PHNOM PENH, (SONNA) \u2014 A court in Cambodia convicted opposition leader Kem Sokha of treason on Friday and sentenced him to 27 years of house arrest, the latest blow in a campaign by the government to silence its critics or drive them out of the country.<\/p>\n
The ruling against the country\u2019s\u00a0most prominent opposition politician not in exile, widely condemned by rights groups and foreign governments, comes just four months ahead of a general election. Kem Sokha\u2019s September 2017 arrest marked the beginning of a fierce campaign by Prime Minister Hun Sen\u2019s government to use the courts \u2014 widely considered to be under its influence \u2014 in a crackdown on dissent. Since then, most other top government critics have fled Cambodia to escape what were generally seen as politically inspired prosecutions.<\/p>\n
Kem Sokha\u2019s Cambodia National Rescue Party was seen as an electoral threat to Prime Minister Hun Sen in 2017, and his arrest came about 10 months before the country\u2019s last general election. The Supreme Court dissolved the party soon after and its members were expelled from Parliament.<\/p>\n
JUDGE SAYS OPPOSITION LEADER PLOTTED \u201cCOLOR REVOLUTION\u201d<\/p>\n
The government charged that an old video of Kem Sokha speaking at a seminar about receiving advice from U.S. pro-democracy groups was proof of collusion with a foreign power to illegally take power.<\/p>\n
Judge Koy Sao of the Phnom Penh Municipal Court said Kem Sokha, backed by foreign powers, had used human rights and politics as a guise to organize people to stage a \u201ccolor revolution\u201d aimed at toppling the legal government. The maximum sentence is 30 years.<\/p>\n
The court said Kem Sokha is barred from all political activity, including voting, and not allowed to meet with anyone, Cambodian or foreign, except for family members. He may leave the house only with the court\u2019s permission.<\/p>\n
His lawyer, Ang Udom, told reporters he will file an appeal within one month.<\/p>\n
RIGHTS GROUPS, U.S., CONDEMN VERDICT<\/p>\n
Rights organizations decried Friday\u2019s court ruling.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was obvious from the start that the charges against Kem Sokha were nothing but a politically motivated ploy by Prime Minister Hun Sen to sideline Cambodia\u2019s major opposition leader and eliminate the country\u2019s democratic system,\u201d said Phil Robertson, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. \u201cSending Kem Sokha to prison isn\u2019t just about destroying his political party, but about squashing any hope that there can be a genuine general election in July.\u201d<\/p>\n
PHNOM PENH, (SONNA) \u2014 A court in Cambodia convicted opposition leader Kem Sokha of treason on Friday and sentenced him to 27 years of house arrest, the latest blow in a campaign by the government to silence its critics or drive them out of the country. The ruling against the country\u2019s\u00a0most prominent opposition politician not […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":120,"featured_media":414636,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[78],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-414635","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414635","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=414635"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414635\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":414637,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/414635\/revisions\/414637"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/414636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=414635"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=414635"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonna.so\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=414635"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}