CNRP linked to Hun Sen Protest, PM’s Son says

Khmer Times/Ven Rathavong and Ros Chanveasna

Tuesday, 09 February 2016

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School of Vice: Shouldn't this Defence Ministry's intelligence be put to far better national purposes such as rampant logging activities and border land encroachments - among others? Instead of trying to suppress what is after all legitimate activity under the national Constitution? If the demonstrators breach any US law, then surely the onus is upon US authorities to apprehend or deal with them appropriately within the parameters of US justice system, whether the event itself is linked to the CNRP or not? 

This kind of police-state mindset does not befit one who otherwise claims he is in power by means of democratic mandate. 

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Mr. Hun Sen’s son and Defense Ministry’s Intelligence Unit’s director Hun Manith accused the opposition of backing potential protests in the US. Reuters/Samrang Pring

“Recently, our intelligence detected that CNRP activists set up and used an online-communication network to organize the protest,” Gen. Manith said, adding that the protesters quickly distanced themselves from any CNRP leadership after “their plan was revealed.” 

Director of the Defense Ministry’s Intelligence Unit and the second son of Prime Minister Hun Sen, Hun Manith, said in an interview on Monday that the upcoming protests against the premier in Sunnylands, California, which he will visit for the joint US-ASEAN summit later this month, is being organized with the consent of the Cambodian National Rescue Party.
 

CNRP leaders, including the party’s president Sam Rainsy, as well as protest officials from the organizing Cambodian-American Alliance, have denied any official CNRP involvement in the protest, saying the nonviolent demonstration is being organized and funded by individuals unaffiliated with the Cambodian-based political party.
 

Mr. Rainsy has even gone so far as to encourage protesters not to organize, saying the threat of retaliation from the CPP may do more damage within Cambodia than the protest will do outside it.
 

According to Gen. Manith, the opposition party’s aim in backing the Sunnylands protest is to show that Khmer populations abroad avidly oppose the prime minister. It is part of a larger strategy to internationally discredit the Cambodian ruler, whose 30 contiguous years in office were celebrated earlier this year, he said.
 

“This is a strategy which the opposition leaders have had in place for several years now,” claimed Gen. Manith, also the chief deputy of the prime minister’s cabinet, adding that Sunnylands will not be the first demonstration “orchestrated” by the CNRP against his father.
 

However Sunnylands, Gen. Manith pointed out, will be sure to affect the culture of dialogue established between the CPP and CNRP in 2014 to encourage transparency and direct communication.
 

“Recently, our intelligence detected that CNRP activists set up and used an online-communication network to organize the protest,” Gen. Manith said, adding that the protesters quickly distanced themselves from any CNRP leadership after “their plan was revealed.”
 

CNRP spokesman Yem Ponhearith told Khmer Times yesterday that while his party once supported the Sunnylands protest, “...the CNRP does not currently have any plans to organize demonstrations inside the country or abroad,” echoing statements made previously by Mr. Rainsy.
 

The party president said in a speech last week, “The demonstration has no advantage, but only disadvantage,” adding that CPP retaliation could damage the CNRP’s chances of securing free and fair elections in the country.
 

Gen. Manith dismissed these statements as tricks and “illusions,” pointing out that Mr. Rainsy is currently in the United States, and claimed the opposition leader knows about plans for demonstrations against the premier in mid-February.
 

“Declarations of CNRP’s leaders and their statements to dissuade their activists’ demonstrations in the US, it is an excuse. They do not want to seem involved with the protest. But actually, they are behind this plan,” he said.
 

Last month on Facebook, Mr. Hun Sen reacted to the comments of a community organizer in Southern California who threatened to demonstrate against him during his appearance at the US-ASEAN summit, warning that there would be CPP counter-demonstrations against CNRP leaders in Cambodia if protesters showed up in Sunnylands.
 

The CNRP released a statement several hours after the prime minister’s reaction stating that they did not have plans to hold a protest in the US.
 

Brady Young, the organizer for the CNRP of Southern California, reaffirmed his plans to protest in an interview with Khmer Times last week.
 

“I will do it for sure. There are about 500 people who will join,” he said, adding that he and his fellow protesters’ decision to stand up against the prime minister were individual choices, unswayed by threats, fear or the urging of the CNRP leadership.
 

“If we listen to news releases, it means we are giving up and letting Hun Sen do everything to threaten Khmer-Americans,” Mr. Young said, adding that his group was not made up of CNRP leaders nor activists, but supporters of democracy in the face of the spread of communism.
 

 Mr. Ponhearith, in response to Mr. Brady’s comments, said, “If he maintains his stance of organizing the demonstrations in the US, the party thinks that it is his individual right, and should not be linked with the CNRP at all.”
 

The spokesman denied Gen. Manith’s claims that the protests would negatively impact the culture of dialogue.
 

CPP spokesman Sok Ey San said the opposite. The planned protest, which he claimed was lacking in honest dialogue, could hamper the culture of dialogue between the parties.
 

“It exhibits that they do not listen to each other,” Mr. Ey San said of the CNRP chain of command. “It is anarchy that there are no leaders to control the activities.”
 

The peaceful demonstration against Mr. Hun Sen’s presence at the US-ASEAN summit will take place next Monday from 9 am to 5 pm throughout the United States and will include cultural displays and performances to enunciate a message of solidarity for human rights, social justice and meaningful reform in Cambodia.