More than 70 deportees from US expected this month

Ben Sokhean and Daphne Chen | Publication date 06 December 2017 | 17:35 ICT

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Deportees from the US socialise in Battambang province earlier this year. Tang Chhin Sothy/AFP

More than 70 Cambodians are set to be deported to the Kingdom by the United States by the end of the month, Cambodia’s immigration department confirmed today, as Prime Minister Hun Sen said he welcomed the “brothers and sisters” home.

In a speech to more than 15,000 garment factory workers in Phnom Penh, the premier said the country is upholding the repatriation agreement it signed with the US in 2002.

“We have an agreement with the US and we need to follow it,” Hun Sen said. “For us, we thought about humanitarian issues and human rights, but we have not changed anything to not follow the agreement.”

Ministry of Interior immigration head Sok Phal said an estimated 72 people are in the process of being deported but said he did not know when they would be arriving.

Bill Herod, head of the Phnom Penh-based Returnee Integration Support Center, said the group will be the largest the NGO has ever received and is expected to land by the end of the month.

“It’s very disheartening to see these numbers,” Herod said.

“It’s a matter of international law. It’s terrible and we all hate it and wish it weren’t that way, but the fact is these are Cambodian citizens, not US citizens,” he added.

Cambodia’s decision to stop issuing travel documents for deportees last October sparked a dispute that resulted in the US suspending certain visas for top Foreign Affairs Ministry officials. The issue became a talking point for Hun Sen, who criticised the US for what he described as its hypocritical approach to human rights.

The government reversed course in November when Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak said Cambodia would begin accepting deportees again. The US Embassy in Phnom Penh declined to comment.