The country’s United Nations mission in Geneva has “squarely dismissed” the contents of a joint press release issued by three UN special rapporteurs regarding a recent trial in the kingdom, calling their findings “politically motivated”.
In their press release on Tuesday, the trio of rapporteurs, which the mission did not name, called for an urgent review of the legal proceedings brought against a group of “opposition politicians” in Cambodia following the convictions of the 43 co-defendants charged with conspiracy to plotting against the government and incitement to cause social chaos.
“To state that the hearings were ‘political’ is both unfounded and prejudicial.
“There is no shortage of instances that those associated with the ruling party have been held accountable before the law by the same courts,” stated the kingdom’s UN mission.
“The recent trial was connected to a plot in 2019 known as ‘event 9/11’ wherein Sam Rainsy and his accomplices openly called for sedition and had mobilised funds to raise illegal armed forces against the government to unlawfully arrest the incumbent prime minister,” it said, referring to the former president of the Supreme Court-dissolved Cambodia National Rescue Party’s plan to return to Cambodia on Nov 9, 2019.
The mission added that the “so-called rights experts” were following a narrative that was one- sided and biased. — The Phnom Penh Post/ANN
