With under a year until next year’s local-level elections, political analyst Em Sovannara predicts that the country’s opposition parties might be able to win a total of five to 10 communes out of more than 1,600.
A second trial hearing was held on Thursday into protesters charged with incitement after a rally outside the Chinese Embassy last October on the anniversary of the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements. They were submitting petitions to embassies around the capital about upholding the accord’s goal of bringing multiparty democracy to the country.
2017’s political crackdown ousted more than 5,000 opposition commune councilors from their elected seats. Now with less than a year until the next commune elections, two former CNRP commune chiefs speak of the desolation of the current opposition landscape.
Elections are set to return to Cambodia in June next year, but the country’s political landscape remains shattered and largely lifeless. In part one, Ouch Sony speaks to several minor party leaders about the daunting task of trying to build up a political movement from nothing.
Mother Nature activists were “gathering strength for an uprising” as evidenced by a Zoom conference where they insulted government leaders and the king, while three arrested activists acknowledged they wanted people to rise up, the Interior Ministry said.
Jailed sandal-thrower Sam Sokha, sentenced twice for incitement after being extradited from her escape to Thailand, should be released five months early due to health concerns amid the pandemic, her lawyer asked the Kampong Speu Provincial Court.
International rights groups and embassies raised concerns over the recent arrests of Mother Nature environmentalists, as a government-aligned media outlet posted alleged evidence of a Zoom meeting where the activists appear to discuss a cartoon sketch of Prime Minister Hun Sen wearing a crown.
In under three weeks, a senior U.S. official pressed Prime Minister Hun Sen over a controversial navy base; a defense attache cut short a visit to the base, saying he was denied full access; and USAID diverted millions in funds away from the Cambodian government.
An NGO officer said three young environmental activists were taken into custody in Phnom Penh and a fourth detained in Kandal province on Wednesday, but authorities have not confirmed the reported arrests, with National Police referring reporters to a Covid-19 committee.
Phnom Penh’s vaccination campaign has reached the city’s last three districts, while provinces are gearing up to be next in line for jabs as the Health Ministry announced it had hit the 3 million mark for first doses out of a target of 10 million people vaccinated nationwide.
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