The Interior Ministry has accused Funcinpec legislator Thach Sang of setting up an ethnic-Khmer movement intent on using arms to achieve an autonomous state in southern Vietnam, officials said on Tuesday.
Thach Sang, who has been in the US for medical treatment since last year, is charged with forming the movement to liberate the Mekong Delta region of Vietnam, known to many Cambodians as Kampuchea Krom.
Home to a large population of ethnic-Khmers, Kampuchea Krom has long been claimed as Cambodian territory but has received heightened attention following the formation in June of the US-based Kampuchea Krom Liberation Front.
Branded as radicals, National Police Director-General Hok Lundy claimed last week the KKLF was an armed movement intent on using Cambodia as a staging area to attack neighboring Vietnam.
Co-Minister of Interior Sar Kheng said Tuesday the ministry had compiled a report on Thach Sang’s activities that proved he was the founder of the armed secessionist movement.
“The ministry sent a report to the prince that proved what was done illegally, such as setting up the illegal armed movement,” Sar Kheng said.
Sar Kheng denied reports the interior ministry asked National Assembly President Prince Norodom Ranariddh to revoke Thach Sang’s parliamentary immunity, which would allow his prosecution.
“The Ministry of Interior does not have the right to ask for the lifting of immunity of any parliamentarian,” Sar Kheng said.
A Funcinpec parliamentarian confirmed the report was sent to Prince Ranariddh, but the party has not yet replied. The allegations against Thach Sang were damaging to the royalist party, he said.
“If we do not defend [Thach Sang], we do not support our authorities. If we defend, we are against the Constitution,” the lawmaker said on condition of anonymity.
A second royalist party member said the Interior Ministry’s evidence against Thach Sang must go so far as to prove the liberation front is a military threat to Vietnam.
Many Kampuchea Krom support groups in the US and Cambodia are working to defend the human and cultural rights of ethnic Khmers, but none are intent on using violence to achieve those ends, the parliamentarian said.
“They are not that stupid,” said the parliamentarian, who also blasted overseas groups for creating movements in the US that then impacted ethnic Khmers in Vietnam and Cambodia.
“They are making problems for Khmer Krom,” he said.
On June 4, more than 2,000 people gathered in Phnom Penh to commemorate the 53rd anniversary of the officials ceding of the Mekong Delta region to Vietnamese authorities by the then-French colonial government.
Criticism during the ceremony of Vietnam’s treatment of ethnic Khmers in the disputed territory sparked an angry response from Hanoi, which warned Phnom Penh to prevent future demonstrations.
In a nine-point declaration issued by e-mail last month, the KKLF said it was committed to liberate “our 12 million compatriots and our country…which has 67,000 square-km, with 21 provinces, and two big islands that [are] currently occupied by Vietnam.”
Phnom Penh-based Kampuchea Krom advocacy groups have distanced themselves from the national liberation front and what some believe will be an ensuing crackdown.
However, a recent statement by Sar Kheng that Vietnam’s ethnic Khmer population need passports and visas to enter Cambodia was criticized on Monday by an umbrella group of seven Kampuchea Krom advocacy groups.
“Respectfully, premier, please be aware that all Khmer Kampuchea Krom living in Kampuchea Krom have never been stripped of their nationality or naturalized as Vietnamese,” the groups said in a letter to Prime Minister Hun Sen.
The groups called on Hun Sen to issue a decree clearly stating the national status of ethnic Khmers.
