The bodies of the mother and daughter covered with blood and riddled with bullets after being killed by Thai soldiers in October 2010.
Friday, 29 July 2011
Chhay Channyda and Vincent MacIsaac
Phnom Penh Post
Thailand's National Human Rights Commission is investigating allegations that the Thai military was involved in more than 20 extrajudicial killings of Cambodian civilians over the last four years, according to a member of the International Commission of Jurists.
Sarawut Pratoomraj, a senior programme officer at the International Commission of Jurists in Bangkok, told The Post yesterday that a subcommittee of the country’s national rights body had this week agreed to investigate a complaint over the allegations.
He also said it would begin questioning the Thai military in the border province of Surin late next month.
The complaint, submitted on June 21 and signed by 20 prominent Thai academics, activists and lawyers, calls for an “immediate investigation” into more than 20 deaths since the border conflict erupted in 2008. Most the cases involve men from border villages who were shot while logging inside Thailand and include a 16-year-old boy who was allegedly burned to death.
A member of the subcommittee confirmed it was looking into the complaint, but declined to comment further.
“As I am a member of [the] subcommittee on Civil and Political Rights … that will be considering the complaint, I feel that it would not be appropriate for me to comment on the issue at this time,” former senator Jon Ungphakorn wrote in an email.
Investigations into the more than 20 alleged extrajudicial killings by rights groups Adhoc and the Cambodia Centre for Human Rights are included as supporting documents.
The documents submitted to the Thai commission include cases from July 3, 2008, to March 17 this year. These comprise three deaths in 2008, eight in 2009, six in 2010, and one this year. They also include cases of Cambodians who disappeared or were jailed in Thailand after being apprehended by Thai soldiers, and others who were shot but returned to Cambodia before they were apprehended.
The most detailed investigation is into the September 11, 2009, killing of 16-year-old Yon Rith, who was captured by Thai soldiers after having been shot by them near the border in Oddar Meanchey province. CCHR suggests the boy was tied down in an oxcart and burned alive.
“Floor markings near his remains exhibit his desperate attempt to escape,” the report reads. “Even if Thai accounts that Yon Rith was dead before he was burned are true, Thai soldiers have committed murder by shooting and killing Yon Rith,” it concludes.
Sarawut said he had urged the panel to “investigate more deeply the Thai military and find out what happened for each case [submitted]”.
If the subcommittee requests additional information on the cases this would signal that it is taking the allegations seriously, he added.
Chhum Socheat, spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, said the Cambodian government welcomed an investigation. “If they investigate the killings they will find that their military has been shooting innocent civilians,” he said. The investigation could ease tension between soldiers, and civilians, on both sides of the border, he said.
Thai military and government spokesmen could not be reached yesterday.
Thailand's National Human Rights Commission is investigating allegations that the Thai military was involved in more than 20 extrajudicial killings of Cambodian civilians over the last four years, according to a member of the International Commission of Jurists.
Sarawut Pratoomraj, a senior programme officer at the International Commission of Jurists in Bangkok, told The Post yesterday that a subcommittee of the country’s national rights body had this week agreed to investigate a complaint over the allegations.
He also said it would begin questioning the Thai military in the border province of Surin late next month.
The complaint, submitted on June 21 and signed by 20 prominent Thai academics, activists and lawyers, calls for an “immediate investigation” into more than 20 deaths since the border conflict erupted in 2008. Most the cases involve men from border villages who were shot while logging inside Thailand and include a 16-year-old boy who was allegedly burned to death.
A member of the subcommittee confirmed it was looking into the complaint, but declined to comment further.
“As I am a member of [the] subcommittee on Civil and Political Rights … that will be considering the complaint, I feel that it would not be appropriate for me to comment on the issue at this time,” former senator Jon Ungphakorn wrote in an email.
Investigations into the more than 20 alleged extrajudicial killings by rights groups Adhoc and the Cambodia Centre for Human Rights are included as supporting documents.
The documents submitted to the Thai commission include cases from July 3, 2008, to March 17 this year. These comprise three deaths in 2008, eight in 2009, six in 2010, and one this year. They also include cases of Cambodians who disappeared or were jailed in Thailand after being apprehended by Thai soldiers, and others who were shot but returned to Cambodia before they were apprehended.
The most detailed investigation is into the September 11, 2009, killing of 16-year-old Yon Rith, who was captured by Thai soldiers after having been shot by them near the border in Oddar Meanchey province. CCHR suggests the boy was tied down in an oxcart and burned alive.
“Floor markings near his remains exhibit his desperate attempt to escape,” the report reads. “Even if Thai accounts that Yon Rith was dead before he was burned are true, Thai soldiers have committed murder by shooting and killing Yon Rith,” it concludes.
Sarawut said he had urged the panel to “investigate more deeply the Thai military and find out what happened for each case [submitted]”.
If the subcommittee requests additional information on the cases this would signal that it is taking the allegations seriously, he added.
