Category: Cambodia PRAJ II

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Cambodia’s Community Peace-Building Network (CPN) constructively addresses human rights issues by linking communities and dialoguing with government.

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Cambodian CSOs opposed a draft Law on Associations and Non-Governmental Organizations (LANGO) that threatened multiple harms to their organizations.

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EWMI trained Ministry officials on new PRAJ2-supported systems developed in partnership with the MoJ: the Justice Statistics Database, Detention Database, and Trafficking Database.

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Mock Trial competitions were held as part of PRAJ 2's legal education program.

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EWMI organized workshops to strengthen ADR skills.

EWMI’s Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II), funded by USAID, came to an end in December 2014 after six years of activity.  Designed to build the foundation of support for reform of the justice sector in Cambodia, the program worked to strengthen the voice of civil society in promoting change while helping Cambodian legal institutions continue their reform efforts.

Through a coincidence of timing, the tenure of the outgoing UN Special Rapporteur for the human rights situation in Cambodia closely corresponded with the lifespan of PRAJ II (2008-2014). Over the course of his tenure, the Special Rapporteur, Surya Subedi, made many trips to Cambodia, meeting with people from all segments of Cambodian society, and issued five substantial reports. In January 2015, Subedi made his final trip to Cambodia.  In his last press conference, he noted many of the ongoing human rights problems in Cambodia. However, looking back to the beginning of his mandate, he had this to say: “The major difference between then and now rests in the people. They are no longer afraid to speak out. People know their rights and are ready to claim them.”

Quantitative data supports Subedi’s observation. In the final months of PRAJ II, the project conducted a national legal aid awareness survey, mirroring in methodology a similar survey conducted eight years before under PRAJ I. The results were astounding. Whereas only 20% of those surveyed in 2006 were aware of the existence of legal aid and where to access it, in 2014 a full 54% of respondents were so aware, a nearly threefold increase. The dramatic opposition gains in the 2013 elections, and the protests thereafter, further support Subedi’s claim. It is significant that the themes of land grabbing and deforestation, a key focus of advocacy by many PRAJ II partners, were underlined by the opposition in the electoral campaign.

Social change is a complex phenomenon, the result of many political, economic and demographic factors. But there is no doubt that Cambodian civil society has changed in the past six years and that PRAJ II contributed to that change. The numbers speak for themselves: over 187,000 Cambodians participated in PRAJ II-sponsored constituency-building activities during this period, and over 35,000 advocacy initiatives resulted from PRAJ II support. The project trained over 37,000 people on topics related to rights awareness and advocacy, and by targeting the next generation of advocates and leaders – over 5,000 law students trained – amplified the long-term effect of its efforts. The visible engagement of legal defense teams in high profile cases involving activists and human rights defenders demonstrated the subtle power of asserting one’s rights, even when the results were unjust.

Cambodian civil society — and the country as a whole — remains fraught with problems and challenges, and ultimately it will be the Cambodian people on their own who must bring Cambodia to a brighter day. But over the course of PRAJ II, as Subedi noted, a page has been turned.  Whatever Cambodia’s future holds, its civil society will be at the center of it.

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EWMI’s CSO partners in Cambodia coordinated their advocacy efforts to fight for the release of imprisoned broadcaster and democracy activist Mam Sonando [photo: LICADHO]

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Scene near the Court of Appeals during Sonando trial. [photo: LICADHO]

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Scene near the Court of Appeals during Sonando trial. [photo: LICADHO]

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Scene near the Court of Appeals during Sonando trial. [photo: LICADHO]

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Scene near the Court of Appeals during Sonando trial. [photo: LICADHO]

The dismissal on appeal of the most serious charges against broadcaster and democracy activist Mam Sonando and his subsequent release in March were in no small part the result of efforts made by both human rights and legal aid partners of EWMI’s Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II).

During January and February, EWMI partners continued their advocacy efforts to draw attention to the case of imprisoned broadcaster and democracy activist Mam Sonando and fight for his release. On October 1, 2012, he had been sentenced to 20 years imprisonment for alleged involvement in an alleged secessionist movement in Kratie. On January 15, CCHR launched the Mam Sonando Justice Calendar Campaign marking the six months since the broadcaster’s arrest. An accompanying campaign allowed individuals to enter design ideas for a postcard related to his case. In February, CCHR distributed 10,000 copies of the winning entry and people were encouraged to write messages of support and return them to the pick-up points. The messages were read during CCHR’s weekly radio broadcasts and the postcards delivered to the democracy activist in Prey Sar prison.

