Cambodia - Deadly Politics
August 2003 - 19 min 15 sec
REPORTER: Jim Gerrand
The Cambodian election campaign is now in full swing and this man, opposition leader Sam Rainsy, has one of the most dangerous jobs in Asian politics.
SAM RAINSY, CAMBODIAN OPPOSITION LEADER, (Translation):In 1993, the people of SIEM Reap voted for me to become a member of the National Assembly, so I owe you a debt of gratitude and no-one can break the bond between Sam Rainsy and the people of Siem Reap.
What we want the most, what we love the most, is justice. We are strongly against the injustice caused by the corruption in our society.
Rainsy's attacks on corruption and the government's contempt for law are serious provocations in this country.
The regime of Cambodian strongman, PM Hun Sen, has the trappings of democracy, but a reputation for violence. In recent months at least 17 political opponents have been killed in the build up to this election.
Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People's Party, the CPP, are accused by the opposition and human rights groups of entrenching their power through political killings and intimidation.
Despite this, Hun Sen is insisting he isn't even campaigning for this election. He says he doesn't want to aggravate personal conflicts with his political opponents.
But that hasn't stopped him getting out amongst his power base in the countryside to portray himself as a man of the people. The CPP has a stranglehold on all levels of government - from the village up and it takes a brave politician to confront its iron grip on power.
Sam Rainsy discovered this when he was leadling a demonstration in Phnon Penh back in 1997.
SAM RAINSY: After five minutes there was a grenade that exploded in the middle of the crowd.
You can imagine the damage.
There were a total of four grenades that exploded. 20 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in the attack.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: I heard somebody shouting "Sam Rainsy is dead, Sam Rainsy is wounded." He was lying there and he had his eyes closed and he had a big stain of blood here on his chest.
Sam Rainsy's wife, Saumura, says the grenade throwers were allowed to escape through a line of Hun Sen's personal personal bodyguards.
SAMURA RAINSY: Why instead of arresting those grenade throwers, these soldiers opened their ranks and let them run and then closed their ranks, when they were demonstrators who run after the grenade throwers, the soldiers pointed their guns at the demonstrators.
Rainsy says that he has no doubt that he was the target of the attack. More than six years later there is still no arrests and no convictions for the crime.
This 20-year-old woman was one of the victims.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Every time I see that picture, I feel a lump in my throat. When I see it can never forget it.
Mrs Pouv Heng lost her 20-year-old daughter as well as a niece in the grenade attack on the demonstrators.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Why did they kill them with grenades? They were just demonstrating for a pay rise. If they don't find the killers, I'll struggle to the end of my life.
CAMPAIGNERS, (Translation): The Sam Rainsy party is the hope of the Cambodian people. Victory!
Far from crushing Mrs Heng, the tragedy has in fact made her determined to confront the Hun Sen regime.
She joined the Rainsy party and managed to get herself elected as deputy chief of her local commune, even though it's still dominated by the ruling CPP.
For these national elections, Mrs Heng is a key organiser in her provincial electorate.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Come and find me if you have any troubles. Like sickness or an emergency. Just find me.
CHILD, (Translation): The SRP will provide proper medical treatment. To poor people without charge.
Mrs Eang Tiv was also inspired to join the Rainsy party after the murder of her husband. He was an opposition scrutineer in the last national elections. But he refused to sign for the ballot boxes after he suspected CPP officials had meddled with them.
MRS. EANG TIV, (Translation): They said, "OK, don't sign for it. But one day you will die and rot like unsalted fish.
Eang Tiv's husband was shot dead by gunmen late one night in front of his children as he slept under the house.
MRS. EANG TIV, (Translation): When they came to shoot my husband, I was shocked. I was inside the house. I heard him cry out. I yelled "What's happened?" I opened the door and they pointed a gun at me. They said, "Don't shout or you'll be killed."
Again, no arrest, no convictions. The Sam Rainsy party claims that most cases like this are never genuinely investigated.
SAM RAINSY: I admire their courage because they accept, do take great risk to represent an opposition party in a remote area. Any harassments, any killing, can be disguised as accidents.
Four weeks have been allowed for this election campaign. Before this period, making public speeches or even handing out leaflets in a market like this were outlawed.
