Son of late prisons chief Nuclear at large despite sentence plans with China
THE son of the former head of the Prisons Department remains at large after he was sentenced to one year behind bars on Tuesday for circulating explicit pictures of his ex-girlfriend, singer Vanny La.
The case is one in a recent smattering of “revenge porn” crimes in the country.
According to Sous Vichyea Randy, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court’s deputy administration chief, Judge Kao Vandy sentenced Kuy Sithisak to one year in prison and ordered him to pay 200 million riel, or almost $50,000, to La in compensation.
Nonetheless, Vichyea Randy said he did not know if an arrest warrant would be issued for Sithisak, saying it was up to the judge to decide.
Sithisak is the son of Kuy Bunsorn, the former general direc- tor of the Interior Ministry’s General Department of Prisons, who passed away last month.
Early last year, Sithisak posted nude pictures of La to Facebook, which were shared widely on Cambodian social media.
“For [almost] two years, the media shared those photos – now I don’t want to talk about it again. What is important is this man got charged,” La said.
Gender and Development for Cambodia Executive Director Ros Sopheap said she was “disappointed” that Sithisak had not yet been arrested and said revenge porn cases were a violation of trust.
“Men try to convince their partners, they will use very powerful language, like ‘if you really love me, you should show this or that’,” she said.
“Women trust them and then their partners show [the pictures to] the public – it violates trust.” on harnessing nuclear energy for medical and agricultural use, he said.
“We have no illusions about the challenges associated with building a nuclear power plant for electricity production,” he said. “Our primary focus is on non-electricity production.”
While it was unclear what specific priorities nuclear technology might address in Cambodia, it can be used in medical processes like diagnosing and treating conditions like cancer, and sterilising medical products. Nuclear energy can also be used to control insect populations and engineer plant varieties.
Cambodia and Russia signed a similar agreement last year under which Russia agreed to help create a nuclear research centre in Cambodia.
At the time, Prime Minister Hun Sen also stressed that nuclear technology would be used “for peaceful purposes”. The Cambodian constitution already prohibits the manufacture, use or storage of nuclear weapons.
Experts say a nuclear power plant remains a distant possibility for Cambodia despite the urgent need for more electricity.
Last year, the former deputy director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency said Thailand would need at least a decade to build a nuclear power plant, and Cambodia would need longer.
Deth Sok Udom, a professor of international relations at Zaman University, said Cambodia “is not ready” to build its own nuclear power plant, but should begin investing in education and raising public awareness.
“The public in general has almost no clue about what nuclear power is,” Sek Udom said. “We should have a conversation about it with the public, have a debate. If down the road we don’t have the public’s support, it will be an issue.”
The draft MOU is expected to be finalised by the end of the month and submitted to leaders of both countries at the China-Asean Expo in Nanning in September.
Ponlok said ministry officials were discussing the partnership with Chinese officials for roughly a year and that the joint venture is supported by the IAEA, he said.
Ministry of Energy officials met with representatives from stateowned China National Nuclear Corporation for four hours on Monday to discuss the MOU, along with representatives from the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries; the Ministry of Health; the Ministry of Industry and Handicrafts; and the Ministry of Mines and Energy.