On the international front, Amnesty International issued a call to action on February 21 urging people to call on Prime Minister Hun Sen and other government officials to release Sonando ahead of his retrial in March. Calling Sonando a “prisoner of conscience,” the appeal also urged people to call on the authorities to “protect, respect and promote the right to freedom of expression in Cambodia.” Council of Ministers spokesman Phay Siphan dismissed the effort, reiterating a long-held position that Cambodia is a sovereign state and would not bow to international pressure. This campaign was significantly influenced by EWMI partners, especially LICADHO, ADHOC, and CCHR, which gave Amnesty International information and strategy advice. 

In preparation for Sonando’s Appeals Court trial, EWMI staff spent significant time supporting the creation of a legal team that could effectively manage the intricacies of this case, involving multiple complex charges founded on a theory of secondary liability similar in nature to conspiracy and the (often conflicting) testimony of numerous witnesses, including fellow accused that had provided testimony in support of the prosecution, apparently for favorable treatment. 

EWMI recruited law graduates (who had previously participated in EWMI legal education programs) from the Royal University of Law and Economics to prepare a database of testimony, evidence and legal conclusions identified in the court judgment supporting the October 1, 2012 conviction, which was used by lawyers to develop a strong legal memorandum in favor of acquittal.  EWMI also engaged Vishnu Law Group lawyers (under its USAID-funded grant) in the preparation of witness requests, direct and cross-examination questions for witnesses, and a legal memo identifying contradictions in evidence and errors in law contributing to Sonando’s conviction.  As a result of actions taken by EWMI partners and others who supported the Sonando defense, his defense team was well prepared for trial and there was a wellspring of public support for his release.

On March 5, the appeal got underway to review the verdicts against Mam Sonando and two co-defendants, Touch Ream and Kan Sovann. There was standing-room only during proceedings, with around 55 people packing the courtroom including numerous international observers. Before the trial began, Sonando’s lawyers had requested the court postpone the proceedings due to the absence of key witnesses. The request was denied. 

Outside the building, around 600 members of the Association of Democrats, which Mam Sonando heads, as well as other activists, gathered to demand his release.  Their shouts were heard inside the courtroom. Numerous national and international representatives observed, inside and outside the courtroom. Monitors included staff from LICADHO, ADHOC, CHRAC, and CCHR. Demonstrators included members of PRAJ-supported CSOs, including IDEA and their affiliates CCFC and CYN, and CPN affiliates from Boeung Kak and Borei Keila.

On March 6, the prosecutor unexpectedly asked that two of the charges against Sonando, inciting insurrection and a charge relating to use of arms against officials, be dropped, but that an additional, less-serious, charge be added of illegally clearing state-owned land. (ADHOC described this new charge as supremely ironic, given Sonando’s work to educate Cambodians about their land rights – and it may have been intended to discredit him in this respect.) The prosecution asked that the remaining charges be upheld. On March 14, the Appeals Court reached its verdict, which tracked with the prosecutor’s recommendations, dismissing the most serious offenses and finding Sonando guilty of remaining minor offenses, as well as illegally clearing forest. The court reduced his sentence from twenty to five years. As four years and four months of the sentence were suspended, Sonando was released from prison. 

A wide array of local NGOs and CSOs, including EWMI partners LICADHO, IDEA, and CCHR, were quick to issue statements welcoming his release and that of Touch Ream and Kan Sovann. Some pointed out that the release came in the wake of intense international and domestic pressure on the authorities for Sonando’s release, including statements by US President Barack Obama, former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault. (It was also noted in the press that, the week before, France had signed off on a multi-million dollar package of aid to Cambodia.)  The pleasure at seeing Sonando released was tempered by the awareness that unwarranted convictions still stand against the three men and that Mam Sonando will remain under judicial supervision for the next three years.  Nonetheless, the case stands as an example where EWMI human rights partners and a legal aid grantee worked together to obtain freedom, if not full justice, for a democracy activist who had obviously been imprisoned for expressing his thoughts, and encouraging others to think freely.

