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| Yi Soksan (left), Nay Vanda (centre) and Ny Sokha (right) being released from Prey Sar prison. Licadho |
Leonie Kijewski, The Phnom Penh Post
Tue, 18 July 2017
The Permanent Mission of Cambodia to the United Nations warned the UN not to interfere in the Kingdom’s internal affairs after the body’s human rights arm issued a statement welcoming the release of the so-called “Adhoc 5”, according to a statement made public early this morning.
The Adhoc 5 – four current staffers of the rights group, and one former staffer-turned-election official – were released on bail on June 29 after spending more than a year in pre-trial detention in a “bribery” case relating to an opposition sex scandal. The case is widely seen as political, and in a July 7 statement, UN Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights spokeswoman Liz Throssell said the body welcomed the release, while also expressing concern about a lack of evidence and legal reasoning to justify charges against the five.
In response, the Cambodian mission said in its own statement that it would “take note with appreciation” the OHCHR’s statement, but “urge[d] the United Nations agents not to prejudice the independent functioning of the judiciary in the application of rule of law; as doing so is tantamount to [an] act of contempt of court”.
The statement goes on to argue that “civil societies & NGOs have quite frequently distorted facts, embarked on lie[s], and exacerbated or dramatized some remote cases in order to undermine the legitimacy of [the] state’s institution including the judiciary”.
Cambodian Center for Human Rights Executive Director Chak Sopheap in an email dismissed the permanent mission’s argument. “States cannot hide behind the well-worn excuse of ‘domestic affairs’ to evade scrutiny of their actions, and state sovereignty is never a justification for violations of human rights,” she said.
Sopheap pointed out that the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention declared in November last year that the detention of the Adhoc 5 was “arbitrary” and that the detainees’ human rights had been violated.
From KI Media - Khmer Intelligence
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