The Mirror, Vol. 11, No. 520
“Samdech Hun Sen said publicly that Cambodia walked ahead one step internationally by removing defamation penalties from the list of criminal offenses. Such situations of defamation penalties are being used also by some developed countries, suing journalists who write defaming articles before they are sent to jail. Besides considering Cambodia to be one step ahead, because it removed defamation penalties from the criminal code, in order to stop suing journalists and sending them to jail. Samdech Prime Minister appealed to journalists to stop cursing others, as such cursing makes only a bad impression, and they should rather write about their opinions with responsibility. Samdech remarked also that to be a good journalist, one should write in a constructive way, but not in a cursing way like the Khmer Rouge did.
“Samdech Prime Minister said so while he attended the national conference on launching the criminal procedural code on 13 August 2007 at the Hotel Le Royal.
“Speaking at the conference, Samdech Prime Minister pointed out that the laws of the State of Cambodia [before UNTAC], the criminal procedural code and the transitional law of the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia [1992/93] state that defamation is a criminal offense. Moreover, so far the draft of the criminal code written by a group of legal experts from France, had defamation penalties also in the draft, but when it was passed through the Council of Ministers, it was removed, and at the present time, after the criminal code had been passed through the National Assembly and signed by the King, the defamation penalty was not included; in conclusion, the Royal Government decided to remove it by not allowing it to be in the penal code. To sum it up, if the journalists write defaming articles, they will be sued for compensation only, they will not be sent to jail.
“It should be noted that at the present time, although the publication of defaming of articles is not in the list of criminal complaints, but so far a number of powerful officials, including court officials, do not consider defamation by an articles to be a penal offense. Because some people want to harm the journalists, they sue them on the accusation of writing false information, and they still accuse them of criminal offenses. Concerning this case, the journalists are checking the procedures in order to ask the court to use the law on the press properly for the complaints related to journalism, in which some journalists hope that the head of the Royal Government will pay attention to this case.” Chakraval, Vol.15, #2706, 14.8.2007
Newspapers Appearing on the Newsstand:
Tuesday, 14 August 2007
Chakraval, Vol.15, #2706, 14.8.2007
- Samdech Hun Sen Appeals to Journalists Not to Write Cursing Articles, but Constructive Ones
Kampuchea Thmey, Vol.6, #1417, 14.8.2007
- Rain Floods in Three Northern Provinces [Kompong Thom, Preah Vihear, Ratanakiri] Destroy More Than 19,000 Hectares of Rice
Khmer Mchas Srok, Vol.1, #2, 14.8.2007
- National Election Committee Uses Trick to Clean Voter Lists in Order to Eliminate Voting by Those Who Do Not Support the Cambodian People’s Party
Koh Santepheap, Vol.40, #617, 14.8.2007
- Cambodia Removes Defamation Penalty from Criminal Code
Rasmei Angkor, Vol.14, #1213, 14.8.2007
- Samdech Hun Sen: Action Against Corruption Can Be Conducted [without anti-corruption law] if We Are Willing
- 103 Families from Mittakpheap District, Sihanoukville, Appeal to Samdech Hun Sen, because the Authorities Grab Their Land
Rasmei Kampuchea, Vol.15, #4362, 14.8.2007
- Cambodia Interested in Toilet Revolution Initiated by South Korea [Sim Jae-Duck, who was born in a toilet, has made South Korea a country which initiated a toilet revolution in order to reduce diseases and the death rate due to a shortage of toilets]
Sralanh Khmer, Vol.3, #477, 14.8.2007
- Wife of Ke Kim Yan [Royal Cambodian Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief] Colludes with Wicked Officials to Rob People’s Land in Sihanoukville
Recent Comments