rong Chhun and Sar Kanika amid a COVID-19 outbreak in many Cambodian prisons. Mr. Chhun, a prominent labour rights defender, is the President of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions (CCU), and a member of the Cambodian Watchdog Council (CWC) [1]. Ms. Kanika is a member of the youth group Khmer Thavrak [2] and an ex-member of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP).

On June 8, 2021, Rong Chhun and Sar Kanika were denied bail by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, which claimed that the crime for which they have been detained affects social security and is therefore unbailable. Rong Chhun and Sar Kanika were not present at the bail hearing as prison officers requested the court to suspend the transportation of inmates to tribunals due to public health concerns. Since mid-May 2021, many Cambodian prisons have been affected by an outbreak of COVID-19. These prisons include Phnom Penh’s Correction Centre 1 (CC1) and Correction Centre 2 (CC2), where the two human rights defenders remain detained, respectively. Rong Chhun and Sar Kanika have been denied access to their lawyers for over four months, raising concerns over their current health condition.

The Observatory recalls that Rong Chhun was arbitrarily arrested at his home in Phnom Penh on July 31, 2020. On August 1, 2020, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court charged him with “incitement to commit a felony or cause social unrest” (Article 495 of the Cambodian Criminal Court) and ordered his pre-trial detention in CC1. Rong Chhun’s detention came following several public statements he made on behalf of the CWC in which he reported community land loss as a result of the demarcation of the Cambodia-Vietnam border.

Sar Kanika was arbitrarily detained in August 2020, amid a wave of arrests of human rights defenders and activists in relation to their planning of peaceful assemblies that were to take place at Freedom Park in Phnom Penh in September 2020 in order to demand the release of Rong Chhun. The Phnom Penh Municipal Court charged Sar Kanika with “incitement to commit a felony or cause social unrest” and placed her in pre-trial detention in CC2.

The Observatory further recalls that Hun Vannak, Chhoeun Daravy , Tha Lavy, Koet Saray, and Eng Malai (aka So Metta), members of Khmer Thavrak, as well as Muong Sopheak and Mean Prommony, member and Vice-President of the Khmer Student Intelligent League Association (KSILA), respectively, remain detained under the same charges in relation to the same acts. Their bail application was likewise rejected by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on May 18, 2021.

The Observatory strongly condemns the ongoing arbitrary detention of the above-mentioned human rights defenders and reiterates its deepest concern about the Cambodian authorities’ systematic legal harassment to target all critical voices, and about the serious deterioration of the human rights situation in the country, including through increasing obstacles to the exercise of the rights to freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly in Cambodia.

The Observatory is further concerned about the risks for the health of all human rights defenders arbitrarily detained in the overcrowded Cambodian prisons and calls on the authorities to immediately take all necessary measures to ensure their access to adequate healthcare and protective equipment, and reduce the prison population through the adoption of non-custodial measures.

The Observatory urges the Cambodian authorities to guarantee the physical integrity and psychological well-being of Rong Chhun, Sar Kanika, Hun Vannak, Chhoeun Daravy, Tha Lavy, Koet Saray, Eng Malai (aka So Metta), Muong Sopheak, and Mean Prommony. The Observatory also calls fortheir immediate and unconditional release, along with all other human rights defenders arbitrarily detained in Cambodia, in order to protect their right to health during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Actions requested:

Three Mother Nature environmentalists were charged on Monday and placed in pretrial detention at Phnom Penh’s Prey Sar prison, as the mother of one of the activists said she was in shock but buoyed by support on social media, including from celebrities.

Sun Ratha and Yim Leanghy were charged with plotting, which carries a jail term of five to 10 years, and insulting the king, punishable by one to five years. Ly Chandaravuth was charged with plotting, according to municipal court spokesperson Y Rin.

Ratha was placed in pretrial detention at Correctional Center II, and Leanghy and Chandaravuth at Correctional Center I, Rin said.

A fourth activist was also arrested in Phnom Penh but has been released.

Ly Chanavy, Chandaravuth’s mother, said she could not see her son’s face at the court on Monday as he had been brought in through a back entrance. But she had earlier seen all three smiling as they were transferred to and from the court, she said.

“They smiled with tears,” Chanavy said.

She was uplifted by seeing strong support for them on social media, she added.

Thierry Chantha Bin, a France-born footballer on the Cambodian national team, shared a post about the activists with emoji of an upheld fist, Cambodian flag and a sproutling. Comedian Peypey Dy also shared the post.

Singer Kesorrr said: “Hope to get further information and hope that nothing bad happens to them.” Singer Jenny Vee added a message: “Can we join hands together one more time?” #justice4all #justice4Rotha #justice4Daravuth #justice4Leanghy”

“Although I’m upset and shocked, I get power from them, because people who have never paid attention to the environment before and never shared [about it], this time they’re sharing and posting, including singers and a footballer,” Chanavy said.

She said the three arrested environmentalists, including her son, had shown bravery.

“He told me that what he has done for society is [for] a clean environment, no polluted water and no impact on biodiversity, and for people’s health and to keep the forests — he thought this was not wrong,” Chanavy said.

The activists were filming sewage discharge on Phnom Penh’s Riverside at the time of their arrest. On Facebook, Mother Nature posted photos of the activists advocating for environmental issues.

Am Sam Ath, deputy director at rights group Licadho, said Mother Nature’s deported co-founder, Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson, was also charged with plotting and insulting the king.

The charges against the environmentalists were severe, Sam Ath said. “We see these charges as a serious threat and intimidation for youth that love and protect the environment and natural resources — this is to break their spirit.”

Interior Ministry spokesperson Khieu Sopheak alleged last week that the group was using environmental issues to try to topple the government.

Three other Mother Nature activists were arrested for incitement last September and sentenced to 18-20 months in jail last month. The latest arrests came just a week after the U.S. ambassador met with Interior Minister Sar Kheng over previous prosecutions against environmentalists.

A community representative in a Preah Sihanouk land dispute was arrested in a case in which three Coalition of Cambodian Farmer Community members were also sentenced to jail last year, and which has previously been reported as involving Deputy Prime Minister Yim Chhay Ly.

Sam Sophat, who the coalition said had represented 68 families in a dispute in Prey Nob district, was arrested on Sunday based on a court warrant from March, said district police chief Hour Yay.

According to a Supreme Court document, Sophat was found guilty by the provincial court on June 17 last year, alongside Sam Samol, Svay Sareth and Nhek Sara. The verdict was upheld by the Appeal Court and Supreme Court last year.

Coalition of Cambodian Farmer Community director Theng Savoeun said the three others were members of the coalition, but had not been sent to jail.

He said they had all been sentenced under Article 97 of the Forestry Law, which lists 10 different crimes carrying jail terms of five to 10 years.

According to Savoeun, the case involved the Than Sour company and one of its developments in the area. The company could not be found on Commerce Ministry records, but the Phnom Penh Post reported in 2016 that the company was managed by Deputy Prime Minister Yim Chhay Ly.

Preah Sihanouk Provincial court spokesperson Yem Bunareth declined to comment on the case and arrest.

Cheap Sotheary, provincial coordinator for human rights group Adhoc, said she had attended last year’s court trial, where Sophat and the others were accused of removing trees from land claimed by Than Sour. But Sophat had argued that he owned the land and that he had planted trees, not removed them. The case had been brought to court by the Forestry Administration, she said.

