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	Land grabbing - big and small - has become all too common in Cambodia by Amnesty, NYT, agencies   Nov 2012   East Asia Summits: An opportunity to address Cambodia’s human rights situation. (Amnesty)   Cambodia will host the 21st ASEAN Summit and 7th East Asia summit in the capital Phnom Penh in Novemeber, with various heads of state attending.   Amnesty International is urging visiting world leaders to press the Cambodian government on addressing the country’s deteriorating human rights situation.   Forced evictions:- The crisis over land continues, with forced evictions, land disputes and land grabbing affecting thousands of people and resulting in an increase in protests.   One of the root causes of forced evictions is economic land concessions (ELCs), which the government grants to businesses for industrial agricultural exploitation of land. The government announced a moratorium on such concessions; although there has yet to be adequate implementation.   Crackdown on freedom of expression:- Respect for freedom of expression, association and assembly has deteriorated. Particularly in the context of the land crisis, human rights defenders and peaceful protesters have faced escalating violence including killings and legal action through government-controlled courts.   Failing justice system:- A politicised justice system effectively grants impunity to perpetrators of human rights abuses, while actively persecuting those who speak out against violations.   For example, no one has been held accountable after security forces shot dead a 14-year old girl during the violent eviction in May 2012 of the community at Kratie province’s Pro Ma village. But 71-year-old radio station owner and government critic Mam Sonando was sentenced to 20 years in prison on charges of instigating “insurrection” in Pro Ma village. Amnesty International monitored his trial, and found that no evidence was presented that any insurrection occurred, or that Mam Sonando was involved. He is a prisoner of conscience, imprisoned solely for the peaceful exercise of his right to freedom of expression.   * ABC Foreign Correspondent: "We will not be Moved".   http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2012/s3641914.htm   October 2, 2012   Donors urged to confront Cambodian abuses, writes Lindsay Murdoch in Bangkok, for Fairfax News.   Mam Sonando, a prominent critic of Cambodia"s government was sentenced to 20 years jail Monday for an alleged secessionist plot, dismaying rights campaigners who said the verdict was politically motivated. Photo: AFP   Donor countries including Australia are being urged to confront Cambodia over escalating violence and human abuses linked to the plunder of the country"s natural resources.   Human Rights groups say the jailing of 71-year-old journalist Mam Sonando for 20 years late on Monday was a politically motivated move to silence protests over the granting of huge economic land resources to companies and the eviction of thousands of land owners by force.   Mr Sonando, a long-time human rights campaigner who owns a radio station in Phnom Penh, has been a long-time critic of strongman Prime Minister Hen Sen who urged in a national broadcast in June that he be arrested for masterminding "a plot to overthrow the government."   There have been at least three deaths and a number of controversial arrests linked to a rapidly increasing number of land disputes that have emerged as companies move to exploit Cambodia"s natural resources such as rubber, sugar and minerals.   Eight human rights groups, including Human Rights Watch, Freedom House, Global Witness and the Asian Forum for Human Rights and Development, have asked donors providing almost half of Cambodia"s annual budget not to reward the country with large-scale new funds and to "make a co-ordinated and public condemnation of the government"s increasing human rights abuses."   Australia is sending almost $78 million to Cambodia this year.   Surya Subedi, the UN Human Rights Councils special envoy for Cambodia, last week criticised Mr Hun Sen"s government, saying Cambodia"s population was growing "increasingly desperate and unhappy" over land-rights abuses.   The World Bank also last year froze new lending for Cambodia over its treatment of hundreds of families facing eviction from land around a lake in Phnom Penh.   The jailing of Mr Sonando, who is unwell, has prompted outrage both inside and outside the country where critics accuse Mr Hun Sen, who has been in power since 1985, of having politicised the bureaucracy and courts to silence public criticism.   Rights groups called the accusations against Mr Sonando baseless and said the government was seeking to justify a crackdown on a land dispute in May when a 14-year-old girl was shot dead by security forces during a protest rally.   Mr Sonando had played a leading role in the dispute in Krabie province and through his independent Beehive Radio had spoken out against human rights abuses, including those associated with the rapid selloff of Cambodia"s land and forests to investors.   He had also reported on a complaint lodged at the International Criminal Court alleging land-grabbing in Cambodia amounted to a crime against humanity.   The court on Monday also sent two other activists to 30 and 15 years in jail.   Ou Virak, president of Cambodian Centre for Human Rights, described Mr Sonando as a prisoner of conscience and said "we will be campaigning for his release."   Amnesty International researcher Rupert Abbott called the verdict "absolutely outrageous."   Earlier this month Cambodian journalist Serei Oudom, who had exposed rampant illegal logging, was found dead in the boot of his car.   In April Chut Wutty, one of Asia"s leading environmentalists, was shot dead by a soldier after leading journalists to an illegal logging site.   In a joint letter to donor countries, the rights groups detailed the arrests of four other prominent activists who had led protests against forced land evictions who face long jail sentences under laws which they say are contrary to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.   The letter said the serious downturn in Cambodia"s human rights situation comes as Cambodia seeks a seat on the UN Security Council and chairs the 10-member Association of South-East Asian Nations which is set adopt a Human Rights Declaration at its November leaders summit that will water down human rights protections, compromising the rights of more than 600 million people across the region.   September 26, 2012   Cambodia’s Landless Class, by Luke Hunt. (New York Times)   PHNOM PENH — In a union office for garment workers on the outskirts of the capital on a recent afternoon, Tith Srey Mom and her sister Mach were pondering what to do next. After losing a 10-year legal battle to keep their 200-square-meter plot of land, they were being evicted. All legal avenues had been exhausted. All they could do was wait for the police to come and forcibly remove them.   