1999 Scores

Status: Not Free
Freedom Rating: 6.0
Civil Liberties: 6
Political Rights: 6

Overview

With the end of active Khmer Rouge insurgency, in 1999 Cambodia experienced domestic peace for the first time since the mid-1960s. Premier Hun Sen continued to run a corrupt, authoritarian regime propped up by key generals and business cronies.

After achieving independence from France in 1953, Cambodia was ruled in succession by King Norodom Sihanouk, the U.S.-backed Lon Nol regime in the early 1970s, and the Maoist Khmer Rouge between 1975 and 1979. The radical agrarian program of the Khmer Rouge killed at least 1.7 million of Cambodia's 7 million people through executions, overwork, and starvation. Vietnam invaded in December 1978 and installed the Communist Khmer People's Revolutionary Party (KPRP).

A 1980s civil war between the KPRP government and the allied armies of Sihanouk, the Khmer Rouge, and former Premier Son Sann ended with an internationally brokered 1991 peace accord, although the Khmer Rouge eventually continued its insurgency. In violation of the accord, the KPRP government, headed by the Khmer Rouge defector Hun Sen, maintained control of 80 percent of the army, most key ministries, and provincial and local authorities. In Cambodia's first free national assembly elections, organized by the United Nations in 1993, the royalist opposition United Front for an Independent, Neutral and Free Cambodia (FUNCINPEC), headed by Prince Norodom Ranariddh, a son of Sihanouk's, defeated the Cambodian People's Party (CPP), the successor to the KPRP.

Hun Sen forced Ranariddh into accepting a coalition government with the two leaders as co-premiers. The new government quickly moved to repress dissent. By 1996, Hun Sen had used his continuing control of the army and political institutions to consolidate near total power. On July 5-6, 1997, Hun Sen seized full power in a violent coup following efforts by both leaders to attract defectors from the crumbling Khmer Rouge.

Aiming to hold a controlled election that would meet the international community's minimum standards to resume aid, Hun Sen agreed to a Japanese plan under which two show trials held in March 1998 convicted Ranariddh in absentia of conspiracy and weapons smuggling, with King Sihanouk then issuing a royal pardon. Despite considerable constraints, opposition parties ran vigorous campaigns for the July 26, 1998, elections, which drew a turnout of more than 90 percent. The CPP won a reported 41.4 percent of the vote and about 59 seats, but the CPP-controlled National Election Council (NEC) changed the electoral formula to hand the CPP a majority with 64 seats. FUNCINPEC won 43 seats, and the Sam Rainsy Party, led by Cambodia's leading dissident, 15. In November, Ranariddh brought FUNCINPEC into a governing coalition.

In December, two senior Khmer Rouge figures – Khieu Samphan and Nuon Chea – defected to the government, and in March 1999, authorities arrested Ta Mok, the last leading at-large Khmer Rouge member. In August, Hun Sen rejected a UN plan to try Khmer Rouge leaders for genocide with foreign judges constituting the majority on the bench. Ieng Sary and other senior Khmer Rouge leaders who have defected to the government since 1996 continued to rule a semiautonomous zone in western Cambodia.

Political Rights and Civil Liberties

Cambodia's 1998 elections were neither free nor fair. The campaign was held in a climate of violence amid continued political killings. Hun Sen wielded his near monopoly over the civil service, local administration, military police, and Khmer-language media to a decisive advantage, particularly in the provinces. Hun Sen supporters held 10 of 11 seats on the NEC, which changed the electoral formula as ballots were being counted to give the CPP a parliamentary majority. Authorities denied opposition parties access to broadcast media, disrupted some opposition rallies, and banned political demonstrations in Phnom Penh during the election campaign.

Politicians have deliberately kept institutions weak. The rudimentary judiciary is politically controlled. In February 1999, a UN experts group reported that Cambodia's judiciary lacked the independence and capacity to try Khmer Rouge leaders for crimes against humanity and for genocide in the 1970s. Prisons are dangerously overcrowded and unsanitary, and authorities abuse inmates.

The CPP has carried out political violence with impunity, acting through the army or paid thugs. There were 41 killings of FUNCINPEC officials and others following the 1997 coup and at least 21 political killings, mainly of FUNCINPEC supporters, in the two months prior to the 1998 elections. In September 1999, authorities arrested two members of the Sam Rainsy Party on the apparently spurious charge of being behind an alleged 1998 assassination attempt on Hun Sen. Security forces routinely harass and intimidate nongovernmental human rights activists. In the countryside, the central government has little authority and soldiers commit rape, extortion, banditry, and extrajudicial killings with impunity.

The private press operates under severe pressure. Journalists are routinely harassed, threatened, and attacked. There have been no convictions in the murders of at least four journalists since 1993. The 1995 press law permits the government to suspend publication of a newspaper for up to one month without a court order and subjects the press to criminal statutes. In recent years, authorities have temporarily suspended several publications. Hun Sen and his allies control the ten radio stations and six television stations.

The constitution refers only to the rights of the ethnic Khmer majority, which complicates the legal status of the estimated 200,000 to 500,000 Vietnamese residents. Khmer Rouge guerrillas massacred scores of Vietnamese villagers in the 1990s.

Traditional norms relegate women to an inferior status, and domestic violence is common. There are several thousand street children in Phnom Penh, and child prostitution is a significant problem. Several independent trade unions exist. Factory conditions are poor and employers flout international labor norms with impunity. Authorities barred the Free Trade Union of Workers, Cambodia's largest union, from holding a May Day march in Phnom Penh to protest against low wages and poor working conditions.

Official corruption is widespread. Cambodia is a haven for international criminals, money laundering, gun-running, drug trafficking, illegal logging, and mainland Chinese prostitution rings. Many prostitutes are subject to violence and are forced to work against their will, having been kidnapped, duped, or sold to brothel owners by relatives.

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