As many as 20 percent of prisoners in Cambodia are subject to torture by police and prison officials, according to a human rights report by UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan.
In some cases, prisoners have been tortured to death and their alleged killers have gone free, said the report released Monday in New York.
“Torture and other forms of physical ill-treatment…has continued to be a serious problem,” the report said. “Interviews with several hundred detainees and prisoners indicate that at least one suspect out of five or six appears to be beaten or tortured.”
“The problem is further compounded by institutional impunity, whereby perpetrators of torture are most of the time protected from prosecution or even disciplinary sanction.”
The allegations brought quick denial from police.
“There is no one who is arrested that is tortured. We arrest those people and keep them in the proper facilities without beating them,” said Mao Chandara, chief of staff for the National Police.
“The Ministry of Interior and the National Police director general never tolerate those who violate the law by torturing.”
The 24-page UN report addresses a wide range of human rights issues, including prison conditions, political violence, intimidation during this year’s election campaign and the rights of women and children. It is based on the work of Thomas Hammarberg, Annan’s special representative on human rights in Cambodia. Hammarberg is scheduled to testify before the UN General Assembly today.
The section on torture said that data gathered by human rights investigators indicated that 92 percent of those interrogated by police confessed to the crime they were accused of. Those confessions are often the main evidence in subsequent trials, despite what the report called “credible complaints” that the suspects were beaten into confessing.
In Battambang town, for example, Hammarberg submitted a report to authorities last year detailing 30 cases of alleged torture in the main district police station. Authorities promised to investigate. He raised the issue again in July 1998, but was told there had been no progress.
“To date, no police officer has been prosecuted or even disciplined for the well-documented cases of torture in Battambang,” the report said.
Another province singled out in the report was Koh Kong, where nearly half of the 60 detainees interviewed complained of having been tortured by police.
Mao Chandara complained that the UN ignored the progress made in preventing and punishing cases of beatings and torture.
“In reality, we have immediately suspended police in Koh Kong following reports of them violating the law,” he said. “We have also responded to the report of such cases in Battambang, but he [Hammarberg] never looks at this.”
The UN report acknowledges “positive developments” and praised efforts by the National Police as well as the ministries of Justice, Interior and Defense to discourage and punish torture.
“However, the lack of effective prosecution of prison and police officials against whom there is evidence of having tortured prisoners to death in Battambang, Prey Veng and Kompong Cham remains a very serious concern,” the report said.
“Further efforts by the government are needed to demonstrate its determination to strictly enforce the prohibition of torture by police and military investigators, including the prosecution of torturers.”
Government spokesman Khieu Kanharith declined to comment on the report, saying he had not yet received a copy.
(Additional reporting by Kimsan Chantara)
