By TAING VIDA and JONATHAN GREIG
Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) officials and anti-terrorism police continued to grill rights workers for a second day yesterday, following a marathon session on Wednesday that lasted until 11 pm over allegations they told the alleged mistress of opposition leader Kem Sokha, Khom Chandaraty, to lie about their relationship to police.
Three rights workers – Ny Sokha, Yi Soksan and Nai Vonda – were brought back to the ACU offices at 8 am yesterday for further questioning along with three new ones: Adhoc’s Lim Mony, National Election Committee deputy secretary-general Ny Chakrya and Silaka director Thida Khus. The ACU tried to bring in UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights officer Sally Soen, but Mr. Soen has immunity as a UN employee. Ms. Khus said she spent three hours at the ACU, 40 minutes of which were spent in the interrogation room, before being allowed to leave. The other five were still at the ACU late last night and according to sources who spoke on condition of anonymity, they were to be detained overnight.
Despite her release, Ms. Khus said she was still afraid of being arrested. “I have done nothing wrong. I do not know what kind of situation Srey Mom [is in] so I can’t say if I’m angry at her or not since I’m here just to say what happened between me and her,” she said outside of the ACU. She added that she had only advised Ms. Chandaraty about her rights during the brief time they spoke.
Ms. Chandaraty had sought assistance from NGOs after audio tapes of intimate conversations – allegedly between her and Mr. Sokha – were posted online. Initially, she denied the female voice on the tapes was hers, but later admitted it was and claimed that the NGO staff she had sought help from told her to lie to police who questioned her about the tapes.
Civil society groups have spent the week criticizing the ACU for questioning and detaining human rights workers, with some opposition party members saying the graft-busting agency has descended into using Khmer Rouge-style tactics.
Twenty-seven civil society organizations signed a joint statement condemning the interrogations yesterday, saying it “amounts to an outrageous misuse of the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) as a political tool to attack and intimidate civil society.”
“The aggressive pursuit of this investigation demonstrates that the ACU’s priorities lie not in tackling endemic corruption, but in abusing its mandate to suppress civil society and target opposition figures,” the statement said.
“It is grossly inappropriate for this body to selectively apply criminal law to civil society and critics of the government. Cambodia is perceived as the most corrupt country in Southeast Asia; in this context, it is perverse but unfortunately unsurprising that the institution supposed to combat corruption is instead being used as a political tool to harass those working to promote human rights.”
The statement questioned the need for anti-terrorism police in this case and asked why the ACU decided to interrogate and prosecute a wide swathe of people with little to no connection to the original case involving Ms. Chandaraty.
“Hauling in civil society members who are only tangentially connected to the case is just another example of Cambodia’s flawed criminal justice system, in which the scales are weighted heavily against not only critics of the government, but also those who support them,” said Naly Pilorge, the director of Licadho.
The organizations cited recent statements by government officials, including one by ruling party spokesman Sok Eysan backing the decision to place two of ACU president Om Yentieng’s sons in senior positions within the ACU.
Chak Sopheap, executive director of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, said, “Civil society in Cambodia is coming under sustained attack, and this situation is becoming more severe as we approach the election period. But these tactics of intimidation will not work. We stand united in the face of this intimidation.”