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Vishnu lawyers provide legal advice to Porng Toek community members.

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Rice farming

For the two farmers at the center of the Porng Toek land case, a guilty verdict could have catastrophic for their large families. The men, one with five children, the other with four, faced from six months to two years in jail in a case that should have been a civil matter, but which like many disputes over land ownership, ended up in criminal court.

The case involved a dispute over 2.1 hectares of land between 20 families and an individual who had the backing of the district chief. The claimant charged the two farmers with trespassing and property damage, although both they and the other families had been peacefully growing rice on the land for years. Other clients were later added to the case, charged with discrediting a court decision.

The public interest law group, Vishnu, a EWMI-Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II) grantee and partner, came to their aid to defend their interests and keep them out of jail. Three lawyers worked closely with community members, providing legal advice, collecting further evidence, and meeting with additional witnesses. They also carefully prepared the two defendants for the September 25 trial, which 100 community members attended.

Thanks to Vishnu’s strong legal advocacy and the quantity of well-grounded evidence, the Kampot Provincial Court of First Instance acquitted the two defendants and ordered that the case be resolved by the cadastral commission due to its civil nature.

“I was happy to have been able to represent the community members and help them obtain justice,” said Vishnu lawyer Sao Kagna.

The case represents a major success and even goes beyond the fact that these two men received justice. Vishnu’s lawyers succeeded in persuading the court that criminal proceedings were categorically invalid in a case where the underlying issue was the ownership of property. If this kind of litigation outcome were replicated across Cambodia, it would result in justice for many people facing criminal charges simply because they refused to yield to questionable evictions.

Improving legal aid, specifically indigent criminal defense, has been an important component of EWMI’s justice reform work in Cambodia. With this goal in mind, EWMI–PRAJ works to strengthen the capacity of Cambodia’s existing legal aid NGO providers and through its grant program assists the most vulnerable groups of people in Cambodia.

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MoJ training promotes global health equity, e.g. prosecution of counterfeit drug traffickers & protection of persons with HIV.

Following three years of measurable impact from EWMI gender-based violence prosecution programs, this year the EWMI’s Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II) expanded the work to address the growing global problem of drug resistance caused by counterfeit and substandard pharmaceuticals. Through a program supported by the USAID/Cambodia Health Office, in September 2012 PRAJ began to develop expanded prosecution training and case tracking to support the joint work of the Ministries of Health and Justice in investigating and prosecuting these crimes. The launch of the EWMI activities marks the first systematic effort to train justice and health officials side-by-side on the investigation and prosecution of counterfeit and substandard drugs and illegal drug services.

Malaria and tuberculosis alone kill more than 2 million people a year, while millions more are infected but do not die because they take malaria and TB drugs. Worldwide, these drugs are failing at alarming rates due to drug resistance, with resistance to the only known successful anti-malaria drug, artemisinin, traced to the Cambodian province of Pailin. The sale of counterfeit and substandard drugs and the operation of illegal pharmacies are regularly identified as primary causes of drug resistance. Counterfeit drugs are a 45 billion dollar a year business, and while laws are in place to combat these illegal drugs and services, global health efforts have focused mainly on defensive efforts to stop their spread: free mosquito nets, free drugs, and direct observation treatment. Limited attention focuses on offensive measures: investigating, prosecuting, and tracking those responsible for their production and sale.

EWMI has based its new prosecution training and tracking program on the successes of two previous programs in Cambodia. The EWMI trafficking in persons (TIP) prosecution training and case tracking program, begun in 2009, led to a 300% increase in convictions – a rate sustained over three years. In 2011, EWMI expanded this program beyond TIP cases to include all GBV prosecutions (nearly 20% of criminal cases), and in just one year the overall clearance rate for these cases, and the number of convictions, doubled. Taken together, these activities have trained several hundred officials from the Ministries of Justice and Women’s Affairs, while closely tracking thousands of court cases. The 2011 GBV program alone covered every Cambodian province, and trained over 500 officials.

