On Thursday, a Phnom Penh court convicted Chhim Sithar, leader of the Labour Rights Supported Union (LRSU) of Khmer Employees of NagaWorld, and eight other union members of “incitement to commit a felony or disturb social security”. Sithar, detained at a Nagaworld casino protest in January 2022, was imprisoned while the other defendants received suspended sentences or court monitoring. The convictions of Chhim Sithar and the others is a flagrant attack on unions and workers fighting for their fundamental rights’, Amnesty International’s temporary deputy regional director for research Montse Ferrer said. “This verdict shows that the Cambodian government prefers corporations to citizens.”
NagaWorld, a Hong Kong stock exchange-listed firm, began its long-running conflict in April 2021 when management fired more than 1,300 workers, half of whom were union members. From the very outset of the casino workers’ strike, the Cambodian government has cooperated with NagaWorld management to punish Chhim Sithar and the union’s leaders and crush the strike’, said Human Rights Watch deputy Asia director Phil Robertson. “Instead of respecting workers’ rights to freedom of association, bargain collectively, and strike, the government has used every repressive trick in the book to intimidate their union.” A fresh onslaught on Hun Sen’s opponents has surrounded the NagaWorld conflict. Before the 2018 elections, Kem Sokha’s primary opposition party was disbanded.
March’s verdict convicted Kem Sokha to 27 years.
A court dismissed the opposition’s appeal against the Elections Commission’s disqualification on Thursday, barring it from competing in the July election. Violent arrest
On January 3, 2022, Sithar was charged with “incitement,” and the next day, plainclothes security officers forcefully detained her as she tried to join the strike. After more than two months in jail, she was freed on bond in March but rearrested in November 2022 after returning to Cambodia from the overseas Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) World Congress in Melbourne and accused of breaking bail restrictions on overseas travel.
She and her lawyer were unaware of the travel limitations, and she visited Thailand in September and October without incident. The Australian Confederation of Trade Unions’ president, Michele O’Neil, denounced the decision against Sithar and her colleagues. “This is a clear case of the Cambodian government waging an anti-union campaign against Chhim Sithar and her union,” O’Neil said, calling for her immediate release.
