Viet Nam Human Rights
Cambodian PM asks US to stop deporting criminals
27/4/17
 |
| Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen |
'America is very smart...they keep only good people while they deport prisoners out of their country back to us.'
Cambodian leader Hun Sen called
on the United States
Thursday to stop forcibly deporting convicts with Cambodian heritage to the
Southeast Asian nation, saying they should revise a policy that splits up
families.
More than 500 felons have been
sent to Cambodia through a
repatriation deal, though many were raised in the U.S. and arrive in the country
having never visited and unable to speak the language.
"America is very
smart...they keep only good people while they deport prisoners out of their
country back to us," said Hun Sen, the strongman premier who has ruled
Cambodia for more than three decades.
"I hope the father of human
rights which is America...will
accept the proposal to amend the agreement to offer convicted Cambodians a
chance to stay in the U.S.
with their families," he added.
The prime minister's comments
come after Cambodia's
foreign ministry said earlier this week it wanted to renegotiate the
15-year-old agreement allowing both nations to deport criminals with ties to
the other country.
The foreign ministry spokesman
said the deal had been "criticised by both Cambodians here and Cambodian
communities in the U.S."
as a form of "double punishment" for those who are deported against
their will.
A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy
in Phnom Penh told that they had been informed of
Cambodia's
desire to amend the agreement.
Hun Sen routinely hurls insults
at the United States
and jumps on any opportunity to point out hypocrisy in American foreign policy.
Washington secretly bombed Cambodia
during the Indochina wars but went on to be a
major donor as the country emerged from the ashes of the Khmer Rouge genocide,
pouring billions in aid into the country.
It also took in tens of
thousands of Cambodian refugees.
Yet relations between the two
nations have grown increasingly frosty in recent years, a period that has seen Cambodia grow closer to regional superpower Beijing.
China has lavished the poverty-stricken country with
billions of dollars in grants and low-interest loans over the past few decades.
Unlike aid from the U.S., Beijing's
support comes without pressure to address rights abuses or strengthen the
country's fragile democracy./.
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