Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Cambodia to the UN Office and other Organisations in Geneva H.E. In Dara yesterday issued a press statement, underlining that “being a political figure, whether or not bearing a political opposition tag, does not entitle that person to act with impunity.”
The full press statement reads as follows:
“Geneva, 9 March 2023—referring to the Press Release of the Special Rapporteurs dated 8 March 2023, which is politically motivated and totally intending to mislead the public as to the nature of the conviction of Mr. Kem Sokha, the Permanent Mission of Cambodia to the United Nations Office and Other International Organisations in Geneva is compelled to offer the following factual and legal grounds of the case:
1. The promotion and advancement of human rights, freedom and democracy are guaranteed under the Cambodian Constitution. However, when such rights and freedom were undertaken in complicity with a secret plan of a foreign state or foreign agent aiming at overthrowing the legitimate government, they become illegal acts by any standard.
2. In Cambodia, similar to other democratic societies, law-breakers can be charged and prosecuted on the basis of offences they have committed, and not on the basis of their political status. Being a political figure, whether or not bearing a political opposition tag, does not entitle that person to act with impunity. A crime committed cannot be justified by some personal or political motive.
3. As such, the conviction of Mr. Kem Sokha is solely derived from his criminal conducts —the conspiracy or collusion with a foreign power — which are explicitly stipulated in Articles 439 and 443 of the Criminal Code. Fair trial of Mr. Kem Sokha has been thoroughly conducted as evidenced through 66 rounds of transparent and public hearings.
4. The statement of the so-called experts, referring to the opinion of the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention that is a group of five self-aggrandised individuals, is not only unwarranted but also misleading. Its opinion carries no weight, let alone legal weight, upon a sovereign state. They are not UN officials and only serve in their personal capacity without any first-hand knowledge of the factual and legal accounts of Cambodia.
5. Contrary to the allegation of the Special Rapporteurs, the arrest and detention of Mr. Kem Sokha are entirely consistent with the legal procedures. Given that Mr. Kem Sokha’s flagrant delicto offence, the judiciary police is within its full power to arrest him at anytime and anywhere, regardless of his parliamentary immunity. Since his arrest in September 2017, Mr. Kem Sokha has had his full rights to legal defence with four attorneys at his disposal to disprove the charges and present their arguments in court as part of his rights to a fair trial.
6. The claims that the pre-trial detention of Mr. Kem Sokha was arbitrary is simply an exaggeration and is truly indicative of either the limited understanding of, or the unwillingness to understand the Cambodian judicial procedures by the Special Rapporteurs. Under Article 208 of the Criminal Procedures Code, the duration of provisional detention in the case of felony may be extended to a maximum of 18 months. The fact that he was released on 9 September 2018 under ‘judicial supervision subject to certain conditions,’ means that he was no longer under pre-trial detention. The judicial supervision measures are only to ensure the presence of the accused for further legal proceedings before the court.
7. The Special Rapporteurs’ assertation that lack of public access to the hearings is tantamount to lack of fairness is bordering on the ridicule by any standard of the legal and judicial profession. In any democratic countries, access to the hearing is always at the discretion of the court, taking into account the court space, order and security. These Special Rapporteurs probably did not know that most of the diplomatic corps were overwhelmingly present in the courtroom throughout the course of the entire hearings.
8. Despite the absence of a few politicians, who are banned from politics due to their infringement of the law, Cambodia remains steadfast in holding the coming July’s general elections in a free, fair, just and transparent manner and fully reflective of the people’s will.
9. The Permanent Mission of Cambodia to the United Nations Office and Other International Organisations in Geneva urges the Special Rapporteurs to strictly adhere to the Code of Conduct for Special Procedures Mandate-holders’ in fulfilment of their functions, including making public statements that can be construed as an interference in the judiciary system of Cambodia.”
Source: Agence Kampuchea Presse
