Sochua fine to be docked from pay

THURSDAY, 12 AUGUST 2010 15:03
By: MEAS SOKCHEA
Phnompenhpost

Photo by: Pha Lina SRP lawmaker Mu Sochua speaks to reporters at the Supreme Court after her defamation conviction was upheld in June.

PHNOM Penh Municipal Court has authorised the National Assembly to withhold Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Mu Sochua’s salary to pay an 8.5 million-riel (US$2,023) fine levied against her for defaming Prime Minister Hun Sen.

In a citation dated Tuesday and signed by Judge Chea Sok Heang, the court said the parliament’s financial department would withhold her monthly salary of 4,204,899 riels until the full amount was recovered. It said the docking of her pay did not require her consent.

“Mu Sochua must not block or prohibit an official in charge of salaries at the financial department of the parliament from seizing the debt. The president of the financial department of the parliament must carry out the above decision,” the citation read.

In July last year, Phnom Penh Municipal Court convicted Mu Sochua of defaming Hun Sen after she filed her own defamation lawsuit against him. The conviction has been upheld on two appeals since.

Last month, the court authorised parliament to withhold an additional 8 million riels in compensation that she owed the premier.

When contacted yesterday, Mu Sochua said she had never agreed to pay the fine, and that docking it from her salary was a violation of her rights.
“This court system is an unclear system and it is a political tool,” she said.

She described the docking of her pay as a form of “force” and “intimidation”, but said she would live to fight another day.

“My political life will be alive until the end of my life. This injustice makes me want to continue my politics,” she said.

Cheam Yeap, a senior lawmaker for the Cambodian People’s Party, said he had not seen the court citation, but that Mu Sochua’s pay would be docked once the parliament’s Permanent Committee met to approve the decision.

Cambodians fight for higher pay

Thursday, August 12, 2010
Al Jazeera

A union movement in Cambodia is growing as workers step up protests, demanding higher pay to cope with rising inflation.

Last month the government raised the minimum wage for employees in the garment industry, which accounts for a massive portion of the country’s exports, but many workers say the salary increase is not enough to meet the skyrocketing costs of food and housing rents.

Due to a recent plunge in consumer demand from abroad, thousands ofpeople have also lost their jobs.

Aela Callan reports from Phnom Penh, Cambodia’s capital, on how many are struggling to survive amid the soaring living costs.

Cambodia wants UN chief to mediate with Thailand

2010-08-12
By SOPHENG CHEANG
Associated Press

Cambodia’s prime minister said Thursday he will ask United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to help mediate talks he is proposing to help settle a border dispute with neighboring Thailand.

Speaking to government officials in the capital Phnom Penh, Hun Sen said he will raise the issue with Ban during the U.N chief’s official visit to Cambodia on Oct. 27-28.

Thailand and Cambodia both claim a 1.8-square-mile (4.6-square-kilometer) patch of land near the cliff-top Preah Vihear temple. Hun Sen on Monday proposed an international conference to discuss the dispute “because the bilateral discussion is at an impasse now.”

“We will request the United Nations Secretary-General to be the coordinator,” Hun Sen said Thursday.

Siam psychopath: Siem Reap and Battambang belonged to Siam

By: The Son Of the Khmer Empire

In the picture is the extremist PAD who protested against Cambodian management plan. It seems that the black turns to white and vice-versa/ the thief accuses the land owner of stealing his stolen land.

By failing to retake Prasat Preah Vihear and its surroundings, co-manage the World Heritage Site, threat Khmers to leave from the Khmer lands at Prasat Preah Vihear areas, now Siamese people start to emotionally remind about their past glory, blaming France, by stating that before the France came Thailand was stretched east to Siem Reap and Battambang. The article posted at Bangkok Post.

Before France forced King Rama V to cede several large parcels of territory along Siam’s eastern frontier in the late 19th century, the lowlying land from this cliff all the way to Siem Rat (now Siem Reap in Cambodia) and Phra Tabong (now Battambang) was Siamese soil. Nowadays the border between the two countries in this area follows the contours of this steep-sided mountain, a state of affairs with which most Thais have no problems. An International Court of Justice ruling in 1962 that gave ownership of the shrine to Cambodia was grudgingly accepted by Thailand, partly because the verdict did not touch on sovereignty of the land surrounding it.

The resentment felt by some Thai citizens about Cambodia’s efforts to have Preah Vihear included on Unesco’s World Heritage list stems from fears that this is merely a ploy to expand Cambodian territory and ultimately lay claim to natural-gas deposits that have been discovered in the Gulf of Thailand.

NOTE: What should we say about this?

• Siamese people should google and read Khmer and Siamese histories. The problem is that if you keep raising such a negative pride it will be backfired  because  Khmer will raise the past pride, too, where the whole Siamese land had belonged to the Khmer for almost a thousand years.
• Stop letting yourself led by emotion and blinded nationalism.
• Believe in laws and stop being greedy, then you will sense the justice, no loss and no win….where  fairness prevail upon your people and my people. And we  peacefully co-exist!

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