Drawing on these three years of documented success, in 2012 EWMI and USAID turned to a third area of criminal conduct facing impunity – illegal pharmaceuticals — and expect to see similar measurable improvements in prosecutions over the coming years.

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B.T. (full name withheld for privacy), a Cambodian domestic worker in Malaysia, was repatriated to her home country with the help of LICADHO, a partner-grantee of EWMI’s Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II), despite having been coerced by her Malaysian employer and a labor agency to extend her contract for an additional year.  

B.T. had registered to work as a domestic in Malaysia with the Ung Rithy Group. After training and English classes, she left for Malaysia on April 28, 2010, and for all intents and purposes, disappeared. Repeated attempts by B.T.’s mother to contact her daughter were unsuccessful, and she could not get any information about her child’s whereabouts or health. 

In Malaysia, B.T. told the local labor agency that she wanted to leave at the end of her contract. However, she was not allowed to do so and instead was coerced into signing on for another year. She finally managed to call her mother and express her desire to come back home. When her mother called the Ung Rithy Group in Cambodia, she was refused help. 

So her mother filed a complaint with the LICADHO office, requesting intervention. In June of 2012, LICADHO staff contacted the Ung Rithy Group, pressing them to take action, following up in July by repeating the demand that B.T. be allowed to return. The company represented that it would bring the young woman back in July and pay her salary. But given the poor reputation many labor agencies have earned in recent years, LICADHO staff met with the third secretary of the Cambodian embassy during a mission to Malaysia, requesting intervention in the case. 

With the embassy’s support, and the persistence of LICADHO staff, B.T. was repatriated to Cambodia on July 31. One day later, she received her $3,700 in back wages from the Ung Rithy Group.

While there have been several tragic stories of domestic workers in Malaysia, B.T. happily did not become one of them. Thanks to continued pressure from LICADHO, including discussions with Cambodian government officials in the receiving country, B.T. was reunited with her mother and obtained the full compensation she was due.

Human trafficking remains a serious issue in Cambodia. In addition to supporting the work of LICADHO, EWMI’s PRAJ II program works closely with government partners and other civil society organizations to address this crime through data collection, legal representation of victims, public outreach, legal training and advocacy.

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Women investigators address court officials, explaining the difficulties with GBV prosecutions.

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MoJ Deputy Director of Research and Training, Sothea Nheom, demonstrates the new Trafficking Database.

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Nationwide working sessions featured intensive dialogue on the causes of low clearance rate of GBV prosecutions.

In Cambodia, the criminal justice system faces two significant barriers when addressing gender-based violence (GBV) cases. First, many cases either go unreported, or never make it past the police investigation to the court. Second, those prosecutions which do commence have a very poor clearance rate.  In 2010, the percentage of GBV prosecutions that led to a final verdict was just 16%, whereas the clearance rate for all other criminal cases in Cambodia averages more than 80%. This second problem of prosecutions dropping away is injurious to society in a number of ways:  not only does it rob the courageous survivor (most of whom are minor girls) from receiving justice, it also reinforces a belief in Cambodian communities that the rule of law does not protect them.

EMWI’s USAID-funded Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II), has been assisting the monitoring of GBV prosecutions in Cambodia since 2009.  A case tracking database developed with the Ministry of Justice (MoJ), and used to train the courts and legal aid groups, has been instrumental in this process. In February 2011, PRAJ and the MoJ discovered the abysmal 2010 clearance rate in these prosecutions — which number several hundred a year — and immediately worked with their partners at GIZ in the Ministry of Women’s Affairs (MoWA) to design a yearlong evidence-based training program to improve the success of the prosecutions. The very next month the nationwide program was launched, and by September 2011 over 500 justice sector officials and legal aid lawyers, from every province, had participated.

These intensive regional workshops set out to diagnose the causes of the attrition, and to design solutions. Last month, PRAJ and the MoJ returned to the database and confirmed that the clearance rate had doubled to 32%. While the rate of successful prosecutions remains poor, hundreds of Cambodian women and girls — and thousands of their family members and neighbors — are now receiving greater care, improved due process, and final justice as a direct result of these programs. This is a good start to correcting a systemic access to justice issue.