Sotheary added that Than Sour was involved in several land disputes in the area.

Long Lun, Sophat’s lawyer, said his client was also involved in several lawsuits, and he was not clear on the arrest.

Sophat’s brother Sam Sopheap said Sophat had been called into the commune police station then arrested by district officers.

“Five criminal police officers came to arrest him. They took him to the district police office and one hour later sent him to the provincial police and to the prison yesterday at 11 a.m.,” Sopheap said on Tuesday.

Savoeun, the CCFC director, said the dispute was about people living on forestry land, and the Forestry Administration should grant land to them rather than prosecute them.

Chhay Ly, the deputy prime minister, is also chair of the Council for Agriculture and Rural Development, a governmental body established in 1998.

Kea Sokun, a young Siem Reap rapper jailed for incitement over his nationalist lyrics, had his yearlong prison sentence upheld by the Appeal Court in Battambang on Wednesday.

Sokun was arrested last September in relation to his song “Dey Khmer,” or Khmer Land, which now has more than 4 million views on YouTube. The song spoke about “the bravery to stand up,” while also warning that “the other race is encroaching” — an apparent reference to long-standing, racially tinged fears related to the Vietnamese border that sparked protests and arrests last year. He was found guilty in late December.

Am Sam Ath, monitoring manager for rights group Licadho, said the NGO provided a lawyer for Sokun at the Appeal Court, which upheld the earlier Siem Reap Provincial Court verdict.

“There were a lot of challenges [made] — the key thing that the lawyer raised about this was the freedom of expression of people, including composing songs and singing songs, and that there was no intention to incite chaos in society or serve anybody’s interest. His intention was to earn money on YouTube,” Sam Ath said.

Sokun was talented, and officials should educate him rather than jail him so he can be an artist that contributes to society, Sam Ath said.

“The prosecutor still kept their stance that the song has an inciting nature and is a crime,” he said. “As civil society, we do not see it as a crime as charged. But we see that he has talent in composing songs and expressing his views.”

Sokun’s sister, Kea Channa, said the family was disappointed by the decision.

“He was just expressing his view about his country and the nation, but instead he was given heavy punishment,” Channa said.

Teang Sambo, spokesperson for the Appeal Court in Battambang, confirmed that the court upheld the verdict.

Earlier this week, the American Bar Association issued a report on the case, in which it said that “[t]he charge of incitement is so broad that the government can apply it in a variety of cases.”

“Together, Articles 494 and 495 form a vague charge that some say is left open to politically motivated misuse,” the association said.

In Sokun’s case, he was “held for an excessive period of time prior to his trial,” the prosecution did not “present any concrete evidence” that his songs actually incited crimes, and it failed “to prove Sokun’s guilt beyond reasonable doubt,” it said.

“The prosecution and court have failed in their legal obligations to perform their roles in finding the truth and providing justice duly in line with Cambodian law and the ICCPR,” or the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the association said, and suggested bail for Sokun during the appeal process, among other recommendations.

The association’s senior staff attorney Waris Husain said the ABA had followed some trials in Cambodia over the past two years, including an espionage trial against two Radio Free Asia journalists and prosecutions against six top labor leaders.

“What we have seen recently is the use of Article 495 incitement to violence/crime being used against human rights defenders and those critical of the government. As the case involving Kea Sokun involved a charge like this, we decided to monitor and analyze the case leading to our fair trial report,” Husain said.

The Justice Ministry has repeatedly defended the courts’ independence and due process, and officials have said that free expression is restricted if it is ill-intended or harms society. The Culture Ministry has previously said in the context of Sokun’s case that it works to educate artists who produce improper works but takes stronger action if they do not listen.

“When it comes to arrests and such, it means that you’ve gone beyond the redline, and it’s come to affect social order and public order,” Culture Ministry spokesperson Long Bunna Sireyvath previously said.

Four members of the Mother Nature environmental group – Sun Ratha, Ly Chandaravuth, Yim Leanghy and Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson – were charged on Sunday, according to pro-government local media, with plotting and insulting the king (lèse majesté) under Articles 453 and 437(bis) of the Criminal Code, which carry maximum sentences of 10 years and 5 years, respectively.

Ratha and Chandaravuth were arrested alongside another activist, Seth Chhivlimeng, in Phnom Penh. The three were arrested on Wednesday morning, apparently in relation to their activities documenting runoff draining into the Tonle Sap river in the capital’s Daun Penh district. Chhivlimeng was later released from detention after being detained for 24 hours at the Police Private Security Management department of the Ministry of Interior, while Ratha and Chandaravuth remained in detention.

Also on Wednesday, police in Kandal province’s Koh Thom district summonsed environmental activist Yim Leanghy for questioning and he was arrested after arriving at the police station. He was later transferred to Phnom Penh and was sent to court along with Ratha and Chandaravuth. Leanghy, Ratha and Chandaravuth face between 1 and 5 years in prison for insulting the king as well as a fine of between 2 and 10 million riel ($500 to $2,500), and they also face between 5 and 10 years in prison for plotting. Also charged with the same crimes was Spanish national Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson, who was deported from Cambodia in 2015 in relation to his activities as the co-founder of the Mother Nature Cambodia environmental movement.

Leanghy is a 32-year-old student who obtained a scholarship to study for a Master’s degree at the Royal University of Phnom Penh’s Institute of Foreign Languages. Ratha is a 26-year-old accountant who graduated from the University of Cambodia, where she was also studying on a scholarship. Chandaravuth is a 22-year-old law student in his 4th year of studying law at the Royal University of Law and Economics.

Last month, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court sentenced three other imprisoned environmental activists associated with the Mother Nature movement to between 18 and 20 months in prison for organising a peaceful, one-woman march to highlight the filling-in of Phnom Penh’s Boeung Tamok lake. Two other Mother Nature members, Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson and Chea Kunthin, were also sentenced in absentia at the time.

The wives of Cambodian opposition activists jailed on “incitement” charges were roughed up by police as they staged a protest Friday outside the U.N.’s human rights office in Phnom Penh, demanding that the government drop the charges against their husbands and release them.

The group of about 10 women — known as the “Friday Wives” for their weekly rallies on behalf of their husbands from the banned Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) — demanded the release of their spouses following reports that the men had been infected with the coronavirus in prison.

Several police officers roughly manhandled the women as they tried to pry large posters with their husbands’ images from their hands during the protest in the capital’s Chamkar Mon district, the women said.

Prum Chantha, one of the protesters, said it was beyond belief that police resorted to manhandling them while breaking up the group in front of the U.N.’s office.

“They dared to abuse us in front of the U.N office… This is very unjust for the family members of politicians,” she said.

The women submitted a petition to the U.N.’s human rights office to intervene, saying that they were concerned about the health and safety of their husbands because they have been banned from communicating with them for the last three months while the pandemic has spread rapidly in Cambodia.

They complained that their husbands are at risk for contracting the virus because they are being held in overcrowded prison cells and don’t have enough food to eat.

The women have said that authorities should allow them access to their detained spouses during the COVID-19 pandemic so that they can monitor their health.

Dos Kimteang, another protester, told RFA that the women did not violate any laws by gathering because they did not impede traffic or disrupt social order, and that they adhered to the Health Ministry’s guidelines to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

“We never provoked any social chaos,” she said. “Please don’t abuse us and then accuse us of violating the law.”

