The Last Word: Sam Rainsy

In 1994, Cambodian opposition leader Sam Rainsy was fired as Finance minister and then stripped of his seat in the National Assembly for accusing then Prime Ministers Hun Sen and Prince Norodom Ranariddh of corruption. He won back his parliamentary seat in 1998, but two weeks ago the Assembly removed his parliamentary immunity, along with that of his colleagues Cheam Channy and Chea Poch. Ranariddh is Assembly president, and Hun Sen, now the sole prime minister, is the most powerful figure in the Cambodian government. Rainsy fled the country, as did Poch, but Channy was arrested and charged with rallying an armed militia to overthrow the government. Poch and Rainsy have reportedly been accused of defaming Ranariddh. He claims he simply repeated previously published allegations that the prince received a $30 million bribe to join a coalition with Prime Minister Hun Sen's ruling party. (The prince has filed a libel suit against Rainsy.) NEWSWEEK's Eric Pape spoke to Rainsy by phone last week. Excerpts:

RAINSY: There has been a totalitarian drift. It is just the latest in a series of events. There have also been assassinations of two top union leaders and our party's activists, a ban on street protests, the exclusion of our party from all parliamentary committees, and now the arrest of one of our parliamentarians.

They unexpectedly added the lifting of our immunity to the agenda. Journalists, diplomats, cameramen and political observers were asked to depart. Once I learned that they would remove my immunity, I left, to avoid taking part in a charade.

They had to wait until after a key international aid meeting made its decisions in December. [Also] the economic situation, poverty and unemployment are worsening. Land grabs and deforestation are causing popular discontent to grow so fast that they had to make a pre-emptive move. They know that discontent will spur support for the Sam Rainsy Party. Hun Sen recently said that nongovernmental organizations and human-rights groups are creating problems for the government.

It reminds me of when I was kicked out of the National Assembly [in 1995]. But this time I have my own political party, so they have to play another trick to get me out of Parliament--putting me in prison.

The verbal condemnation over the removal of immunity and the arrest of Cheam Channy is the strongest by the United States since the 1997 coup. In Washington, people are seriously considering imposing sanctions. When they [the Cambodian leadership] realize there is a real possibility of sanctions, they will back off.

We are calling for a visa ban that would apply to a handful of members of the ruling elite and their families. The United States is their favorite destination; they send their students to American schools and universities, and they go there to spend their ill-gotten money on things like property. I think it would be most effective, and it wouldn't hurt the Cambodian people.

So far, yes. Robert F. Kennedy once said, "We should not be complacent with the peace of a cemetery and the security of the enslaved." If Cambodia is stable, it is the stability of oppression. The message is: please don't advocate stability for its own sake; look at what lies behind it, or Cambodia could end up as stable as North Korea.

The justice system in Cambodia is corrupt beyond repair. We must promote democracy and defend human rights so that the Cambodian people are able to choose the regime, the system and the leaders they want. Don't allow repression and electoral manipulation. Just allow the Cambodian people to express their will and help that will to be implemented.

I think they are testing the waters. If there is no meaningful reaction from the international community, they will go after other members of Parliament until the opposition is totally destroyed.

If there is no strong reaction from Cambodia's aid donors, the Sam Rainsy Party will be eliminated before the 2008 elections, and the seeds of democracy planted by the United Nations in the early 1990s will be dead. Only donors have leverage.