Law change to target Rainsy
political troubles for 20 years.
“Why eliminate him? He wants to eliminate [us]. He has provoked chaos and unrest in the nation’s society,” Eysan said. “He is not a member of any party now. Why does he still interfere? This [is because] he wants to stir the situation of our country.”
“His political life [and] his social life is gone,” he said.
Rainsy – whose regular posts to Facebook from self-exile in France have drawn the ruling party’s ire, and have been at the centre of a number of his defamation cases – appeared unfazed by the proposed changes, which were called for by Prime Minister Hun Sen during the celebrations for the anniversary of the CPP’s founding last week.
“How can they silence me?” Rainsy said in an email.
“With modern and borderless technologies nobody can prevent anybody from sharing information and ideas with possibly devastating impact on any dictatorship, especially in a small and internationally dependent country such as Cambodia.
“How can they prevent the air from cir- culating and the wind of freedom – that is blowing all over the world – from reaching Cambodia?”
Rainsy said it was “not only wrong but silly or, at best, childish”, for the CPP to alter the law each time they spotted a Facebook post they didn’t like, and that the pending changes were “very much” influenced by the coming national elections next year. “It’s a sign of weakness and despair,” he said.
National Assembly spokesman Leng Peng