‘They gathered without permission’

A coronavirus outbreak has surged unabated through Cambodia’s prisons in recent weeks amid a nationwide outbreak. As of Friday, the government reported a total 33,075 confirmed coronavirus cases, including 886 news ones, and 242 total related fatalities.

San Sok Seiha, spokesman for the Phnom Penh municipal police, said police prevented the women from gathering because they did not request official permission to assemble.

But when RFA asked him to cite the regulation that requires people to ask for permission to hold public gatherings, he refused to elaborate.

“They gathered without permission,” he said. “This county has laws, so authorities are obligated to implement them. We can’t let a few people to provoke problems in Phnom Penh city.”

On Friday, 20 civil society organizations and unions issued a statement repeating a call for the government to release all prisoners of conscience in light of the growing number of COVID-19 infections.

“In view of the reports of mounting COVID-19 cases within Cambodian prisons, compounded by prison overcrowding, we call on the RGC [Royal Government of Cambodia] to release all nonviolent prisoners of conscience as a mitigation measure to minimize the risk posed by the spread of the virus,” the statement said.

Soeung Sen Karuna, spokesman for the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (ADHOC) who monitored the Friday Wives protest, said that the police crackdown on the women in front of the U.N’s human rights office indicates a further decline of human rights in the Southeast Asian nation.

“This is yet more evidence showing that … the authorities should consider their actions and coordinate them, so that people can express themselves and their demands,” he said. “It would give the government a better image.”

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Tuesday denied bail to five members of activist group Khmer Thavrak and two members of the Khmer Student Intelligent League Association, as the defendants urged that they had already been in jail for as long as nine months.

Khmer Thavrak members Hun Vannak, Chhoeun Daravy, Tha Lavy, Eng Malai and Koet Saray were arrested in August and September amid protests in support of jailed unionist Rong Chhun; KSILA’s, Muong Sopheak and Mean Prom Mony were arrested in September for their involvement in the same protests.

On Tuesday, Malai, with a visible swollen leg, held hands with Daravy as their lawyers made their arguments for bail.

Vannak spoke out that even though the courts had not found them guilty, it had already jailed them for many months.

Judge Tith Sothy Borachat tried to cut him off, telling him that only lawyers would be permitted to speak.

“Please release us. We have clear home addresses and we are prepared to show up when the court needs to do any interrogation,” Vannak said.

Sam Chamroeun, one of three defense lawyers, argued that the pretrial detention had continued too long. The crime for which they had been charged — incitement to disturb social security — carried a potential jail sentence of six months to two years.

The seven defendants had already been in jail for longer than the low-end of the potential sentence, he said.

Pretrial detention of more than six months also breached the requirement for a quick and fair trial, Chamroeun argued, citing the Criminal Procedure Code.

“The court needs to consider this case as urgent and necessary,” he said.

Bail would reduce challenges for the defendants, including the risk of Covid-19 and mental health pressures, as they could be in the care of their families, Chamroeun said.

Deputy prosecutor Sam Rithy Veasna said the defendants had already had two trial hearings, and their release now would obstruct the court process.

The trial had been delayed due to Covid-19, he added. “We will continue the procedure when the Covid-19 situation is better,” he said.

Prum Mony was questioned during a trial hearing in February, when he was asked about links to a Cambodian-Australian former member of parliament in Victoria, Hong Lim.

Sopheak, the other KSILA member, said on Tuesday that he was chronically ill and he was not getting the care he needed.

“It is very difficult to endure this and it is very difficult to live there,” especially without money to spend in prison, Sopheak said.

He did not want to stay in prison as he was afraid that he would have mental health issues, he said.

During a 15-minute break, the defendants talked with each other and visiting family members. Some family members could be heard asking about their health and seen handing over bundles of 20,000 riel notes, worth about $5 each.

After the break, Sothy Borachat, the judge, said there was not enough evidence to release the defendants on bail, and rejected the defense’s arguments.

“To guarantee their presence for the charges at the upcoming trial, [the court] does not allow their release on bail,” he said.

A specific trial date was not announced.

Chamroeun, the defense lawyer, said he would discuss appealing the decision with his clients.

Soldiers fired bullets at land protesters on Thursday in Kandal province, hitting one man in the shoulder, as a group of about 100 Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) soldiers faced off against villagers involved in a land conflict in Kandal province, about five kilometres from Phnom Penh. The injured man remains hospitalised, while some local villagers resumed protesting on Friday morning.

The shooting occurred in Tuol Prich commune, Angk Snuol district, in an area that houses several military bases and outposts and has seen a boom in development in recent years. Villagers reported that the soldiers were from the nearby Thmat Pong military school. Videos of the incident show an excavator digging up land while local villagers try to stop it and block National Road 51. Uniformed soldiers can be seen advancing on the villagers and firing dozens of live rounds from handguns and assault rifles into the air, at the ground, and into the crowd of villagers, hitting one man in the shoulder.

The land conflict involves more than 150 hectares that have been farmed for many years by more than 300 local families from at least seven villages. Satellite data shows that the land around the location of the shooting has been farmed continuously since at least 2008, which is the earliest satellite imagery available on Google Earth. Government-produced maps dating from 2001 also mark the area as containing farmland. The Kandal provincial government issued a letter on Thursday saying that all of the land was state land, while some villagers have said they have farmed on the land since 1979.

There have been several shootings of land protesters by mixed forces including military soldiers in recent years. In January 2019, a man was shot in Preah Sihanouk province and left paralysed after mixed forces descended on protesters and opened fire during the enforcement of a Supreme Court decision over a land conflict in the province. In March 2018, three people were shot in Kratie after mixed forces fired into a crowd of 300 villagers protesting a violent eviction.

Several protesters captured the improper deployment of soldiers and excessive use of force using smartphones, and videos of the shooting were posted to Facebook.

For Hong Ly, the dispute over her family’s hectare of farmland in Kien Svay district was frustrating, but it became personal on Monday when authorities arrested her 40-year-old brother.

As the woman recounted his unexplained arrest on Wednesday, dozens of people huddled in the shade of her stilted house, discussing how authorities have disappointed them in their response to a yearlong land dispute and to the residents blocking National Road 1 in protest, and now for a new offense: the arrest of Hong Sok.

“He’s a gentleman. He never hurt anybody,” said Ly, 52.

A Kandal province land dispute that was supposed to be solved in 2017 has continued, as residents of three villages say they’ve been forcefully stopped from using their land, leading residents to block roads in protest of the dispute and one man’s arrest.

In less than an hour after reporters arrived, more than 60 people were murmuring to each other, occasionally raising their voices to explain the two-day protest and vent about the land they feel they’re losing to neighbors.

The dispute ignited on Sunday, when residents of Kien Svay district’s Banteay Dek commune decided to block National Road 1 in order to garner attention to their dispute, over about 3,000 hectares of farmland distributed among three villages.

The residents who were gathered under Ly’s house told VOD that they were awarded 1 hectare of land per family a few years ago, when Prime Minister Hun Sen intervened in their dispute with Lok Hour, a CPP lawmaker, and granted the area back to residents of Prek Pol, Kandal Krom and Samrong Thom villages. However, villagers said they never received titles for the area.

About 3 km away from their homes, past fields of rice, eggplants and other crops, the residents constructed a number of farm shacks to guard their land, marked with Cambodian and Buddhist flags. At the intersection of two dirt motorbike paths, residents hung large laminated posters of Hun Sen, deputy prime minister Sar Kheng and Hun Sen’s wife Bun Rany.