PRAJ understands that the 2011 success must be repeated to begin to bring the GBV clearance rates and convictions up to par with other criminal cases. To that end, this year PRAJ — again with its partners from GIZ — will expand on the national training series to engage civil society organizations that provide support to rape and domestic violence victims in the provinces, improving the critical referral systems to hospitals and to MoWA investigators. Reviewing the case data from 2011 to examine procedural bottlenecks, the joint program will also offer more advanced sessions based on the assessment that accompanied the 2011 trainings. These sessions will focus in more detail on key evidentiary matters facing the male magistrates and female MoWA investigators alike: instruction on the elements required to prove GBV crimes under the new Penal Code, pertinent due process matters under the new Penal Procedure Code, and issues such as medical forensics, working with post-traumatic stress disorder, and how to conduct gender-sensitive witness interviews.

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Cambodian Eng Vannak codes as Mozilla representative speaks with localization team.

To protect a free and open web, citizens need to understand their gateways to the Internet. If web browsers don’t operate in local languages, then a web user’s relationship with the Internet is troubled at best, and the social commitment necessary to protect a free and open web is weak. With a local language in place, users feel ownership of their Internet – and want to protect it.

Knowing this need to deliver an official Khmer web browser to Cambodia’s rapidly growing web citizenry, EWMI, Mozilla, and the Khmer localization team in Phnom Penh joined together to reenergize – and complete – the stalled localization effort of the Firefox web browser. As of January 2012, a localization process several years in the making was finally accomplished: the most popular web browser in Cambodia was officially transformed into Khmer Firefox.

The Mozilla Corporation, and the Foundation that guides it, support the makers and doers of Internet freedom through the hands-on, transparent, and participatory principles of Open Source software. This philosophy is appreciated by many young Internet users, such as the youth of Cambodia who choose the Firefox browser over the alternatives by a ratio of more than 3 to 1. John O’Duinn, the director of release engineering at Mozilla – and responsible for shepherding the 93 languages of Firefox’s 450 million users worldwide – explains the approach simply: “We just want people talking and sharing on a free and open web.”

Internet use is exploding in Cambodia, with the number of Facebook users last year reaching more than a quarter million – a two thousand percent increase from the year before. This dramatic growth, however, is taking place in an environment increasingly hostile to Internet freedom, with a recent crackdown on free expression followed by a pending new Cyber Crimes Law. With an awareness that localization builds advocates of a free and open web, in September 2011 EWMI and Mozilla co-hosted Open Cambodia: an event that brought the human rights elements of civil society in contact with the coders and developers of the private sector, sparking dialogue and tool-building among these one hundred web leaders to strengthen the constituency of Internet freedom. Drawing on the knowledge and enthusiasm of Mozilla, and the training expertise of the Technology and Social Change Group at the University of Washington in Seattle, Open Cambodia successfully bridged the private sector and civil society, and re-ignited the development of Khmer Firefox.

Four months later, in January 2012, Mozilla’s John O’Duinn returned to Cambodia for the first time in six years, and hosted a final localization design session at the EWMI offices in Phnom Penh. Building on the momentum of Open Cambodia, O’Duinn worked with the localization team led by Eng Vannak to understand the process and prepare the final few hundred strings of code. By the end of January, a six year journey was complete: Khmer Firefox was officially submitted to Mozilla to become the 94th language, joining half a billion other local users worldwide.

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Law students attended client counseling skills workshops prior to competition (2009).

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Winners of the Winners of the 2010 competition at a ceremony with the US Ambassador and President of Cambodia’s Bar Association.

When the East-West Management Institute’s USAID-Funded Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II) began its legal education programs in Cambodia six years ago, no law schools had any form of moot court or practical lawyering exercises. This year, when PRAJ 2 launched its fifth annual Client Counseling Competition, the number of law schools participating in these new legal skills programs had risen from zero to nine. Over the course of the six years, thousands of law students have participated in the PRAJ Mock Trial and Client Counseling Competitions.

