GENERAL APPEAL (Cambodia) : Police suppressed freedom of assembly and expression in Rattanakiri Province

Dear friends,

The Asian Human Rights Commission (AHRC) has received information from the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights (CCHR), human rights organization in Cambodia that police force prevented the holding of a public forum which CCHR organised on 27 November 2007 in Rattanakiri province. The police set up a roadblock to prevent the organizers from entering the place so that the forum was not held. Even though the villagers were unable to enter the venue, they started speaking with the organisers about the land grabbing in their area that had affected their livelihoods.

CASE DETAILS:

On 18 November 2007, CCHR informed the commune, district and provincial authorities of its plan to organise a public forum on 27 November 2007 in Kong Yuk village, Patey commune, O Yadao District in the northeastern province of Rattanakiri. The commune chief, Sev Ngang, gave a positive reply welcoming the forum. The district authorities did not reply. The provincial governor replied with a “disagreement” with the forum on the grounds of “insecurity” in the area, which was not justified based on the real situation, according to the organisers.

CCHR invited relevant officials and Members of Parliaments (MPs), but none replied to their invitation, except the Patey commune chief. CCHR also proceeded to disseminate information on its forum in and around Kong Yuk village and invited villagers to participate in it. It then got a make-shift meeting hall built with cover and floor mats for participants and invited guests.

All was set for the forum to be open, and in the morning of November 27 some 300 villagers arrived at the venue ready for debates and discussions. However, before the opening of the forum, the local police, without issuing any ban notice to the CCHR organisers, dispatched a force of nine officers, some of whom were armed with assault rifles to the access road some 3 kilometers away from the venue. This group set up a roadblock with their car and two motorcycles to bar CCHR organizers from making their way and bringing their audio equipment to the forum.

The O Yadao district police chief, Ma Vicheth, said that the police action is well warranted when “the organizers had not informed the local authorities.” However, the Patey commune chief contradicted Ma Vicheth’s allegation, saying that “the organizers had informed the district authorities and these authorities gave them authorisation.”

CCHR Director Ou Virak tried to talk with the police on the spot and then called Police Inspector Ma Vicheth to get the police to remove the roadblock so that the organizers could proceed to the forum with all the equipment and the forum could begin. During the negotiations some 100 villagers were walking from the venue to join the organizers at the police roadblock to request the police to remove the roadblock and allow the organisers to proceed to the forum. Those villagers offered to carry all the equipment if the police did not allow the organizers’ vehicle in.

Upon learning about the arrival of those villagers, Ma Vicheth charged that Ou Virak had incited the villagers to stage a demonstration without authorization and threatened to arrest him for such incitement. Unable to persuade the police to remove the road block Ou Virak gave up and cancelled the forum. But at that road block those villagers were nevertheless voicing in front of the CCHR organisers their grievances against land grabbing in their area that had affected their livelihood. The organizers simply recorded those grievances to air on their radio programme.

When asked about the police action, a representative of the villagers said it was a violation the rights and freedoms of the people meant to cover up corruption among local officials who colluded to sell the community land of the indigenous people. He said: “they shut the forum and they deny the rights of the people.”

BACKGROUND INFORMATION:

The Cambodian Centre for Human Rights (CCHR) is a non-governmental human rights organisation. It has been organising public forums in different localities around the country to enable people in and around those localities to debate and address local, regional and national issues together with relevant local, district, provincial and government officials, and also their Members of Parliaments (MPs), all whom it invite for the occasion.

During each forum, it sets strict rules of order for speakers to “take the floor” in turn in the pre-set time allocated to each speaker, on the first-come, first-served basis, to ensure fairness and allow everyone to have a voice if they so wish. The full length of each forum will then be broadcast on a number of radio stations whose airtime CCHR has bought.

Rattanakiri province where the forum was due to take place is a remote northeastern province bordering Laos and Vietnam. It is sparsely populated, and its population is mainly composed of different groups of indigenous people. All these people have a tradition of communal land ownership which the Cambodian Land Law recognizes and protects.

Over the past ten years or so there has been a continuous acquisition of land in that province “for development purposes”, especially by the rich and the powerful after the opening of roads to that province. This acquisition has affected the communal ownership of those people and reduced their “living space” where many of them still practice slash and burn cultivation.  Because of an ineffective enforcement of the Land Law, abuse of power and corruption of local officials, an increasing number of large areas of land in that province have been acquired as private property by powerful and rich people. Communal land has increasingly been and those indigenous people’s livelihood is being threatened.

In that particular area where the public forum was to be held, those indigenous people have been affected by a case of alleged land grabbing by a lady dignitary named Keat Kolney who is the wife of Chann Saphann, a Secretary of State for Land Management Urban Planning and Construction and the sister of Finance Minister Keat Chhon. The affected villagers have been protesting against this landgrabbing for some time. They wanted to participate in the planned forum to voice their side of the story and appeal to the government to protect their communal land.

Cambodia has a history of grave violations of human rights, and to prevent the repetition of this history it has undertaken, as its international human rights obligations, to ensure respect for, and observance of, human rights and fundamental freedoms. It has adhered to all international human rights norms and standards and incorporated them into its constitution.

The AHRC has learned that back in September the same local authorities and police had banned a seminar forum a radio NGO called Voice of Democracy had organized in the same locality. The Cambodian authorities have practically banned all public demonstrations since 2003, and have also banned or disrupted many of public forums organized by CCHR and Voice of Democracy.

The AHRC deplores the action taken by the authorities of Rattanakiri province and by the police of O Yadao district in particular for their suppression of freedom of assembly and expression which is a constitutional right Cambodian citizens. Action should be taken against the police of O Yadao district and effective measures should also be taken to prevent any repetition of such suppression.

SUGGESTED ACTION:
Please send your letters to the authorities listed below to call for action to stop all action to suppress freedom of assembly and expression in Cambodia. The AHRC is writing separate letters to the UN Special Representatives of the Secretary-General for human rights in Cambodia and UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of expression calling for their intervention into this case.

To support this case, please click here: SEND APPEAL LETTER