But since that government intervention, residents of another nearby village, Chong Ksat, have been trying to stop their community from using the farmland, explained resident Cheang Sinoun, 48. She said she had been able to clear and plow her land but wasn’t able to cultivate it, and some of her neighbors had been attacked with slingshots while trying to clear the land.

When asked why people would be attacking others for their land, Sinoun said she did not know, later adding, “I think someone hired the people to claim this land.” Powerful people have been interested in the area, she said.

Sinoun said a group of villagers — she couldn’t remember how many — gathered at the Kien Svay district office on Sunday at 8 a.m. to meet with officials, alleging that residents from another village were trying to prevent them from using land that was granted to them. They were ignored by district officials, so instead they went to block the national road at about 10 a.m. to demand attention. Sok, the arrested man, was with them during this protest.

“They threatened us to stop blocking the road. Police told us they could arrest us for blocking the road,” Sinoun said, saying this was the first time the frustrated residents took this action.

Recounting what she learned later from peers, Ly said her brother Sok had gone for a meal and coffee early Sunday evening, and was arrested at about 6:30 p.m. He participated in the protest, but Ly said she did not know why he was targeted, saying he wasn’t a community leader.

“We do not know whether someone called him [for a meal] to target him or not,” she said.

The residents then gathered again that night, blocking the road a second time, now to demand Sok’s release as well as for a solution to their dispute, Sinoun said.

“Only this way can break through to them,” she argued, saying authorities ignored their concerns before. “We are ignorant, but we don’t think it’s illegal.”

Sok’s 24-year-old daughter, Sok Kakada, said she saw her father briefly on Monday morning, when the residents reported to the Kien Svay district hall for a discussion. While others were worried about Sok’s health because he has diabetes, he told the crowd he was okay.

“We wanted to ask authorities” what Sok was charged with, Kakada said. “But they wouldn’t talk.”

Sin Siphoeun, another resident who joined the roadblock protest, said the authorities had promised protestors they would release Sok on Monday morning, but they had not. She called Sok’s short visit with the protestors an attempt by authorities to appease the angry residents, but she warned that they could block the road again. Siphoeun said she and her neighbors just wanted an explanation for his arrest.

“He has not killed anybody nor stolen anything from anybody, and what he has done was for all the people to find a solution, but [authorities] accused him of being a bad person and arrested him,” she said. “We’re not scared because we have not done anything illegal. … Why did they arrest [him] and what kind of offense did he commit?”

When asked about the dispute, Kandal’s deputy provincial governor, Nouv Peng Chandara, told reporters to check the provincial administration’s Facebook post from Monday, which said that residents who blocked the road had accepted the government’s mediation.

According to a Phnom Penh Post report from 2017, the Council of Ministers ordered the Land Ministry to return 2,997 hectares of land in Kien Svay and Sa’ang districts to villagers, with some 2,391 hectares taken from CPP lawmaker Hour.

Mao Phirun, a Kandal provincial councilor and former governor, said the land was returned to residents via a sub-decree in 2017 after Hour had taken the land illegally from residents. Hard titles from this area were made, he said, but people who were not granted land by the government could be jealous.

“People know it, and they have no land and they see other people’s land. … They have been provoked by other people,” he said.

“There are brokers behind this … the one who is behind it, they have been known [by the people], and the one who is being detained pushed the cyclo only to be crushed by the car,” he said. “[The protestors] will be the ones to bear the blow.”

Senior NagaWorld union leaders all received dismissal notices amid the casino’s plan to lay off more than 1,000 employees, a union official said, in what some labor and civil society observers labeled an attempt to eliminate the active union from the workplace.

NagaWorld has begun a process of laying off 1,329 employees, which it has explained is due to declining revenues, according to the union. But the workers targeted for dismissal have been long-time union members, and on Thursday the union’s top leadership all received notice, said NagaWorld union vice president Chhun Sokha.

Sokha said on Friday that she and other leaders, including union president Chhim Sithar and more than a dozen core activists, received a dismissal message from the company on Thursday.

As of Friday, more than 600 employees — mostly union members — had received notice, she added.

Sokha said the company wants to eliminate protests, which the union has led. She said recent protests were about protecting workers rights.

“It is a violation of the freedom of association. We have the right to be an independent union, which has been registered and recognized by the Ministry of Labor. And now the company is terminating the leaders as well as the union activists, to make the leaders and activists unable to fulfill their obligations on behalf of workers,” she said.

She added that NagaWorld should not be allowed to do whatever it wanted, and the union was preparing a legal complaint to file to the Labor Ministry.

She said most workers had declined the redundancy compensation offered by the company so they could fight the dismissals together.

“They are also waiting to see what Naga wants to do to the union. They said as they already cut [the leaders], they might as well cut all 8,000 employees in the company. Then let’s wait and see how the company will operate without any employees working for them.”

Labor Ministry spokesman Heng Sour said he hadn’t received any complaint from the union yet, but any dismissals of union leaders needed to be justified.

“In principle, union leaders cannot be fired unless they have made serious mistakes or violated any of the company’s internal regulations, or [due to] the actual financial situation of the company. We need to look at the facts and the root of the problem first,” Sour said.

NagaWorld chief operating officer Mike Ngai could not be reached.

International Labor Organization national coordinator Sophorn Tun, when asked if the ILO would be taking action in the case, said: “It will, as soon as it receives from the union of the workers affected a request detailing the circumstances of the case.”

He added that ILO staff have no authority to pronounce whether the case was a violation of labor rights or Cambodia’s Labor Law — “only its competent supervisory bodies, including the Committee on Freedom of Association [can do that].”

Ath Thorn, president of the Cambodian Labor Confederation, said he believed NagaWorld’s layoff plan was not about Covid-19 economic disruptions, but a way to eliminate union activities. The NagaWorld union had been unafraid to strike and protest.

“I can say that there can be some discrimination against the union, and [the company] wants to take advantages of workers’ rights. For example, dismissing old workers, recruiting new workers, eliminating unions, et cetera,” he said. “Laying off unionists in particular sets a bad example for other employers.”

Pav Sina, president of the Collective Union of Movement of Workers, said the company was taking advantage of the Covid-19 outbreak to “crush” the union.

“There is nothing other than intent to destroy the union,” Sina said. Dismissals due to genuine financial difficulties were fine, but “dismissals focusing on union activists, union leaders — these show that the real intention is to discriminate against the union.”

Cambodian Center for Human Rights executive director Chak Sopheap said mass layoffs amid Covid-19 went against the Labor Ministry’s advice to support workers during the crisis.

“If the termination refers to active individuals like union representatives, it means that the company has violated and harassed the union representative,” Sopheap said, calling it “revenge against active individuals.”

The casino and hotel company reported a net profit of $102 million in 2020 despite the Covid-19 crisis, down from more than $521 million in 2019.

Police detained an informal-workers union official and placed him in two-week quarantine in Banteay Meanchey province as he was gathering names of members facing economic difficulties amid the nation’s ongoing Covid-19 outbreak.

Poipet city deputy police chief Born Seiha said on Wednesday that Kang Nakorn, an official for the Independent Democracy of Informal Economy Association, or IDEA, was brought in after he went to a noodle shop that had previously been visited by people who tested positive for Covid-19. Nakorn had collected as many as 170 names, Seiha said.

Officers had yet to question Nakorn, as he was placed in quarantine at Nimit High School in the city, Seiha said.

