Saturday, 30 August 2008

Parties Warn World of 'Death' of Democracy

By Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
29 August 2008

Two opposition leaders said Friday they would continue to push the international community to support their denial of July's election results, following a series of hearings this week that dismissed their complaints of fraud and calls for a re-vote.

The Sam Rainsy and Human Rights parties maintain the election results were fraudulent and have called for a nationwide re-vote, citing a number of irregularities during the run-up to the election and on the day of the polls.

The parties are now seeking international lawyers to complain of irregularities to the US government, the EU and the UN, and to call on them "to review their relationship with the fourth mandate of the Phnom Penh government," opposition leader Sam Rainsy said Friday.

"The Phnom Penh government has come from an illegal National Assembly, which came from unfair elections."

Kem Sokha, president of the Human Rights Party, said a failure of the international community to intervene would lead to "the death of the democratic process in Cambodia."

Both the National Election Committee and the Constitutional Council maintain that the elections were legitimate, with the ruling Cambodian People's Party claiming to have won 90 or 123 National Assembly seats.

According to the NEC, the Sam Rainsy Party won 26 seats and the Human Rights Party won three.

CPP, Funcinpec and Norodom Ranariddh Party officials say they will go ahead with a swearing-in ceremony for the newly elected National Assembly on Sept. 24, but both opposition leaders said Friday their representatives would boycott the ceremony.

A boycott of the ceremony could lead to a further delay in the formation of a new government.

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