The greatest testament to the program’s success is the level of programming that partner institutions have initiated, using their own resources, around these competitions. While the PRAJ-organized Client Counseling Competition this year consisted of sixteen preliminary and final rounds, the number of lead-up sessions wholly organized by the law schools themselves dwarfed that number. Steve Austermiller, who directs the PRAJ Legal Education division, recalled: “there were over a hundred qualifying rounds and practice sessions at the law schools this year before the actual competition even started.” Austermiller, whose programs have trained more than three thousand Cambodian law students and magistrates since 2007, pointed out other signs of sustainability: the rise in participating schools, the hosting of the competitions at the law schools, funding coming from the Cambodian government, and the active involvement of local Khmer lawyers as coaches.

One driver of the schools’ preparation for the competitions is the success the Cambodian teams have had in the international rounds. Three years in a row the Cambodian national team has made it to the semifinals at the English-language world championships, at times advancing further than the United States and the U.K. Back home, the impact of the first semifinal appearance reached all the way to center of government. Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen “was invited to the opening of our school’s new building,” remembered 2009 National Champion Kanika Tan, “and in his speech he said that we were the pride of the country.”

Competition graduates carry their new skills back into the Cambodian legal profession, and to other public and private sector positions, to reshape the way law is practiced and understood in the country. Last year’s National Champion Vo Vannarith, for example, now works at the Ministry of Environment, while his partner that year, Saing Darareaksmey, has entered the business community working at a Cambodian investment firm.

PRAJ’s other annual law student competition, a Mock Trial tournament, has also generated substantial initiatives — and investment — by Cambodian law schools. Seeking to enhance their students’ relevant skill sets several law schools have established not only internal mock trial competitions, but have added trial advocacy courses to their official curriculum. Because one of the schools modernizing its program in this manner is the Royal University of Law and Economics, which offers the benchmark law program in Cambodia, the gradual adoption of these initiatives by other faculties is inevitable.

Developed with the support of EWMI, as well as the American Bar Association, these competition-based legal education programs are part of an array of trainings aimed at introducing the next generation of lawyers to key principles of justice: analytical thinking, legal research, procedural fairness, free legal aid for the poor, and bench and bar ethics. In addition to the successful competitions, these programs have included magistrate training at the Royal Academy of Judicial Professions, several courses taught at the law schools, law student clinics which offer hands-on skills to aspiring lawyers, and the introduction of Cambodia’s first academic law journal.

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Following intensive collaboration between the Ministry of Justice and the EWMI’s USAID-funded Cambodia Program on Rights and Justice II (PRAJ II) to support the investigation in a child trafficking case, an Australian national was convicted in Siem Reap in July and sentenced to eight years in prison for a sexual assault against a four-year-old Cambodian girl. The case was brought to light by PRAJ colleagues from the International Justice Mission (IJM), who contacted PRAJ about the flight risk of a man accused in a child trafficking case in Siem Reap Province. The accused had been arrested in connection with the solicitation and sexual assault of two sisters, ages four and eight, and had been released on his own recognizance pending the decision of the court’s investigating judge. IJM representatives had noticed familiar signs indicating an imminent flight risk — including meetings between the accused and immigration authorities — and approached PRAJ for assistance in learning the status of the prosecution, and to help in communicating with the counter-trafficking offices at the MoJ. 

Using the MoJ Trafficking Database, PRAJ was able to identify the relevant Siem Reap court officials from the prosecution and investigating judge divisions, and was able to reach key MoJ officials to look into the case. Exercising care to uphold the rights of the accused and of the victims in the case, PRAJ worked with IJM to obtain the investigation documents and trace the status of the case file as it worked its way from the prosecutor’s office, to the court president, and finally for referral to the investigating judge. This intensive research and communication took place during a Cambodian holiday season and across two provinces, demonstrating the dedication of PRAJ’s partners at the MoJ in ensuring effective prosecutions of trafficking cases.

Following the court’s analysis of the investigation records, the accused was placed in pre-trial detention, avoiding his flight risk and allowing the victims to prepare for their testimony without intimidation. Based on the courageous testimony of the four-year-old victim and other corroborating evidence, the accused was convicted, sentenced to eight years in prison, and required to pay a significant sum in restitution to the victim’s family. IJM hailed the work of PRAJ during the process as being essential to the successful outcome, stating in one correspondence: “Without [PRAJ involvement] the man probably would have fled the country. I wanted to thank you all. Please forward this to Andy [Boname] and Neil [Weinstein], too. Because of your efforts other eight and four year olds are safer!”