“[We] have not arrested him. We called him in for questioning, called him in for questioning for collecting [names], of 170 people. For what purpose?” the deputy police chief said. “People complained to us.”

Seiha said he could not say whether the authorities would release Nakorn after 14 days of quarantine, as authorities were still investigating.

Vorn Pov, the union’s president, said there were others at the noodle shop, so it did not make sense to only detain and quarantine Nakorn.

“A lot of people,” Pov said. “Why was only he taken in?”

Nakorn had collected names and ID numbers of members linked to or facing challenges in relation to Covid-19 cases, Pov said.

“It is just a matter of charity — purely charitable activities, not political incitement,” he said. “So I think it is unusual to call him in for questioning. Yes — it’s regretful.”

He asked for Nakorn’s release, saying he suffered from health problems like high blood pressure.

Two digital news journalists reported harassment by authorities Tuesday while covering villagers protesting two separate land disputes.

Though government officials dismissed the confrontations with reporters from outlets VOD and TN Hot News as a matter of enforcing public order, media advocates are again sounding the alarm of ever-tightening restrictions of press freedom in Cambodia.

VOD reporter Khut Sokun, 33, said he had arrived at about 11 a.m. at the scene of a dispute in the Krakor district of Pursat province when an armed man in military uniform approached and seized his smartphone, recorder and notebook.

“I parked my motorbike and rushed to report,” Sokun told CamboJA of the day’s work in Ansar Chambak commune. “I turned on my recorder, and wrote what they were saying, but after that one official came to ask my identity, and where I had come from.”

Authorities had come to tell villagers mostly from the nearby Boribor district of Kampong Chhnang province to stop cultivating paddy rice in a location deemed state land, an area that authorities are measuring to reserve as a social land concession. They had come on Tuesday with military police, at least one of whom eventually focused on Sokun.

“I told him that I am a reporter at VOD, and I came to report something related to land issues, and he asked me to delete the pictures I’d taken from my smartphone,” Sokun recalled. “A man with a RCAF uniform and an AK-47 confiscated my recorder and notebook. They also tore up my notes of what I wrote and [deleted] audio from the recorder.”

Sokun said authorities returned his equipment more than a half-hour after talking with Pursat province Deputy Governor Cheng Lai, who had led the meeting to resolve the dispute.

“I tried to ask him why they didn’t allow pictures and reporting, but they did not tell me the reason,” Sokun said. “I think that it was threatening, intimidation, and it has restricted the right of press freedom because I did nothing wrong. I just went down to report and listen to what [the villagers] were saying.”

A VOD colleague who interviewed Cheng Lai after the incident told Sokun the deputy governor had claimed informally that his reporting on Tuesday had caused incitement among the villagers, a potentially serious charge often used to silence dissent. After hearing of this allegation, Sokun said that he is now scared to report land disputes in that area.

“Now, I dare not report this story because I am afraid of the accusation. I am also living near that area,” he said. “And yes, I am worried about my security and safety.”

Lai denied the accusation of harassment to CamboJA, saying officials had confronted the journalist only to learn who he was. Though he confirmed Sokun’s recorder had been confiscated and later returned, he denied that anyone had destroyed the reporter’s notes.

“Our authorities were working [to resolve the land dispute] and we did not know who he was, and at that time there were military police, police and soldiers accompanying me,” he said.

“We just asked what he was doing,” Lai said, adding that any claim otherwise was subjective. “It is just their opinion, because no one threatened him.”

As for the land dispute, Lai said people who have cultivated the area for a long time will be excluded from government action but that newcomers will have their access revoked. He said a directive was issued in 2017 to prepare a 5,400 hectare social land concession to benefit 3,000 families in the Ansar Chambak commune.

Though the deputy governor described the encounter with Sokun as benign, at least one witness described it otherwise.

“In fact, I saw they [authorities] scuffled with him, seized his phone and deleted pictures, and checked his press card,” said Pen Phol, 43, who attended Tuesday’s meeting and said authorities had not allowed photography and reporting. “I feel pity for him because he is a journalist that comes to help villagers who are suffering.”

After the confrontation, Phol said she didn’t see anything else, as authorities then dispersed the gathered villagers.

Phol is now concerned authorities will take her land away, noting that her family has been cultivating about 2 hectares since the 1980s.

“I am worried because I heard that they will revoke our land and provide it to other villagers,” she said.

When asked about the incident at Ansar Chambak, Information Ministry spokesman Meas Sophorn said local authorities had only implemented the law in their jurisdiction to maintain security and public order.

“Authorities and police have their duty to fulfill too,” he said, declining to comment further.

But Sokun wasn’t the only reporter to face a confrontation Tuesday from authorities while reporting on a land dispute case.

Keo Ratana, 36, journalist and publisher of TN TV, or TN Hot News Online, said that he suffered harassment while covering villagers protesting that same day against a decision of the Kampong Chhnang Provincial Court in favor of a wealthier landholder.

The protest was complicated when a bodyguard named Lon Leng intervened apparently on behalf of the landholder and, according to Ratana, physically confronted the journalist at the event. Ratana said Pheng ordered police to detain the reporter, but the officers did not due to the many villagers around him.

“He came and pushed me away and attempted to use violence, and I pushed his hand back,” Ratana said of the bodyguard. “As a journalist, I think it is a threat to press freedom as we carry out our professional journalism.”

Ratana was previously arrested in July 2019 by military police for his role in covering a long-running land dispute in Sihanoukville between local villagers and the Thai Boon Roong development company.

Ith Sothoeuth, media director at the Cambodian Center for Independent Media, condemned the harassment against working journalists who amplify important viewpoints for the public to hear.

“For me, it seriously threatens press freedom because journalists have just gone to fulfill their duty in reporting land disputes between villagers,” he said of the Tuesday incidents.

Sotheouth, whose center produces VOD, said the media plays a significant role in a democratic society by providing voices for those who can’t express their concerns by themselves to the government or the general public.

“It is an extreme violation of press freedom in Cambodia, while it has already narrowed its space,” he said, pointing to the confrontation in Ansar Chambak.

Nop Vy, executive director at CamboJA, said that any activities that obstruct the work of journalists run directly against government policy to cooperate with the press.

“It is a message of warning and intimidation to the duty of journalists,” he said, urging officials and the head of state to review law enforcement policies of lower authorities and advise them on correct implementation.

Cambodia’s Ministry of Information said local and foreign media coverage of the red zone has “confused the public and provoked social chaos that will lead to more COVID-19 spreading.”

“In order to protect social security and prevent COVID-19 from spreading, the Ministry of Information is advising journalists to halt all actions immediately,” it said in a statement issued Tuesday. “In the event that people continue to ignore this notice, [we] will take legal action.”

Ministry spokesman Meas Sophorn told RFA that journalists who went to “red zone” areas and broadcast live via social media made comments without any medical foundation that might risk the spread of the highly contagious virus. He also said that some reporters chased ambulances during live broadcasts.

“If they comply with the law, then they can continue their work,” he said.

Journalist Leng Det said even though he supports the ministry’s order, he wants the media to work with authorities so reporters can provide accurate news.

“In order to get accurate news, we need many sources,” he said. “We don’t have to chase ambulances and police to tell the news.”

Nop Vy, executive director of the Cambodian Journalists Alliance, said preventing the media from covering news in red zones will not be in villagers’ best interest, and he insisted that those who have received training on reporting on the coronavirus pandemic be allowed to cover news freely.