The sisters are from Chrolang Village, about 30 miles south of Phnom Penh. Tith Srey Mom’s grandparents assumed control of their land in 1979 as the Khmer Rouge were retreating. The family tilled the patch of dirt for decades, growing rice to subsidize their meager incomes.   Then in 2002 the police arrived and told them to leave, claiming that the sisters no longer owned it. No one among the 32 families in Chrolang had ever heard of Tep Menon, but the police said he was now the owner of the plot. And so began the sisters’ decade-long fight in the courts to keep their land.   Land grabbing — big and small — has become all too common in Cambodia. Protests and violent confrontations with the authorities have left a mounting death toll. Meanwhile, as more and more poor Cambodians are being dispossessed, many fear the end of the “communal rice bowl" and traditional village life that once guaranteed food and a family home for all. With no more land to go home to, village life is being decimated.   All land titles, along with nearly a third of the population, were destroyed by Pol Pot’s regime, and farmers moved swiftly to repopulate the land when the Khmer Rouge collapsed. Later, the Cambodian government recognized ownership of land occupied prior to 1989, when the Vietnamese occupation ended.   The land grabs can be traced back to 2001 when laws were passed that allowed the government to usurp any “private state land” and grant up to about 25,000 acres to companies and private individuals. The shady deals escalated sharply after 2008 as property prices soared and well-off businessmen, local and international companies took control of grants for development.   A spate of violence has been one result. This year alone a prominent anti-logging activist was murdered, a teenage girl was killed by the police during an eviction and 13 women were jailed, and later freed, for protesting against a concession that cost them their homes with little recompense. A journalist with a history of reporting on illegal logging and land grabs was found this month in the trunk of his car. He had been hacked to death.   Elections must be held by mid-2013, and land-grabbing has provided Prime Minister Hun Sen with his worst political headache. The issue will come to the fore at the annual donors meeting this week in Phnom Penh, at which Cambodia’s benefactors decide how much to dole out to the Cambodian government and what conditions to attach. Made-up largely of Western nations and international institutions, donors routinely provide about one billion dollars a year, almost half the government’s annual budget.   Nongovernmental organizations are urging donor countries to pressure the government to rein in its wayward authorities. The U.N.’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights said in its annual report that of particular concern was the increased use of force and live ammunition on people protesting the land grabs. “These instances of violence were predominantly unprovoked, and primarily related to land disputes,” the report said.   This is cold comfort for Tith Srey Mom. She and her siblings have little choice but to take a menial job in a garment factory six days a week, working 8 to 12 hours a day for a minimum wage of about $90 a month, producing apparel for big-name brands.   Similar tales were told by Yong Eaon, a 41-year-old mother of three who is preparing a legal challenge after her neighbors — armed with knives and political connections — annexed a plot that she brought from her brother in 1997.   “They turned it into an access road," she said. “So, one daughter goes to work, makes garments. She can only send home $25 a month, but it helps and I will fight.”
	UN calls on countries to strengthen women’s access to justice by United Nations News   24 September 2012   United Nations officials have urged countries to implement measures to improve women’s access to and participation in justice systems, stressing that the rule of law can help break down gender barriers.   “Our theme of women’s access to justice reminds me of all the women I have met who suffered terrible crimes, including sexual abuse in wartime,” said Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in his remarks at an event at UN Headquarters in New York, entitled ‘Strengthening Women’s Access to Justice.’ “But women are not only victims – they are champions for justice.”   The event took place on the sidelines of the High-Level Meeting of the General Assembly on the Rule of Law, which drew heads of State and Government and ministers from nearly 80 nations, with the aim of highlighting the essential link between the rule of law at the national and international levels and economic growth, sustainable development and the eradication of poverty and hunger.   Mr. Ban outlined three commitments that countries must make to ensure women have access to justice systems in their countries, stressing they are “critical, valuable and urgent.” These consist of: repealing laws that discriminate against women and girls, increasing women’s involvement in the justice system, and investing at least 15 per cent of overall rule of law funding to breaking down the barriers to justice for women.   “Increasing women’s participation is not a jobs programme for them – it is a source of power for you and your communities,” Mr. Ban said. “Women have the right to equal access to public administration – and services are better when they reflect both male and female perspectives.”   “Justice for women takes more than new laws and new funding. Ultimately, we need new mindsets,” the Secretary-General added, adding that gender equality must run through the entire development agenda.   According to the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women), which co-organized the event with the governments of Finland and South Africa, eight in 10 women worldwide do not have access to their country’s formal justice system.   “We need action because the rule of law often rules women out,” said UN Women’s Executive Director, Michelle Bachelet. “I have travelled around the world and listened to women. And women are tired of waiting for justice. They are demanding action.”   Ms. Bachelet noted that gender inequality continues to exist in many countries and is reflected in their laws. More than 100 countries still impose legal differences between women and men in areas such as a woman’s ability to sign a contract, travel abroad, manage property and interact with public authorities and the private sector.   In particular, she said, women who are poor, or come from racial and ethnic minorities or are displaced tend to be more vulnerable to human rights violations, and highlighted the alarming rates of domestic violence around the world.   “In Australia, Canada, Israel, South Africa and the United States, between 40 to 70 per cent of female murder victims were killed by their intimate partner. In Guatemala, two women are murdered, on average, each day. In India, there were some 8,000 reported cases of dowry deaths per year from 2007 to 2009,” Ms. Bachelet said.   She added, “Women’s access to justice depends on the rule of law and also on women’s economic and political empowerment and participation in decision-making.”
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