Rainsy followed everywhere by police.
POLICE, (Translation): We forbade them to distribute the leaflets. They didn't listen to what they were told.
In the buildup to this year's election, Sam Rainsy was targeted by the government when anti-Thai riots erupted in Phnon Penh.
Police stood by as a gang known as the 'Pagoda Boys' torched the Thai Embassy and a number of Thai business in Phnon Penh.
All this was provoked by bizarre media claims by a Thai actress that Cambodia's famous Angkor Temples really belonged to Thailand.
PM Hun Sen fuelled the anti-Thai hysteria by calling for a boycott of the actress's films. He then blamed Sam Rainsy for sparking the riots, forcing the opposition leader to seek refuge in the American Embassy.
SAM RAINSY: The US and Mr Powell himself have saved my life. Because I would have been arrested or killed by Mr Hun Sen if I was not given a protection.
Three weeks after the anti-Thai riots, a close advisor to the royalist Funcinpec party, Om Radsady, was shot dead in broad daylight as he left a restaurant in Phnon Penh.
Om Radsady's murder sent shock waves through the Funcinpec party, whose followers flocked to his funeral. The killing followed a fiery public row between Hun Sen and the king's half sister,
Princess Vacheahra, who had accused the Prime Minister of ignoring the national assembly by never attending it. Hun Sen reacted by demanding she apologise or he'd sue her. Om Radsady had been visiting the princess daily as her closest adviser.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: One day he came and see me and the day after he has been killed. He was just our friend. And two hours after his assassination, the ministry of interior declare that it was an affair of robbery.
Two suspects have been arrested and the government says it's investigating further, but it rules out political assassination because the gunmen fired too low.
KHIEU KANHARITH, SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INFORMATION: You cannot say that this was what we call killing, to shoot under the hip, but the bullet cut through his arteries. If you want to kill somebody, you have to kill on the head or something more important, organ, you know.. even children know how to shoot to kill.
Following Radsady's murder, Princess Vacheahra did apologise to Hun Sen.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: He wants me to apologise - OK, I do it. But please, no more killings.
REPORTER: So in that sense he wins?
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: Hun Sen wins all the time, because nobody dears to be against him.
The Hun Sen regime, in response to calls to investigate the rising number of highly suspicious murders in recent months, announced a police inquiry.
It concluded that none of the 30 murders or attempted murders investigated were politically motivated.
KHIEU KANHARITH: More than 85% of the cases were resolved. Maybe some were arrests, some were not arrest but we know the identity of the culprit 85%. This showed the political will of the government to eradicate any political violence, any violence during the election campaign.
Out in the countryside, most cases don't even get to the courts. Here, the rule of law starts and finishes with the local police whose jobs depend on loyalty to the Hun Sen regime.
I am taken by Sam Rainsy party activists to a small commune office where the local police are handling a recent murder of a Sam Rainsy party supporter.
In this darkened hut in a heavy storm, the police chief insists that the killing was not political but the result of a personal dispute.
POLICE, (Translation): We suspect personal revenge.
REPORTER: About what, what was the dispute about? What kind of revenge.
POLICE, (Translation): I can't say because we're in the process of investigating.
REPORTER: Because you don't know or you don't want to tell?
POLICE, (Translation): Because I don't know. The widow, according to Rainsy party activists, has changed her story. They say she initially believed her husband was killed because he'd quit the people's party and joined Sam Rainsy. Now she suggests it must have been over a personal dispute with his brother in law.
MRS. SAM SARORN, (Translation): Yes, it must have been. There was no other dispute.
Mrs Sam Sarorn is all too aware that she's now a widow with seven children and is under pressure from two sides - not only the police who keep hauling her back to the commune office for daily interviews but also the Sam Rainsy party activists.
ACTIVIST, (Translation): You should say it was a political killing, because your husband was with the SRP. It can only with for that reason. This time they did it to him, but next time it will be to others.
Another killing and nothing is clear. Whatever Mrs Sam Sarorn believes, the fact is she's lost her husband and still has to survive in this village community.
Sam Rainsy knows his party members are vulnerable and doesn't miss a moment to publicise any attacks for political advantage.
