Defying a public warning from Prime Minister Hun Sen, the Sam Rainsy Party held a religious ceremony on Saturday to honor the souls of those killed in the July 1997 factional fighting.
About 200 party members gathered inside headquarters to offer alms to a dozen monks.
“We are holding this ceremony today to commemorate the anniversary of the July 5-6 coup d’etat, during which many democrats were executed,” party Vice President Kong Korm said.
Kong Korm said the fighting hurt not only the Funcinpec party, which then headed the government, but the whole nation. “It is a national crime that legal, then-first prime minister Prince Norodom Ranariddh was illegally ousted from power, and the prince’s loyalists were killed.”
Kong Korm criticized Funcinpec for delaying its official memorial ceremonies. “Funcinpec is afraid of the truth. Funcinpec parliamentarians must not give in to the threat of the prime minister.”
Last week, Hun Sen warned that “whoever wants to provoke an incident” by holding remembrance ceremonies “must bear full responsibility in front of history and the Cambodian people.”
Funcinpec recently changed its official memorial ceremonies from last Friday and Saturday to this Thursday. Some Funcinpec members said the original memorial date had angered CPP officials.
Funcinpec members did attend an informal religious ceremony at party headquarters Friday, and several Funcinpec lawmakers appeared at the National Assembly Friday wearing commemorative black ties.
One Funcinpec supporter, who attended the Sam Rainsy Party ceremony Saturday, labeled the royalist party “cowardly” for changing the ceremony date.
