PHNOM PENH, March 1 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Cambodia's Supreme Court rejected Tuesday an appeal by opposition leader Sam Rainsy (pictured) against conviction and two years in prison for tearing up boundary markers on the Cambodia-Vietnam border.
Presiding Justice Khim Pon said the court upheld the verdict and sentence for Sam Rainsy made by the Svay Rieng Provincial Court in January 2010.
Sam Rainsy, 62, is in self-exile in France.
He was sentenced in absentia last year for leading villagers in uprooting border markers in October 2009.
The lower court ruling found Sam Rainsy guilty of destruction of public property.
Sam Rainsy, leader of the Sam Rainsy Party, could not be reached for comment, but his lawyer Chou Chung Ngy told Kyodo News the ruling was "unjust."
He said Sam Rainsy's action was aimed at securing a proper border demarcation based on "fact and mutual interest" of the two countries.
Sam Rainsy has said his action was taken after villagers showed him wooden poles in their rice fields that had been placed by Vietnamese and "complacent" Cambodian officials.
He said the poles were 200-500 meters inside Cambodian territory and the villagers uprooted them "to symbolically show their refusal to give up ancestral rice fields they had been cultivating since 1979 and to be deprived of their livelihoods."
Both the Cambodian and Vietnamese governments rejected the border claim by Sam Rainsy and the villagers as "groundless."
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Opposition Leader Loses Appeal
3rd March, 2011
Sam Rainsy calls his convictions an attempt to exclude him from Cambodian elections.
RFA
Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy today blasted as “political” a Cambodian Supreme Court decision rejecting his appeal of a conviction for inciting racial tensions with Vietnam.
Rainsy, who lives in exile in France, was sentenced in absentia to a two-year prison term in January 2010 for removing border marking posts between the two countries in a protest the previous year.
He has frequently spoken out against what he has described as Vietnamese encroachment on Cambodian territory.
In a separate case, Sam Rainsy received an additional ten-year term for publishing what the Cambodian government called a false map of the border.
Speaking to RFA, Rainsy called the top court’s ruling “purely a political decision” and declared that France would likely refuse a Cambodian government request to extradite him to serve his jail term in Cambodia.
Upcoming election
Rights groups and Sam Rainsy’s own party have described the convictions as ploys to prevent the outspoken politician from contesting Cambodia’s next national election, which will be held in 2013.
He is widely viewed as the main rival to Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen, 59.
Expressing confidence in a favorable resolution of his case ahead of the election, Rainsy called for a “political solution” between his party and the government.
“There must be a political solution, as I have experienced cases like this many times before.”
“The government has used the courts to pressure me, but ultimately there will be a solution,” he said.
Reported and translated by Samean Yun for RFA’s Khmer service. Written in English by Richard Finney.
Presiding Justice Khim Pon said the court upheld the verdict and sentence for Sam Rainsy made by the Svay Rieng Provincial Court in January 2010.
Sam Rainsy, 62, is in self-exile in France.
He was sentenced in absentia last year for leading villagers in uprooting border markers in October 2009.
The lower court ruling found Sam Rainsy guilty of destruction of public property.
Sam Rainsy, leader of the Sam Rainsy Party, could not be reached for comment, but his lawyer Chou Chung Ngy told Kyodo News the ruling was "unjust."
He said Sam Rainsy's action was aimed at securing a proper border demarcation based on "fact and mutual interest" of the two countries.
Sam Rainsy has said his action was taken after villagers showed him wooden poles in their rice fields that had been placed by Vietnamese and "complacent" Cambodian officials.
He said the poles were 200-500 meters inside Cambodian territory and the villagers uprooted them "to symbolically show their refusal to give up ancestral rice fields they had been cultivating since 1979 and to be deprived of their livelihoods."
Both the Cambodian and Vietnamese governments rejected the border claim by Sam Rainsy and the villagers as "groundless."
--------------------------------
Opposition Leader Loses Appeal
3rd March, 2011
Sam Rainsy calls his convictions an attempt to exclude him from Cambodian elections.
RFA
Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy today blasted as “political” a Cambodian Supreme Court decision rejecting his appeal of a conviction for inciting racial tensions with Vietnam.
Rainsy, who lives in exile in France, was sentenced in absentia to a two-year prison term in January 2010 for removing border marking posts between the two countries in a protest the previous year.
He has frequently spoken out against what he has described as Vietnamese encroachment on Cambodian territory.
In a separate case, Sam Rainsy received an additional ten-year term for publishing what the Cambodian government called a false map of the border.
Speaking to RFA, Rainsy called the top court’s ruling “purely a political decision” and declared that France would likely refuse a Cambodian government request to extradite him to serve his jail term in Cambodia.
Upcoming election
Rights groups and Sam Rainsy’s own party have described the convictions as ploys to prevent the outspoken politician from contesting Cambodia’s next national election, which will be held in 2013.
He is widely viewed as the main rival to Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen, 59.
Expressing confidence in a favorable resolution of his case ahead of the election, Rainsy called for a “political solution” between his party and the government.
“There must be a political solution, as I have experienced cases like this many times before.”
“The government has used the courts to pressure me, but ultimately there will be a solution,” he said.
Reported and translated by Samean Yun for RFA’s Khmer service. Written in English by Richard Finney.
1 comment:
Does every one know that KI was funded by Thai, to separate us from youn, and to destroy Khmer, youn got khmer krom indeed franch cut it to youn, youn never fought with Khmer, Thai steale khmer land all time and fought with us over 700 years, doese any one know about this, all KI writer are Thai, they never show up real nam , they are thai. khmerization may tell you more about how KI thai media objectiv toward khmer
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