He's got a well-oiled media machine that didn't miss a beat when Rainsy met with US Secretary of State Colin Powell recently.
At a press conference immediately before he saw Hun Sen, Colin Powell talked up America's hopes for this weekend's election.
COLIN POWELL: Let's hope instead for a free, fair, open election, where we see the clash of ideas and clash of political personalities in a peaceful way. No violence in the election and an aggressive media helping the people of Cambodia understand what their political leaders are saying to them.
For Mr Sam Rainsy, the media attention generated by Powell's visit is crucial for getting his message out. It's also some sort of insurance against the risk of assassination.
Politicians are not the only ones in the firing line. Journalists who upset the government are also vulnerable. Journalists like Keo Sophorn, the editor of the Cambodian weekly, 'The Independent Voice'.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): Sometimes a day or so after an edition comes out, there will be phone calls threatening us with all kinds of intimidation. For example, death threats, and telling us that our days are numbered.
Two of Sophorn's fellow editors have been killed in recent years.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): Their killers were never found. They will never be able to find the killers. How can they find them? The same people who govern the country also act as judge and jury.
Riding his motorbike one Sunday, Sophorn himself was threatened and then pursued by gunmen before escaping into a crowded market.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): So I ran off while I saw them taking out a gun and trying to chase me. But I'd already mingled with the crowd. That was all I saw before I fled.
Sophorn is now living in Australia. Fearing for his life, he escaped Cambodia and is living in Sydney where his case for political asylum is being considered.
He fears for his wife and five children who remain behind in Phnon Penh. His pregnant daughter has already been threatened and was knocked to the ground by standover men when they came looking for Sophorn.
It's in such a climate that the people of Cambodia go to the polls this Sunday. Hun Sen has dominated power for the last 18 years and he's shown that he's determined to stay in power at any price.
REPORTER: JIM DURRAND EDITOR: BEN DEACON / KERRIE-ANN WALLACH
(Ref: 1743)
August 2003 - 19 min 15 sec
REPORTER: Jim Gerrand
The Cambodian election campaign is now in full swing and this man, opposition leader Sam Rainsy, has one of the most dangerous jobs in Asian politics.
SAM RAINSY, CAMBODIAN OPPOSITION LEADER, (Translation):In 1993, the people of SIEM Reap voted for me to become a member of the National Assembly, so I owe you a debt of gratitude and no-one can break the bond between Sam Rainsy and the people of Siem Reap.
What we want the most, what we love the most, is justice. We are strongly against the injustice caused by the corruption in our society.
Rainsy's attacks on corruption and the government's contempt for law are serious provocations in this country.
The regime of Cambodian strongman, PM Hun Sen, has the trappings of democracy, but a reputation for violence. In recent months at least 17 political opponents have been killed in the build up to this election.
Hun Sen and his ruling Cambodian People's Party, the CPP, are accused by the opposition and human rights groups of entrenching their power through political killings and intimidation.
Despite this, Hun Sen is insisting he isn't even campaigning for this election. He says he doesn't want to aggravate personal conflicts with his political opponents.
But that hasn't stopped him getting out amongst his power base in the countryside to portray himself as a man of the people. The CPP has a stranglehold on all levels of government - from the village up and it takes a brave politician to confront its iron grip on power.
Sam Rainsy discovered this when he was leadling a demonstration in Phnon Penh back in 1997.
SAM RAINSY: After five minutes there was a grenade that exploded in the middle of the crowd.
You can imagine the damage.
There were a total of four grenades that exploded. 20 people were killed and more than 100 wounded in the attack.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: I heard somebody shouting "Sam Rainsy is dead, Sam Rainsy is wounded." He was lying there and he had his eyes closed and he had a big stain of blood here on his chest.
Sam Rainsy's wife, Saumura, says the grenade throwers were allowed to escape through a line of Hun Sen's personal personal bodyguards.
SAMURA RAINSY: Why instead of arresting those grenade throwers, these soldiers opened their ranks and let them run and then closed their ranks, when they were demonstrators who run after the grenade throwers, the soldiers pointed their guns at the demonstrators.
