PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — The day Kea Sokun was arrested in
Cambodia, four men in plainclothes showed up at his photography shop near
Angkor Wat and carted him off to the police station. Kea Sokun, who is also a
popular rapper, had released two songs on YouTube, and the men said they needed
to know why he had written them.
اضافة اعلان
“They kept asking me: ‘Who is behind you? What party do you vote
for?’” Kea Sokun said. “I told them, ‘I have never even voted, and no one
controls me.’”
The 23-year-old artist, who says his songs are about everyday
struggles in Cambodia, was sentenced to 18 months in an overcrowded prison
after a judge found him guilty of inciting social unrest with his lyrics. His
case is part of a crackdown in which dozens have been sent to jail for posting
jokes, pictures, private messages and songs on the internet.
The ramped-up scrutiny reflects an increasingly restrictive
digital environment in Cambodia, where a new law will allow the authorities to
monitor all web traffic in the country. Critics say that the decree puts
Cambodia on a growing list of countries that have embraced China’s
authoritarian model of internet surveillance, from Vietnam to Turkey, and that
it will deepen the clash over the future of the web.
Cambodia’s National Internet Gateway, set to begin operating
Feb. 16, will send all internet traffic — including from abroad — through a
government-run portal. The gateway, which is mandatory for all service
providers, gives state regulators the means to “prevent and disconnect all
network connections that affect national income, security, social order, morality,
culture, traditions and customs.”
Government surveillance is already high in Cambodia. Each
ministry has a team that monitors the internet. Offending content is reported
to an internet crime unit in the Ministry of Interior, the center of the
country’s robust security apparatus. Those responsible can be charged with
incitement and sent to prison.
But rights groups say that the new law will make it even easier
for the authorities to monitor and punish online content, and that the recent
arrests are meant to further intimidate citizens into self-censorship in a
country where free speech is enshrined in the constitution.
“The authorities are emboldened by China as an example of an
authoritarian state that gives Cambodia political cover, new technology and
financial resources,” said Sophal Ear, a dean at the Thunderbird School of
Global Management at Arizona State University whose family escaped the Khmer
Rouge, a murderous regime that seized power in Cambodia in 1975.
“The National Internet Gateway is merely centralizing what has
been a decentralized system of control over Cambodia’s internet,” he said. “The
outcome will be to crush what little remains of freedom of expression online.”
The Cambodian authorities have defended the decree as essential
for peace and security, dismissing allegations of censorship or any notion that
freedom of speech is under threat. “There is a free press in Cambodia and
freedom on the internet,” said Phay Siphan, chief government spokesperson. “We
encourage people to use the internet, up until it becomes incitement.”
Phay Siphan accused rights groups of “spreading paranoia.” He
said he felt sorry for the young people who had been arrested because they were
not speaking for themselves.
“With freedom comes responsibility,” he said. “We warn them. We
lecture them, make them sign documents, then the next week they post the same
things, without taking the responsibility to maintain peace and stability.”
Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has been in power since 1985 and has
shown great zeal when publicly condemning his political rivals, appears eager
to transfer his opprobrium to the digital era.
When a former monk and activist posted a disparaging poem about
the loss of the nation’s forests on the prime minister’s Facebook page, Hun Sen
described the act as “extremist” and ordered the police to hunt the man down.
He was arrested in October.
Of more than 30 arrests made over digital content since 2020,
the most publicized one involved an autistic 16-year-old who was released in
November. The teenager, Kak Sovann Chhay, had been jailed for comments he made
in a chat group on Telegram, a private messaging app.
His father, a senior member of the opposition Cambodian National
Rescue Party, which has been outlawed, was in prison at the same time. He had
been jailed in 2020 for criticizing Hun Sen on Facebook.
Sopheap Chak, executive director of the Cambodian Center for
Human Rights, said the timing of the new law was unsettling, given upcoming
elections.
“There is a real risk that the National Internet Gateway will be
used to block and censor dissenting opinions online,” she said. “This will
hinder Cambodian citizens’ ability to make an informed decision on which
candidate they deem to be the fittest to rule the country.”
Kea Sokun, the rapper, was released in October after serving 12
months in prison. Six months of his original 18-month sentence were suspended
to keep him in line, he said, a reminder that he is “not legally free yet.”
“Khmer Land,” one of the songs that got him arrested, now has
more than 4.4 million views on YouTube, and Kea Sokun is already working on his
next album.
“I’m not angry, but I know what happened to me is unfair,” he
said. “The government made an example out of me to scare people who talk about
social issues.” He said he could have had his sentence reduced if he had
apologized, but he refused.
“I won’t say I’m sorry,” Kea Sokun said, “and I never will.”
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