Chhum Socheat, spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, said the Cambodian government welcomed an investigation. “If they investigate the killings they will find that their military has been shooting innocent civilians,” he said. The investigation could ease tension between soldiers, and civilians, on both sides of the border, he said.
Thai military and government spokesmen could not be reached yesterday.
7 comments:
This what Thai's soldiers did in the past and present time. If you ask the Burmese, loas, and Vietnamese they also have similar stories regarding harsh treatment from Thai's soldiers. Thai's soldiers have committed many human right violations in the past and present time and nothing was done about it. Take example, Khmers were loaded into trucks and they were dumped into Phnom Dong Rek cliff while Thai's soldiers threw stone at them and crushed them to death. Women, children hung to the cliff for survival; sadly Thai's soldiers finished them off with their heartless killing machine, there were thousands of them died at Phnom Dong Rek. USA should take a look at Thai's military on human right issues rather said "it doesnt take side" This is major concerns, why turned blind eyes? I thought USA is human right defender. Cambodian government should have pushed this agenda a long time ago. Thank god for the human right groups that care about other human kind regarding of their ethnicity. I am saying all Thai's are bad, there are good and bad. These human right violations cannot be ignored any more. How come, I never seen any Wikileak on this human right violation issues? May be it is not important enough to release the file.
The Cambodian government should be doing more than welcoming this reported investigation.
Beer Garden Anonymous.
USA can be defending human rights if it chooses to do and it has done so more than not.
Politics always rise above logics, common sense and the good side of human nature. For that America gets zero mark for choosing to be silent over the human rights abuses committed by the Thai military rather than speaking out against it. America should be helping her close ally to respect human rights and not abuse it.
America itself also commits human right abuses during the wars when it drops loads of bombs on its so-called good targets when some of those bombs fall on civilians. The case in point here is the dropping of the bombs on Neak Loeung during the civil war in Cambodia in the 70s as shown in the movie entitled "the Killing Fields".
However, America is more on the right track than many other nations so it needs to be encouraged and pressured to put more efforts into becoming a true advocate and defender of human rights.
Anet Khmer
This is a must to do investigation.
They killed all kinds of civilian people: men, women, young women, and even teenagers (younger than 18 years old).
This is a International Human Criminal.
There a must to bring those culprits.
I don't know people here seem to condemn the US because the US don't take part in solving Cambodia-Thai conflict.
How about United Kingdom?
UK is a very silent one: never said a word.
Well, yes the UK's human rights record isn't something to boast about either. Many UK nationals who married Cambodian citizens in Cambodia and tried to bring their spouses over to join them in the UK can testify to the nightmare and humiliation of the visa application process. Khmer nationals are often required to attend the entry clearance interview in Bangkok, and more likely than not only to hear their application is rejected on the flimsiest of pretexts.
This would be followed by a year or more of separation endured by the married couple while the appeal awaits hearing, eventually only for the judge to overrule the Home Office's decision in favour of the couple without - in some cases - going through any proper hearing process. The judge having browsed the arguments put forth by both parties in his office prior to turning up at the hearing chamber would simply siganl to the solicitors that the appeal is granted, leaving the anxious appellant momentarily stunned before regaining enough self-composure to say 'Thank-you, Your Honour!'.
Of course, at least the UK's justice system allows this kind of appeal and outcome eventually and after a great deal of stress endured and financial expenses paid towards all the costs of a legal paperwork.
This may not amount to human rights violation in any brutal sense, but a form of outright discrimination that is nonetheless just as painful and unjust to the victims.
Perhaps, one of the UK's most shameful records on human rights in recent memory had been the mistreatment of Vietnamese refugees quarantined on the former British territory of Hong Kong in the eighties and beyond. The refugees had been forced to remain in this cage-like concentration camp (where rape and suicide were daily horrors for inmates) because London had been determined to deter further waves of Vietnamese 'boat-people' from seeking refuge on its territory. I believe most of the refugees on the islands of Hong Kong (who had been lucky enough to have lived through their ordeals) had eventually been repatriated to Vietnam. And that's where their dream of a better life ended.
The UK is a loyal ally of the US. It has made some contribution in the context of third world development as well as peace-keeping. In relations to Cambodian-Thai conflict, London would prefer the role of a silent bystander for a number of reasons. However, the Thais have always been indebted to the British historically, and members of the Thai elite tend to be enamoured with the English high culture, from uniforms, horses and costumes to Eton where the departing Thai PM had been groomed.
England had been asked by Siam to put pressure on France over territorial claims and treaty negotiations. This British historical influence had resulted in the 1904/1907 Franco-Siamese demarcation Treaty between Siam and French Indochina which would have been accepted by Siamese rulers at the time as something of a favourable deal for Siam who still held on to most of the former Khmer provinces, but not by their descendants today who see nothing wrong in reneging on the treaty because one of the parties to that agreement - France - is not in Indochina anymore!
Kouprey
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