Responding to comments made during a speech by Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday, and the police’s publication of an apparently coerced “confession” by one woman today, Amnesty International’s Regional Director Nicholas Bequelin said:
“Hun Sen’s assertion that women are to blame for sexual violence and human trafficking due to their choice of dress on Facebook is a despicable and dangerous instance of victim-blaming. This rhetoric only serves to perpetuate violence against women and stigmatize survivors of gender-based violence.
“The Prime Minister’s order to track down and ‘educate’ women represents a menacing application of the state’s surveillance apparatus to advance a discriminatory and patriarchal agenda. Facebook must refuse to cooperate with any discriminatory requests by the Cambodian authorities to block women’s profiles.
