Marking the 28th annual World Press Freedom Day, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen published a letter on May 3 calling on news media to be guided by ethics and professionalism.
“I sincerely appreciate and place high value on our journalists who have made great efforts to overcome obstacles and dangers in fulfilling their duties to actively broadcast and publish news on what is really happening in the country,” the Phnom Penh Post cites him as saying.
Hun Sen called on local and international media to follow the law and refrain from “spreading fake news” that damages reputations and fosters “social chaos.”
"It’s the way to fight against criminals who seek to gain personal interests by using media as a cover to commit offenses that affect people’s dignity and the prestige of the media and professional journalists. This cannot be tolerated,” Hun Sen said.
Hun Sen’s claim to place a high value on journalism is false. The evidence suggests that those in Cambodia who actively report on “what is really happening in the country” face intimidation, assault and imprisonment.
Also on May 3, dozens of Cambodian nongovernmental organizations released a statement authorities “to cease the ongoing harassment of independent media outlets and journalists for exercising their fundamental right to freedom of expression” amid a deteriorating media environment.
The journalist advocacy group Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) 2020 World Press Freedom Index, which rates the media environment in 180 countries and territories, toward the bottom (144th).
RSF stated that, prior to Cambodia’s July 2018 election, Hun Sen, fearing he could lose his grip after 36 years in power, launched “a major pre-emptive offensive against the media that devastated the journalistic landscape.”
That offensive included an outright ban on radio and newspapers critical of his government as well as a “purge” of staff at non-compliant news organizations.
In September 2017, the independent Cambodia Daily following what it called “extra-legal threats by the government.”
In 2018, the Phenom Penh Post underwent a massive editorial shakeup following what the advocacy group Human Rights Watch its “coerced sale” to a Malaysian businessman tied to Hun Sen.
RSF stated: “Cambodians now only have access to news provided by major media groups directly linked to Hun Sen.”
The Phenom Penh-based Cambodian Center for Independent Media (CCIM) reported in February 2018 that the “facade of media freedom collapsed in 2017,” with authorities shuttering “32 radio stations carrying opposition, U.S.-funded or independent content.”
CCIM likewise that sea change to the July 2018 elections, and noted that journalists were being accused of “incitement” and espionage amid claims that “foreign agents” were working to overthrow the government.
The number of journalists who reported they had been attacked increased by 12% since 2015, the group reported, and 47% of those surveyed said they had been threatened.
“Journalists at outlets considered to be independent were more than twice as likely to have been verbally or physically attacked this year, at 20%,” CCIM wrote.
Journalists have also been arrested. Two Radio Free Asia journalists, Yeang Sothearin and Uon Chhin, were picked up in November 2017 on what Human Rights Watch “baseless espionage charges.”
The arrests came soon after RFA, which is U.S. government-funded but editorially independent, shuttered its Cambodian operations after nearly 20 years. the closure followed “a relentless crackdown by Prime Minister Hun Sen's authoritarian regime on independent media.”
The Cambodia Daily’s Aun Pheap and Zsombor Peter with “incitement to commit a felony” from a constituency in Ratanakiri province in May 2017 that Hun Sen had failed to win in 2012 communal elections.
Reporters Without Borders the journalists had been hit with “absurd, trumped up charges” intended to “intimidate all of Cambodia’s journalists.”
The case against The Cambodia Daily journalists was dropped in November 2020. However Peter, who contributes to the Voice of America (a sister news agency to RFA), the court’s decision not to proceed with the case meant little for the Cambodian press, as others are still being prosecuted for “doing their jobs.”
In November 2020, Ros Sokhet, who runs the Khmer-language news website Cheat Khmer, to 18 months in prison for “incitement to provoke serious chaos in social security.”
His crime: criticizing plans by Hun Sen to name his son as his successor and a lack of government action on debt relief for those affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.