Rainsy says that he has no doubt that he was the target of the attack. More than six years later there is still no arrests and no convictions for the crime.
This 20-year-old woman was one of the victims.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Every time I see that picture, I feel a lump in my throat. When I see it can never forget it.
Mrs Pouv Heng lost her 20-year-old daughter as well as a niece in the grenade attack on the demonstrators.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Why did they kill them with grenades? They were just demonstrating for a pay rise. If they don't find the killers, I'll struggle to the end of my life.
CAMPAIGNERS, (Translation): The Sam Rainsy party is the hope of the Cambodian people. Victory!
Far from crushing Mrs Heng, the tragedy has in fact made her determined to confront the Hun Sen regime.
She joined the Rainsy party and managed to get herself elected as deputy chief of her local commune, even though it's still dominated by the ruling CPP.
For these national elections, Mrs Heng is a key organiser in her provincial electorate.
MRS. POUV HENG, (Translation): Come and find me if you have any troubles. Like sickness or an emergency. Just find me.
CHILD, (Translation): The SRP will provide proper medical treatment. To poor people without charge.
Mrs Eang Tiv was also inspired to join the Rainsy party after the murder of her husband. He was an opposition scrutineer in the last national elections. But he refused to sign for the ballot boxes after he suspected CPP officials had meddled with them.
MRS. EANG TIV, (Translation): They said, "OK, don't sign for it. But one day you will die and rot like unsalted fish.
Eang Tiv's husband was shot dead by gunmen late one night in front of his children as he slept under the house.
MRS. EANG TIV, (Translation): When they came to shoot my husband, I was shocked. I was inside the house. I heard him cry out. I yelled "What's happened?" I opened the door and they pointed a gun at me. They said, "Don't shout or you'll be killed."
Again, no arrest, no convictions. The Sam Rainsy party claims that most cases like this are never genuinely investigated.
SAM RAINSY: I admire their courage because they accept, do take great risk to represent an opposition party in a remote area. Any harassments, any killing, can be disguised as accidents.
Four weeks have been allowed for this election campaign. Before this period, making public speeches or even handing out leaflets in a market like this were outlawed.
Rainsy followed everywhere by police.
POLICE, (Translation): We forbade them to distribute the leaflets. They didn't listen to what they were told.
In the buildup to this year's election, Sam Rainsy was targeted by the government when anti-Thai riots erupted in Phnon Penh.
Police stood by as a gang known as the 'Pagoda Boys' torched the Thai Embassy and a number of Thai business in Phnon Penh.
All this was provoked by bizarre media claims by a Thai actress that Cambodia's famous Angkor Temples really belonged to Thailand.
PM Hun Sen fuelled the anti-Thai hysteria by calling for a boycott of the actress's films. He then blamed Sam Rainsy for sparking the riots, forcing the opposition leader to seek refuge in the American Embassy.
SAM RAINSY: The US and Mr Powell himself have saved my life. Because I would have been arrested or killed by Mr Hun Sen if I was not given a protection.
Three weeks after the anti-Thai riots, a close advisor to the royalist Funcinpec party, Om Radsady, was shot dead in broad daylight as he left a restaurant in Phnon Penh.
Om Radsady's murder sent shock waves through the Funcinpec party, whose followers flocked to his funeral. The killing followed a fiery public row between Hun Sen and the king's half sister,
Princess Vacheahra, who had accused the Prime Minister of ignoring the national assembly by never attending it. Hun Sen reacted by demanding she apologise or he'd sue her. Om Radsady had been visiting the princess daily as her closest adviser.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: One day he came and see me and the day after he has been killed. He was just our friend. And two hours after his assassination, the ministry of interior declare that it was an affair of robbery.
Two suspects have been arrested and the government says it's investigating further, but it rules out political assassination because the gunmen fired too low.
KHIEU KANHARITH, SECRETARY OF STATE FOR INFORMATION: You cannot say that this was what we call killing, to shoot under the hip, but the bullet cut through his arteries. If you want to kill somebody, you have to kill on the head or something more important, organ, you know.. even children know how to shoot to kill.
Following Radsady's murder, Princess Vacheahra did apologise to Hun Sen.