“I am very concerned that the ministry will completely ban journalists [from covering the red zone],” he said. “So far, journalists have broadcast about food shortages and people’s appeals to get food aid into the red zone. This has shown that journalists have contributed to disseminating news.”

Three Mother Nature environmentalists were sentenced to jail for 18 to 20 months for incitement over their activism, while two others, including the group’s founder, were also found guilty in absentia.

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court announced the verdict on Wednesday morning in a courtroom newly equipped with transparent screens and other Covid-19 preventative measures. Judge Li Sokha, wearing a mask, read out the verdict as the three defendants, Phuon Keoreaksmey, Long Kunthea and Thun Ratha, stood up holding hands.

Sokha said that based on the evidence, witnesses and the answers of the defendants, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court concluded that the three were guilty of incitement.

Ratha was handed 20 months in jail and a fine of 4 million riel, or about $1,000, for incitement to disturb social security. Alejandro Gonzalez-Davidson, the group’s co-founder who has been deported from Cambodia, was given the same sentence for being an accomplice.

Keoreaksmey, Kunthea and another activist tried in absentia, Chea Kunthin, were given 18 months and the same 4 million riel fine.

The court also issued arrest warrants against Gonzalez-Davidson and Kunthin and ordered the confiscation of materials belonging to them.

Ratha said aloud to reporters as he departed the courtroom: “This is very unjust. Sentencing people who just care about nature … they are very eager for trials.”

“The Khmer court is like this. Please tell people that we are still strong,” he said.

Defense lawyer Sam Chamroeun said he would discuss the verdict and a possible appeal with his clients.

Kunthea, Ratha and Keokeaksmey were arrested in September while planning a one-woman march by Kunthea to raise awareness about the infilling of Boeng Tamok, one of Phnom Penh’s last lakes.

Kandal provincial authorities have told farmers to stop posting photos of vegetables spoiling in their fields without a market amid lockdowns as they were affecting morale, an official said.

Hor Sophal, deputy director of the Kandal department of agriculture, said his department had visited farmers in Sa’ang district on Friday. There were in fact vegetables that farmers could not find a market for due to the Covid-19 crisis and lockdowns in the major markets of Phnom Penh and Takhmao city, he said.

But the officials had told the farmers to stop posting pictures publicly because it affected the morale of other farmers and affected society, Sophal said.

“This is his second time, so we went to instruct him, and now he took note and said [he would] stop posting in public,” he said about Tai Song, one farmer who had been posting photos to Facebook.

Song has uploaded pictures about having to clear and throw away his vegetables amid the lockdown’s closure of markets.

Song told VOD that he had been pressured to sign a contract saying he would stop.

“I’m very disappointed and have nothing to say to them,” Song said. “I asked them to go take a look at the vegetables in my village, but they didn’t go to look. Hundreds of hectares of sugarcane will be plowed in the future as well, and there’s no less than thousands of tons of vegetables that they did not help to find a solution for. They just ordered me.”

“They no longer allowed me to post and use Facebook extensively. Me!” he continued. “I’m just a normal farmer. … I don’t know what they think that they ordered me like this.”

Another farmer, who gave his name only as Bunly, said several farmers had posted the photos so that authorities are aware of problems and can help find solutions.

“They came down to hide the difficulties of the farmers, so we don’t know what to say when they spoke those words. We are discouraged because we give them information so that they can help solve it, but instead they say that [our] posting is [intended] to pollute society,” he said. “There should be encouragement to farmers who are smart in urging superiors to help find a market. But they turned on us to tell us to end the sharing, and not say that there is no market. But every day, there really is no market.”

The letter Song signed says the farmer must first provide information to local authorities, not post it publicly. This is to avoid sharing incomplete information, misleading the public and undermining the efforts of officials, the letter says.

Photos showing the destruction of vegetables affect public morale and feeling, and the photos can incite discrimination, the letter says.

Incitement to discriminate is a criminal charge that applies to inciting malice or violence against a particular ethnicity, nationality, race or religion, and carries a prison term of up to three years.

About 100 residents in a Phnom Penh lockdown zone protested for food on Thursday night, according to a witness, as the local commune chief labeled the protesters an “opposition group” who are “not poor” and “give the authorities headaches.”

Stung Meanchey II commune chief Touch Sam Ol, in Meanchey district, said the protest was in Phneat village, and authorities would be distributing food to the residents on Friday morning.

“We hadn’t been able to [distribute food] in time for them because there have been too many and the supplies have not arrived on time, and there has been only rice so we couldn’t distribute just rice,” Sam Ol said late Thursday.

However, he said there was a “mastermind” behind the protest.

“In short, they are an opposition group and they are not poor,” he said. “The majority are rich, and firstly they were angry with us because we blocked the road … and they could not earn money to support their living.”

A few of the protesters had even received gifts of food from the state already, he added. “It gives the authorities headaches,” he said.

He also denied that the residents were hungry.

“The most important issue is the blocking of the road, which means they cannot do their business,” he said. “So they linked the blocking of the road with starvation.”

Stung Meanchey II is part of Phnom Penh’s red-zone restrictions due to high numbers of Covid-19 cases linked to garment factory workers living there. The government shut down markets and initially said the Commerce Ministry would take over all food sales in red zones, though local authorities have since allowed some vendors to sell in open, outdoor areas. The government has also set up a Telegram group so people in need can ask for donations for food, and it has been flooded with thousands of messages.

Mao Thora, a restaurant worker near Thursday’s protest, said about 100 people had gathered on the street, some carrying banners saying “My village is starving.”

The protesters had said the village had yet to receive food donations from the state, and without the ability to run their businesses they couldn’t pay rent, according to Thora. Some were workers who could not get to their workplaces, while others were small business owners who had been forced to suspend their operations, she said.

“It was crowded so I did not go very close to them since I am afraid of infection since I am in the red zone. They gathered and protested to demand that the authorities quickly provide food donations for them,” she said.

Six youth activists were detained for a night for collecting thumbprints — despite the ongoing Covid-19 outbreak — for a petition calling on the government to ease citizens’ costs of living, the Phnom Penh governor said.

“What they are looking for — thumbprints — that is against the Covid-19 rules,” Khuong Sreng said.

The activists had admitted their guilt and were released, he said, adding that such actions could lead to legal action if they were infected with Covid-19 and had transmitted the disease to others.

The governor added that they were focusing on the wrong issue at the wrong time.

“At this time, they should be holding banners and telling all people to wear masks to protect themselves from Covid-19,” Sreng said. “That would be the most appropriate.”

Keo Tith Lida, president of the Women’s Association for Society, said three of her members had been arrested on Wednesday while making copies of their petition to deliver to Prime Minister Hun Sen on Friday.

She and two other members went to the Stung Meanchey 1 commune police station to try to secure the others’ release, but they were also detained, Tith Lida said.

The group has been collecting thumbprints for a petition calling on the government to ease people’s financial burdens. The petition suggests suspending payments to microfinance institutions and banks, halting water and electricity bills, reducing the price of gasoline, or halving businesses’ rent for three to six months.

Tith Lida said the six activists were detained overnight and released around 5 p.m. on Thursday.

“We were asked to make a contract … to not gather youths, to not collect thumbprints during Covid, and to not make any propaganda,” she said.

The campaign had now been suspended, she said.

