Funcinpec President Prince Norodom Ranariddh is preparing to return to the government a French-made, twin-engine passenger plane currently in his possession, the prince’s cabinet said in a statement issued Monday evening.
The plane will be returned via the CPP’s Cabinet Minister Sok An, the statement said, though it does not reveal when the plane hand over would occur or what had prompted the embattled prince to return the aircraft.
“[Prince] Ranariddh, president of Funcinpec, told His Excellency Sun Chanthol, Minister of Public Works and Transport, to prepare documents with the plane, a Falcon XU-008 that is being repaired in Singapore, to return [it] to the Royal Government,” the prince’s cabinet said in the statement.
Prince Ranariddh first used the plane during the government mandate from 1993 to 1998, said Ok Socheat, public affairs adviser to the prince.
The prince acquired the plane from a private company in 1993 but lost it to the CPP when he was ousted following the factional fighting of 1997, Funcinpec Secretary-General Nhiek Bun Chhay said. He added that Prime Minister Hun Sen gave the plane back to Prince Ranariddh in July 2004, following the formation of the current coalition government that emerged from the one-year deadlock after the 2003 general election.
SRP leader Sam Rainsy claimed in 2004 that the government had returned the plane to the prince as an incentive for him to form a coalition government and end the deadlock. Prince Ranariddh subsequently filed a defamation lawsuit against Sam Rainsy, who in February 2005 had his parliamentary immunity stripped as he fled the country. He remained overseas for a year. Sam Rainsy said Tuesday that returning the plane was “too little, too late.”
Sun Chantol could not be contacted and Cabinet Minister Sok An said he was too busy to talk to a reporter.