Cambodian opposition leader faces arrest after angering country's hardman

Cambodia braced for protests as Sam Rainsy vows to fly home from foreign trip after regime of Hun Sen, the veteran prime minister, resurrects old defamation conviction

Telegraph | 16 November 2015

File photo: Sam Rainsy (L), president of the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) and Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen leave after a plenary session at the National Assembly in Phnom Penh, Cambodia Photo: Reuters

By Philip Sherwell, Bangkok

2:34PM GMT 16 Nov 2015

Cambodia is braced for street protests after the regime of Hun Sen, the country’s strongman leader, stripped his main rival of parliamentary immunity to pave the way for his jailing for defamation.

Sam Rainsy, the popular opposition leader, has vowed to return home from an overseas trip this week, despite the likelihood that he will be jailed for two years for a previous conviction.

“I absolutely must go back to rescue our nation,” said Mr Rainsy, who survived an assassination attempt in 1997 and later spent five years in self-imposed exile before returning home in 2013. “If I must die, let it be.”

A long-running case has been resurrected after Mr Rainsy infuriated Mr Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge commander, by drawing comparisons between Cambodia and the electoral defeat of the ex-generals in Burma.

He predicted that “the wind of freedom that is blowing through the world would reach Cambodia in the near future”.

File photo: Cambodia's main opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party president, Sam Rainsy  Photo: Getty Images

The prime minister, an authoritarian figure who brooks no criticism, responded by called Mr Rainsy the "son of a traitor" for his remarks.

Asia’s longest-ruling leader also established an “arrest commission” for Mr Rainsy headed by Sar Kheng, his powerful interior minister.

Mr Rainsy postponed his scheduled return from a trip to South Korea late on Monday evening as he said that he wanted to arrive in daylight when his treatment would be easier to follow.

On Friday, a court ordered his arrest in a defamation case dating back seven years to a 2008 speech when he accused Hor Namong, the foreign minister, of colluding with the Khmer Rouge.

File photo: Cambodian politician Sam Rainsy (L) and Prime Minister of Cambodia Hun Sen  Photo: Reuters

The Hun Sen ally denied the claims and Mr Rainsy was convicted of defamation in 2013 and sentenced to two years in prison.

But the sentence was never enforced and since his return from exile, he served as opposition leader with parliamentary immunity.

But on Monday, the National Assembly standing committee – which is controlled by MPs from Mr Hun Sen’s ruling party – revoked his special privileges.

Mr Rainsy’s supporters are expected to take to the streets in large numbers if he is detained, as they did to welcome him home two years ago. MPs from his party have been advised to remain together in Phnom Penh for security amid fears of a wider crackdown.

Allies of Mr Rainsy said that the arrest warrant was an attempt to force him from the country’s politics before local elections in 2017 and the next national ballot a year later and 2018 national elections.

Cambodia is formally a democracy but Mr Hun Sen has dominated the country for 25 years as prime minister.