Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen (AFP/File, Tang Chhin Sothy)
WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United States said Thursday it was pressing
Cambodian leader Hun Sen to reverse his "very worrying" direction on
human rights as President Barack Obama prepared to visit for a regional
summit.
Obama will on Monday become the first sitting US president
to visit Cambodia, where human rights groups accuse the government of
stepping up a crackdown on dissidents and on protests, many linked to
land disputes.
Samantha Power, a White House official in charge of
human rights, told reporters on a conference call that Obama was
visiting for the "important" East Asia Summit and related meetings
hosted by Hun Sen.
"But our message to him on a bilateral basis is
very much about human rights abuses that are being committed within
Cambodia's borders and urging him once and for all to actually start to
take these concerns seriously rather than continuing to move in very
worrying directions," she said.
Power said that the main US
message to Hun Sen will be to hold free and fair elections, to end land
seizures and to protect human rights more broadly.
A dozen US
senators and members of the House of Representatives last month urged
Obama to speak out over Cambodia's "deteriorating human rights
situation."
Phil Robertson, the deputy Asia director of Human
Rights Watch, earlier said that if Obama does not speak out over
concerns, "his visit will be seen by the government as an endorsement
and deepen the sense of inviolability."
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