Am Sam Ath, rights group Licadho’s monitoring manager, said everyone should be following the Health Ministry’s Covid-19 guidelines.

“There should be a discussion about solutions, and, in the future, they will follow the measures of the Ministry of Health and of the authorities about preventing the spread of Covid-19. That would be good,” Sam Ath said.

Tith Lida previously said the group had collected more than 200 thumbprints for its petition.

The Covid-19 pandemic has led to tens of thousands of job losses in Cambodia, with tourism having plummeted amid disruptions to global travel, and garment factories losing orders due to suppressed worldwide consumer demand.

More than 700,000 households, or about 2 million people, have received emergency cash handouts as part of the government’s IDPoor program, the Planning Ministry said last month.

Sitanan Satsaksit was on the phone to her brother early in the evening on 4 June when he told her to hold the line. Wanchalearm, also known as Tar, was handing over a few dollars for meatballs at a stall opposite his home in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh.

Then Sitanan heard noise coming from the other end of the line.

"I heard a loud bang. At first I thought he had a car accident as he shouted 'I can't breathe, I can't breathe,'" she tells the BBC.

Sitanan could hear the screams of her brother as men shouted in Khmer, a language she doesn't understand.

But her brother had not been hit by a car - he was being kidnapped.

Witnesses at the scene say they saw a group of armed men bundling Wanchalearm into a black SUV. As he shouted for help in Khmer, some people started moving towards him, but the armed abductors warned them to back off, before speeding away.

Confused and terrified, Sitanan could hear the muffled voice of her brother for another 30 minutes. Then the line went dead.

A friend of Wanchalearm made some inquiries for her.

"Twenty minutes later, this person called me back to say: 'Keep calm sister, Tar was abducted,'" she recalls.

Wanchalearm Satsaksit, 37, a prominent Thai pro-democracy activist who had lived in exile in Cambodia since 2014, has not been seen since. He is the ninth exiled critic of Thailand's military and monarchy to become a victim of enforced disappearance in recent years.

A popular and colourful character, Wanchalearm's activism started more than a decade ago, primarily focusing on gender and LGBT rights in Thailand. Over time, his interest started to shift to broader calls for democracy in the country, says Sunai Phasuk, a senior researcher for Human Rights Watch Asia and friend of Wanchalearm.

By the time of the 2014 military coup led by General Prayuth Chan-ocha, Wanchalearm was affiliated with the United Front for Democracy Against Dictatorship (UDD), also known as the Red Shirts. The group was first formed in 2006 to oppose an earlier military coup which overthrew then prime minister, Thaksin Shinawatra.

Wanchalearm was angered by what he saw as yet another affront to democracy by the military in 2014. The new junta wasted little time in rooting out its critics.

Soon after the coup, Wanchalearm's face appeared on TV and he was called to attend a meeting at a military camp, Sunai says. He didn't turn up. Wanchalearm knew this meant he needed to flee his homeland and start a new life in Cambodia.

Once in Phnom Penh, Wanchalearm settled into his new surroundings. But while he had swapped the dangers of Thailand for relative safety in the leafy outskirts of the Cambodian capital, he was still building up an online following in his homeland through his witty takedowns of the Thai government.

"He sees himself as a satirist, almost like a political comedian," Sunai says. "He made fun continuously of the military junta. He made fun of Gen Prayuth, who at that time was leader of the coup group, he made fun of other generals.

"He exposed what he considered to be stupid blunders of the junta using the dialect of north-easterners," he adds. "Most of them are poor and he is from that region. He did it to show that a commoner can make fun of those in power. That seemed to be the way of getting even with the oppressors."

But his playful poking did not go unnoticed.

In June 2018, Thai authorities issued an arrest warrant for Wanchalearm based on allegations he violated the Computer-Related Crime Act - which criminalises writing that incites unrest - through his Facebook page. The police vowed to bring him back to Thailand.

Wanchalearm was just one of many Thai exiles speaking out from the perceived safety of a neighbouring country. But in reality, doing so is becoming increasingly perilous.

At least eight other pro-democracy activists have disappeared since the 2014 coup.

The bodies of exiled critics Chatcharn Buppawan and Kraidej Luelert were found disembowelled and stuffed with concrete along the Mekong River border with Laos last year. The Thai army says it had no knowledge of what had happened. Jakrapob Penkair, who served as government spokesman under Thaksin Shinawatra, has been living in exile since 2009 after he says he received a tip-off that he was to be killed. He has known Wanchalearm for many years.

Speaking to the BBC from an undisclosed location, Jakrapob says he was shocked by his friend's disappearance due to the light-hearted nature of his activism. He sees almost no chance that Wanchalearm is still alive.

"I think the message is: 'Let's kill these folks. These are outsiders, these are people who are different from us and they should be killed in order to bring Thailand back to normalcy,'" he says.

"But nothing could be more wrong in that interpretation. I believe their decision to kidnap and murder Tar, and others before him, has been subconsciously radicalising the people.

"Like it or not, I think Tar's disappearance and his murder could be a turning point."

Wanchalearm's disappearance sparked protests in Bangkok, with demonstrators accusing the Thai government of involvement, while demanding the Cambodian government investigate the case fully. Posters of Wanchalearm and other disappeared activists have been cropping up around the city.

#SaveWanchalearm was trending on Thai Twitter in the days following his abduction.

The hashtag "#abolish112" was also written or retweeted more than 450,000 times. This is a reference to Article 112 of Thailand's criminal code, which states: "Whoever defames, insults or threatens the King, Queen, Heir-Apparent or Regent shall be punished with imprisonment of three to 15 years".

Some of the disappeared dissidents were accused of violating the article. Any public questioning of the monarchy in Thailand was until recently almost unheard of.

Many activists believe this abduction is linked to the palace, but the strict laws against any negative comment on the monarchy make this a dangerous link to explore or investigate.

Despite widespread outrage over the kidnapping of Wanchalearm, few are holding out much hope for his return.

"The abduction is not for money, it's not a private matter. There is no need to keep him alive," says Somyot Pruksakasemsuk, a prominent activist who served seven years in jail on charges of lese majeste - or "insulting the monarchy" - and defamation.

"The objective of kidnapping is to kill him and to create the atmosphere of fear in Thailand and other countries where [Thai] people are active in criticising the monarchy," adds Somyot, whose daughter was once in a long-term relationship with Wanchalearm.

Somyot was in little doubt as to who was behind the disappearance.

"The government knows very well about this kidnap and disappearance. I can insist that the government are the ones behind this violation," he says.

Thai government spokeswoman Narumon Pinyosinwat told the BBC: "We have no idea what happened to him.

"We don't do anything in that category of invading into other countries. They have their own law and control," she said.

"The person who can answer that question best should be the government of Cambodia because they know what happened in that country to this person."

In response to questions raised by opposition politicians in parliament, Thai Foreign Minister Don Pramudwinai said that Wanchalearm did not have political refugee status, so Thailand had to wait for Cambodia to finish its investigation.

The spokesman of the Cambodian interior ministry did not respond to requests for comment. A justice ministry spokesman told Voice of Democracy last week that investigations are under way to ascertain "whether the news is true or not".

Brad Adams, Asia director of Human Rights Watch, said: "Cambodia and Laos have obviously decided to look the other way as now nine prominent Thai exiles have been abducted, and likely killed, by unknown men."

The Thai government is pursuing a "quid pro quo" with its two neighbours, he said, accusing Bangkok of making Thailand "off limits" to Cambodian opposition figures.

