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Posted by: | Posted on: January 15, 2012

Let collectively pray for those residents of Borei Keila who are forcibly evicted

Source: Venerable Luon Sovath Blog

Lord Buddha teaches us to sacrifice materials, relatives, personal organs and including personal life in order to safeguard the Dhamma or the rule of laws or righteousness. In Cambodia, the current flow of her society is in reverse to this teaching. Top leaders and their colleagues seem enjoy personal gains, personal materials, personal relatives and personal power more than any other things. Their gains are at the ridge of greed, hatred and delusion. It is at a clear spot of damaging the Dhamma.

Look at the development project, Boeung Kok lake as well as Borei Keila; the residents who have been living here have continuously received unfair treatment and forcibly evicted. The status of their citizenship and the status of their human dignity have been violently perpetrated by the powerful and the riches. Nonetheless, while winners have obtained all the capacities, the losers and the bottom-line Cambodians, have become the victims. They have been victimized unjustly. Dhamma of Lord Buddha has been twisted and manipulated by the winners and the powerful. The state of the weaks and bottom-line people are visibly placed as the guilty.

Let join together to pray for the well-being and safety of those forcibly evicted residents and their young children.

Image of detaining those people in a place which are not consented by them is the grave violation of human rights.

Image of policemen equipped by guns and buttons viciously forced those innocent residents. Image of policemen kicking that small boy is a grave violation of human rights.

Posted by: | Posted on: January 11, 2012

January 7 and the Khmer Rouge Tribunal

January 7 and the Khmer Rouge Tribunal

Ms. Theary Seng, Dec. 2011

January 11, 2012
By Theary Seng
Letter to The Phnom Penh Post

Dear Editor,
January 7 is indeed a significant day for survivors of the Khmer Rouge. It arrested the macabre convulsions that would have swallowed all of us into a hellish hole if the Vietnamese military had not intervened.
It is a bittersweet day of commemoration through invasion.
And now, unfortunately, it is a day propagandised to be solely the Day of Liberation, neatly sweeping away the equally important fact of it being simultaneously the inaugurating day of an occupation that would last for the next decade.
That occupation began with the barricading of Phnom Penh to facilitate the plundering of its wealth by convoys of trucks heading to Vietnam and the mass crimes of the K5 plan.
My hairdresser remembers returning from Battambang to his home in Boeung Keng Kang I on February 3, 1979, only to find that all the wealthy neighbourhoods of villas and jewellery stores were still barricaded off.
It was an occupation cut short only by the meltdown of the Cold War – specifically, the break-up of the Soviet Union, which funded the Vietnamese occupation of Cambodia.

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Posted by: | Posted on: January 11, 2012

Lessons for toppling dictators

Lessons for toppling dictators

 Jan. 11, 2012

A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS

Popovic tells us we need analytical skills in “unity, planning, and nonviolent discipline” to succeed in a revolution. He tells us of the working of the dynamics of enthusiasm and humor vs. fear and apathy: As enthusiasm and humor go up, fear and apathy go down, and vice versa. And he tells us to select strategy and tactics: Start small and pick the battle one can win.

I ended 2011 with a column on Lord Buddha’s teachings from 2,500 years ago about man as an activist, an “actionist,” and a maker of the world. As 95 percent of Cambodia’s 14 million people identify themselves as Buddhist, I deduced that Cambodians are activists and “actionists” who can transform autocratic Cambodia into a Buddhist country of civil rights, justice, and compassion.
The people profess to want those changes. Yet change has not happened.
After my column, I received an email from a former Khmer monk, Bouawat Sithi, a graduate of Thailand’s Djittabhawan College, which was founded to provide opportunities to students from poor families to pursue higher education. He affirmed that my interpretation of Buddhism is what he learned as a monk and still practices daily — that Buddha never taught man to believe in fate, but “to believe in our own action (karma).” He lamented Buddhism is not taught or understood correctly and “egoism, anger, greed, delusion, desire, craving, hate and aversion” overwhelm many Cambodians.
Heng Sreang, Royal University of Phnom Penh professor, sent an article, “The Scope and Limitations of Political Participation by Buddhist Monks,” that contains his belief that Khmer Buddhist monks “should play not only a legitimizing but also a critical role” as a “constructive force for the improvement and reconstruction of the social well-being and political life of the country.”
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Posted by: | Posted on: January 8, 2012

Lawyer now a ‘monk’

Cambodian Bar Association is also under pressure or not, but whenever the lawyer or the Bar Association is not independent, how can this legal carrier can independently bring justice to Cambodians? Of course, according to our observation, many lawyers who have worked for the minors and opposition party members, have stopped their duty from those minors and opposition party members in order to obtain their Bar Association license. Mr.Choung Choungy’s decision to shave his head and practicing meditation this time is a puzzling question for all of us. He has been aware since the beginning that he will face with terrific obstacle ahead especially the discarding of his license from Bar Association.

Phnom Penh Post

  • Meas Sokchea
  • Friday, 06 January 2012
120106_02

Photo by: Heng Chivoan

Choung Choungy, a lawyer for the opposition Sam Rainsy Party, has his head shaved at the party’s headquarters in Phnom Penh yesterday.

A lawyer for the Sam Rainsy Party yesterday began his meditation for justice campaign at the opposition party’s headquarters in the capital’s Meanchey district, after a Buddhist layman shaved his head and blessed him.

Dressed in white, the lawyer began meditating in the morning between placards calling on the Justice Ministry, prosecutors, lawyers and the Bar Association to defend justice.

“Lawyer Choung Choungy is focusing on clear sightedness, keeping silent and seeking tolerance and truth through meditation to liberate people from danger and obstacles,” layman Hing Phirom said.

“He is doing it for the nation.”

Late last month, Choung Choungy was charged with helping a prisoner escape jail. SRP lawmaker Chan Cheng was also stripped of his parliamentary immunity over the same case, after the Kandal provincial court charged the pair with helping Bantey Dek commune deputy chief Meas Peng escape jail in September.

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