Koh Santepheap Journalist Sued for Defamation and Disinformation

Related to the previous case of a group of traffic police officers, who were trying to arrest and handcuff a driver for missing to put on safety belt, in Siem Reap on February 11, 2010; and the case was published on newspapers; such as Rasmei Kampuchea Daily, Koh Santepheap Daily and aired by the Radio Free Asia as well, a journalist was sued by a police officer with Provincial Court for defamation and disinformation.

Sim Samnang, 30, a journalist for Koh Santepheap Daily was summoned for questioned on April 1, 2010 by Siem Reap Court Prosecutor Ty Soventhal for defamation and disinformation of those police officers.

The complaint was lodged by a police officer, named Duy Saron, accusing him of writing the article without thinking about the problem that affected the person he wrote about.

However, the journalist asserted that he had written the correction for an unexpectedly technical wrongdoing.

With respect to the event on February 11, RFA also cast the case and published on its own web site on February 13 to show the picture of the driver’s hands in handcuff. The interview with a witness clarified that, “[The police officers] pulled him out of the car [his own car] and pushed him up to the car. The driver was carrying televisions. [The police] used the victim’s shirt to put on his nose; and banged his head to the seat and the steering-wheel. The victim was struggling to run away from the authorities. A policeman fired a shot into the air. It was so vicious.”

Whereas Mr. Leang Bunra, Adhoc provincial monitor, who also investigated the case, he received a short video from a source to show that several traffic police officers were striving to arrest and tie up the driver with handcuff for he had not put on safety belt and answered back with them. Mr. Bunra said that there was no serious violence, but the police should not have done that in public.

However, the authority should not have sued the journalist. It shows the act of abusing freedom of information and freedom of expression; which has guaranteed in the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (in Article 19) and the Cambodian Constitution.