"You can be sure there will be more refugees on the chopping block unless governments around the world start publicly demanding answers and accountability from leaders of these three rights abusing governments," he said.

Sunai Phasuk says Cambodia must investigate fully what has happened to Wanchalearm if it expects to be seen as a country that has "improved from a lawless society into a country with due process".

"A crime like this cannot happen in broad daylight. This is a test case for Cambodia," he says.

But Sitanan has little hope of ever seeing Wanchalearm alive again and is just trying to make sense of why someone would want to kill her younger brother.

"I want to know if someone has his own opinion, does he need to be so severely punished?" she asks.

"He didn't rob anyone, he didn't rape anyone. He just thinks differently. Do you really need to kill him?"

A Siem Reap-based journalist says he fears he is being targeted by illegal loggers after being beaten at night as he slept in a hammock outside Beng Mealea temple.

Pran Sean, the publisher of Anachak Khmer, a digital news outlet and quarterly newspaper, said he was driving a car to his home after covering news in Preah Vihear province on Sunday when he became tired and decided to sleep outside the temple in Siem Reap’s Svay Loeu district.

“I was too tired and started to tie up a hammock to rest. Later, around 12 o’clock, two men came out of the forest and attacked me,” Sean said.

A cut on his head required 20 stitches, and the attackers broke two of his teeth, he said.

Sean said he thought the attack was premeditated, and retribution for writing articles about illegal timber trading. “As a journalist, I write a lot of information related to crimes,” he said.

Svay Loeu district police chief Sun Eng said police were working on the case.

“It is difficult, brother. The victim went to sleep in the middle of the forest,” Eng said. “So far, we have not yet identified or arrested any suspects. All in all, we are monitoring and investigating.”

Cambodian Journalists Alliance executive director Nop Vy said he hoped the attackers would be found, as journalists in the country often faced the risk of violence.

Security guards blocked some protesters outside the Phnom Penh Municipal Court from buying breakfast, and told a street vendor of noodles, meatball soup, pork and rice to not sell to them, the protesters alleged on Thursday while rallying on an empty stomach.

Mey Sophorn, 41, and Dos Kimteav, 43, sat in the shade around the corner from City Mall, across the street from the court, around 10 a.m. on Thursday. Kimteav appeared dejected, while Sophorn’s face was hidden behind a surgical mask. They still had not eaten, they said.

“The food vendor would not dare to sell to us,” said Sophorn. “We felt hurt. We had money.”

Just before 8 a.m., the pair, among demonstrators calling for the release of jailed opposition members, initially tried to approach the street seller, stationed outside the mall on Charles de Gaulle Blvd., but was rebuffed by guards, Sophorn said.

“The security guards said that if we didn’t leave, they would stop them from selling,” she added

Kimteav said the guards had argued that the breakfast could turn into a larger gathering of protesters if they sat down around the seller.

One guard then approached the cart, allegedly telling the vendor and her two assistants, “Don’t sell it, don’t sell it, be careful, be careful of not being allowed to sell here,” according to Kimteav.

In recent months, guards have increasingly prohibited gatherings near the court, including confining protesters and journalists to the nearby Olympic Stadium grounds during prominent trial dates.

When VOD arrived at the scene around 10 a.m., five security guards sat on plastic chairs around the vendor eating, and this reporter was also able to order pork and rice with a fried egg.

The street vendor later acknowledged that a guard had spoken to her. If she sold to the women and the women caused trouble, she wouldn’t be allowed to continue her business, the vendor said she was told. The vendor declined to give her name or further details, saying she was afraid she would face problems.

It could not be ascertained for which institution the allegedly breakfast-blocking guards worked.

Chan Rithy, Phnom Penh’s chief of municipal security guards, said he had no information about Thursday’s enforcement. Prampi Makara district governor Lim Sophea and deputy governor Chea Sotheara said they were too busy to comment.

Phnom Penh City Hall spokesperson Met Measpheakdey, however, said he would look into the case. He said he needed more time to find out if the allegations were true.

“I will research and ask them if there was such a case or not, so I can comment,” Measpheakdey said on Thursday.

Reached on Friday, the spokesperson said he had checked with local authorities and none had reported the incident described by the two protesters, although Measpheakdey did not specify which authorities he asked about the alleged breakfast ban.

“There is no such case. I do not know​ which security guards would have led them to make these claims. No one forbids anyone to eat. It seems wrong,” he said.

Am Sam Ath, monitoring manager for human rights group Licadho, said that if the protesters’ account was accurate, the actions of a couple of guards could tarnish the image of authorities as a whole.

“There is no right to ban anyone from selling or eating,” he said. “There can be no ban on eating.”

The winner of the 2016 Goldman Environmental Prize Ouch Leng and four other forestry activists were sent to Kratie Provincial Court yesterday after being accused of putting signs up in a protected area.

On Friday, Leng, Heng Sros, Man Muth, Heng Run and Phong Cheang hung up signs in Prey Lang forest saying: “Please help preserve our ancestral heritage forest”.

Human rights Adhoc senior investigator Soeng Sen Karuna said yesterday if activists enter the forest just to monitor, gather information and hang signs to protect against deforestation, the authorities should not arrest them.

“Environment officials should take action on bad people who go into the forest, but not the activists who just want to prevent deforestation,” he claimed.

“According to the forest law, it will be implemented on people who commit crimes such as the destruction of natural resources, deforestation or killing wildlife,” he said.

Sen Karuna added that the leadership should intervene in this matter and not allow officials to take such action against activists who assist the government in preventing and protecting natural resources in Cambodia.

“Arresting an activist who uses their rights to protect the forests is not right and could be criticised by the international community, plus it is an opportunity for bad people to continue to destroy the forest,” he said.

Choub Sreynuth, wife of Sros, said she has asked the authorities to release her husband and the other activists.

“The activists only participated in protecting natural resources, but they have been arrested like they are perpetrators,” she said.

The provincial Environment Department director Duong Chhay Savuth said that according to Article 11 of the protected area law, all entry and exit to protected areas must be authorised.

He said the five activists went into Prey Lang wildlife sanctuary without asking permission. “The officials detained them for questioning for 48 hours on Friday, and sent them to the provincial court yesterday,” Savuth said.

Prosecutor Keo Socheat said yesterday the five activists are being detained and will be questioned further today.

Ministry of Environment spokesman Neth Pheaktra said yesterday, park rangers are judicial police officers who have the duty to protect and conserve natural resources in accordance with the law in preventing and suppressing illegal activities that take place in the protected area. No matter who the person is, if the rangers find that the act is not in accordance with the law, they must comply with the law.

“The suspects’ response stated that they were operating in the protected area to take pictures to seek financial support from various donors. This clearly shows the malicious intentions of some groups who take refuge under the label of environmentalists and forest activists who use bad methods to benefit their party and serve a corrupt agenda,” Pheaktra said.

He said that the Ministry of Environment calls on and encourages some donors to provide support to associations and NGOs that are properly registered and encourage law-abiding associations and NGOs.

Pheaktra added that the ministry welcomes the participation of associations and NGOs in the protection and conservation of natural resources, but that they must enter through the legal channels.

Ouch Leng, the working group leader of the Cambodian Human Rights Task Force was selected as the winner of The Goldman Environmental Prize 2016, presented by the Gold Fund for Global Environmental Heroes 2016 in San Francisco, United States.