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: He wants me to apologise - OK, I do it. But please, no more killings.
REPORTER: So in that sense he wins?
PRINCESS VACHEAHRA: Hun Sen wins all the time, because nobody dears to be against him.
The Hun Sen regime, in response to calls to investigate the rising number of highly suspicious murders in recent months, announced a police inquiry.
It concluded that none of the 30 murders or attempted murders investigated were politically motivated.
KHIEU KANHARITH: More than 85% of the cases were resolved. Maybe some were arrests, some were not arrest but we know the identity of the culprit 85%. This showed the political will of the government to eradicate any political violence, any violence during the election campaign.
Out in the countryside, most cases don't even get to the courts. Here, the rule of law starts and finishes with the local police whose jobs depend on loyalty to the Hun Sen regime.
I am taken by Sam Rainsy party activists to a small commune office where the local police are handling a recent murder of a Sam Rainsy party supporter.
In this darkened hut in a heavy storm, the police chief insists that the killing was not political but the result of a personal dispute.
POLICE, (Translation): We suspect personal revenge.
REPORTER: About what, what was the dispute about? What kind of revenge.
POLICE, (Translation): I can't say because we're in the process of investigating.
REPORTER: Because you don't know or you don't want to tell?
POLICE, (Translation): Because I don't know. The widow, according to Rainsy party activists, has changed her story. They say she initially believed her husband was killed because he'd quit the people's party and joined Sam Rainsy. Now she suggests it must have been over a personal dispute with his brother in law.
MRS. SAM SARORN, (Translation): Yes, it must have been. There was no other dispute.
Mrs Sam Sarorn is all too aware that she's now a widow with seven children and is under pressure from two sides - not only the police who keep hauling her back to the commune office for daily interviews but also the Sam Rainsy party activists.
ACTIVIST, (Translation): You should say it was a political killing, because your husband was with the SRP. It can only with for that reason. This time they did it to him, but next time it will be to others.
Another killing and nothing is clear. Whatever Mrs Sam Sarorn believes, the fact is she's lost her husband and still has to survive in this village community.
Sam Rainsy knows his party members are vulnerable and doesn't miss a moment to publicise any attacks for political advantage.
He's got a well-oiled media machine that didn't miss a beat when Rainsy met with US Secretary of State Colin Powell recently.
At a press conference immediately before he saw Hun Sen, Colin Powell talked up America's hopes for this weekend's election.
COLIN POWELL: Let's hope instead for a free, fair, open election, where we see the clash of ideas and clash of political personalities in a peaceful way. No violence in the election and an aggressive media helping the people of Cambodia understand what their political leaders are saying to them.
For Mr Sam Rainsy, the media attention generated by Powell's visit is crucial for getting his message out. It's also some sort of insurance against the risk of assassination.
Politicians are not the only ones in the firing line. Journalists who upset the government are also vulnerable. Journalists like Keo Sophorn, the editor of the Cambodian weekly, 'The Independent Voice'.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): Sometimes a day or so after an edition comes out, there will be phone calls threatening us with all kinds of intimidation. For example, death threats, and telling us that our days are numbered.
Two of Sophorn's fellow editors have been killed in recent years.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): Their killers were never found. They will never be able to find the killers. How can they find them? The same people who govern the country also act as judge and jury.
Riding his motorbike one Sunday, Sophorn himself was threatened and then pursued by gunmen before escaping into a crowded market.
KEO SOPHORN, (Translation): So I ran off while I saw them taking out a gun and trying to chase me. But I'd already mingled with the crowd. That was all I saw before I fled.
Sophorn is now living in Australia. Fearing for his life, he escaped Cambodia and is living in Sydney where his case for political asylum is being considered.
He fears for his wife and five children who remain behind in Phnon Penh. His pregnant daughter has already been threatened and was knocked to the ground by standover men when they came looking for Sophorn.
It's in such a climate that the people of Cambodia go to the polls this Sunday. Hun Sen has dominated power for the last 18 years and he's shown that he's determined to stay in power at any price.
REPORTER: JIM DURRAND EDITOR: BEN DEACON / KERRIE-ANN WALLACH
(Ref: 1743)