As today marks one year since land rights activist Yorm Bopha was detained, the Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders, a joint programme of the World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) and FIDH, reiterates its call to the Cambodian authorities for Ms. Yorm Bopha’s immediate and unconditional release. The Observatory further denounces that the Phnom Penh authorities restricted a peaceful march that was organised to mark the one-year imprisonment of Ms. Bopha.
Ms. Yorm Bopha, a housing rights activist who was pivotal in the protests against forced evictions of residents from the Boeung Kak Lake community in Phnom Penh, was detained on September 4, 2012 and sentenced to three years in prison on December 27, 2012, on the basis of questionable allegations that Ms. Bopha has always denied.
On June 14, 2013, the Court of Appeal in Phnom Penh decided to uphold the conviction of Ms. Bopha, but suspended one year of her three-year original sentence. She then appealed to the Supreme Court. In the meantime, she remains detained in Prey Sar prison, where she is expected to serve the rest of her sentence until September 2014.
“Ms. Yorm Bopha is being detained merely for being at the forefront of the campaign in favour of the Boeung Kak Lake community’s rights and calling for the release of community members who were arbitrarily arrested in May 2012 after protesting their forced evictions”, OMCT Secretary General Gerald Staberock said today. “Accordingly, she should be released immediately and unconditionally, as her detention merely aims at obstructing her human rights activities”, he added.
Moreover, on September 4, 2013, the Phnom Penh authorities restricted a peaceful march by Boeung Kak community representatives and supporters to mark the one-year imprisonment of Ms. Yorm Bopha. The community planned to march from their area of Phnom Penh to the Wat Phnom pagoda and then to the Supreme Court to demand that the court urgently hear Ms. Bopha’s case. When they notified City Hall that they planned to hold the march, City Hall responded that if they were planning on having more than 200 participants, they could only carry out their activities within the Boeung Kak area.
Despite the lack of permission from City Hall, the community decided to proceed, believing that there were no legal grounds to prevent them from peacefully demonstrating. When they attempted to leave from Boeung Kak this morning to march towards Wat Phnom, several groups of community members wearing t-shirts and carrying flowers, flags, loudspeakers and other campaigns material were prevented from exiting by the police. The community representatives then asked the team from the Cambodian Center for Human Rights (CCHR) who was monitoring the rally to load their van with the campaigns material so that they would be allowed to leave. The police and military police then stopped the CCHR van and prevented it from exiting. The police and other security forces also confiscated aggressively the materials supporters behind the van were carrying, even hitting one man on the head. Following the intervention of rights groups and observers, the march was finally able to proceed.
“We condemn the obstacles to the peaceful march that was organised to mark the one-year imprisonment of Ms. Yorm Bopha and we reiterate our call on the Cambodian authorities to ensure in all circumstances that human rights defenders are able to work without any fear of reprisals”, FIDH President Karim Lahidji said.
The Observatory more generally urges the authorities of Cambodia to conform to the United Nations Declaration on Human Rights Defenders, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and international human rights instruments ratified by Cambodia.