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Crackdown in Cambodia Ahead of Planned Return of Opposition Leader

Leonie Kijewski

   PHNOM PENH - Cambodian authorities have launched a crackdown on
   activists in a move observers say is an attempt to intimidate
   opposition supporters ahead of the planned, but uncertain return next
   month from self-exile of Sam Rainsy, the acting head of the
   now-dissolved opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, and other
   opposition leaders.

   Rainsy, who faces a range of charges and convictions in absentia and
   multiple arrest warrants, and others who fled the country following the
   2017 dissolution of the CNRP, plan to return Nov. 9, which is Cambodian
   Independence Day and the anniversary of the day the Berlin Wall fell.

   According to a CNRP list, as of midday Oct. 9, 37 activists affiliated
   with the party and former officials have been arrested this year and
   placed in pre-trial detention. Thirteen of those were arrested in
   September. Since then, four more members have been arrested.

   More than a dozen others have been charged over the past week with
   incitement to commit a felony or with conspiracy to topple the
   government for attempts to mobilize citizens for the return of the
   opposition leaders.

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