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First Post
6 days ago
- Politics
- First Post
Cambodian leader posts operational military maps on Facebook amid clashes with Thailand — See pics
Amid escalating conflict with Thailand, Cambodian Senate President Hun Sen —father of Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet— shared a photo of operational military maps on social media in what appears to be a misstep. read more Amid escalating conflict with Thailand, Cambodian leader Hun Sen on Thursday shared a photograph on Facebook that showed military operational maps. Thailand and Cambodia have exchanged missiles and rockets today and their soldiers have also clashed on the ground. Tensions had been simmering for months between the two countries that came to a boil in the early hours of the day, leading to Thailand conducting airstrikes inside Cambodia in what it said was retaliation to Cambodian rocket attacks had killed Thai civilians earlier in the day. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Following the attacks and counter-attacks, Cambodian Senate President Sen posted on Facebook photos that showed him what analysts said were operational military maps. He soon deleted the post but open-source intelligence analysts took downloaded the photo and shared it on the internet. It looks like Hun Sen, the President of Cambodia, posted these photos, including operational maps, to his Facebook page and then almost immediately deleted the picture with the maps (I can only find reposts). — Nathan Ruser (@Nrg8000) July 24, 2025 Sen is the father of the current Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet. He run the country either as the prime minister or as a second prime minister continuously from 1985 to 2023 — when his son became the prime minister. He continues to be the head of the senate and the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and wields great control over the country's government and military. He has been actively involved in the ongoing hostilities with Thailand. In a post on X, journalist Thomas van Linge called Sen's photos 'very compromising'. Van Linge said, 'Very compromising pictures which indicate the current border skirmish are part of a planned Cambodian attack. Of course posted online by the mastermind himself.' Van Linge called Sen as the architect of the current conflict. Analysts have noted that Cambodia targeted civilians in six to seven places inside Thailand. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'A crisis which is largely of Cambodia's own making. As Thailand sought to deescalate tensions weeks ago former PM Hun Sen decided to humiliate the Thai PM instead by leaking their private call, forcing the Thai government into a corner from which it could only escalate to survive,' said Van Linge on X.

Sydney Morning Herald
16-07-2025
- Politics
- Sydney Morning Herald
From weed parlours to citizenship, the unexpected fallout from a jungle border bust-up
Singapore: A border skirmish in a remote South-East Asian jungle has spilled into the back streets and upper echelons of Thai and Cambodian society, threatening cannabis parlours, casinos, the ominously named 'Godfather of Poipet', and even a political dynasty. And this improbable-seeming chain reaction of patriotism, intrigue and self-interest is not spent yet. Cambodian strongman and former prime minister Hun Sen, not one to let a crisis go to waste, appears to be using the border tensions with Thailand to further entrench the power of his long-ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP). On Monday, his son, Hun Manet, the current prime minister, announced the government would activate a dormant law requiring men aged 18 to 30 to serve a stint in the military. He also flagged an increase in defence spending, not only on human resources, but 'equipment modernisation'. Cambodia is one of the poorest nations in the world. Luckily, it can count China as its No.1 ticket holder. Loading The CPP is framing the military build-up as prudence in the face of aggression from a more powerful neighbour. And while this may be a good pitch to patriotic citizens, the policies are also beneficial to the Hun family and the CPP, which, despite their grip on Cambodia, figure it can always be tighter. 'The armed forces are certainly not an independent, neutral body,' says Gordon Conochie, an author on Cambodian democracy and an analyst at La Trobe University. 'They are used as a way of bringing people into the controlling sphere of the CPP through jobs and financial inducements. That's why you've got more than 3000 generals. It's a way of the CPP rewarding loyalty and rewarding people who do a service for them.'

The Age
16-07-2025
- Politics
- The Age
From weed parlours to citizenship, the unexpected fallout from a jungle border bust-up
Singapore: A border skirmish in a remote South-East Asian jungle has spilled into the back streets and upper echelons of Thai and Cambodian society, threatening cannabis parlours, casinos, the ominously named 'Godfather of Poipet', and even a political dynasty. And this improbable-seeming chain reaction of patriotism, intrigue and self-interest is not spent yet. Cambodian strongman and former prime minister Hun Sen, not one to let a crisis go to waste, appears to be using the border tensions with Thailand to further entrench the power of his long-ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP). On Monday, his son, Hun Manet, the current prime minister, announced the government would activate a dormant law requiring men aged 18 to 30 to serve a stint in the military. He also flagged an increase in defence spending, not only on human resources, but 'equipment modernisation'. Cambodia is one of the poorest nations in the world. Luckily, it can count China as its No.1 ticket holder. Loading The CPP is framing the military build-up as prudence in the face of aggression from a more powerful neighbour. And while this may be a good pitch to patriotic citizens, the policies are also beneficial to the Hun family and the CPP, which, despite their grip on Cambodia, figure it can always be tighter. 'The armed forces are certainly not an independent, neutral body,' says Gordon Conochie, an author on Cambodian democracy and an analyst at La Trobe University. 'They are used as a way of bringing people into the controlling sphere of the CPP through jobs and financial inducements. That's why you've got more than 3000 generals. It's a way of the CPP rewarding loyalty and rewarding people who do a service for them.'


The Diplomat
15-07-2025
- Business
- The Diplomat
Moving a Mafia State: Why Thailand's Punch Lands Harder Than America's
If you want to influence the Cambodia's regime, you must pressure its criminal economy – not just its formal trade. Over the past few weeks, both Thailand and the United States have ratcheted up the pressure on Cambodia, each seeking to influence the kingdom's behavior in line with their respective domestic interests. But the contrast between their approaches – and their likely effectiveness – is striking. The U.S., true to form, opted for blunt force: a threatened 36 percent tariff on all Cambodian exports, announced last week by President Donald Trump as punishment for Phnom Penh's 'persistent' trade barriers and 'unfair' practices. Thailand, too, is taking a (less characteristically) blunt tack, imposing costs on the regime in the wake of the Thai-Cambodia border dispute and ensuing fallout. It has shut border crossings, cut utilities, blocked Cambodian labor access, and then, last week, issued an arrest warrant for a powerful ruling-party senator and seized Thailand-based assets that Bangkok has linked to online scamming operations. The scope of this argument does not extend to the legitimacy of either the American or Thai grievances with Cambodia. My point is more about the how. One party has demonstrated astute awareness of the kingdom's political economy and the other has not. Results are likely to follow accordingly. Over the past five years, the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) has evolved from merely corrupt and repressive into a paradigmatic and globally damaging mafia state – perhaps the world's most durable. Putting its other predatory interests aside for a moment, CPP ruling elites own, protect, and profit from an industrial-scale cybercrime economy that generates an estimated $12-$19 billion annually – an amount that dwarfs the value of its licit industries (including its low-margin, tariff-vulnerable garment sector) and is equivalent to roughly half its formal GDP. Scam compounds dot the landscape, guarded by armed security, surrounded by barbed wire, and shielded invariably by corrupt ties to political elites. This is not crime exploiting a 'governance gap.' It is governance by criminality. Thailand has seen this reality up close, particularly in Poipet, the notorious border town where scams and casinos dominate. For years, it has more or less tolerated the status quo, benefitting from its own cross-border flows of cash, labor, and goods. But recent mutual antagonisms – including a deadly border skirmish and Hun Sen's escalating interference in Thai politics – appear to have crossed a line for Bangkok. Over the past month, Thailand has struck back hard, first through nationalist posturing over the border dispute, and then through a series of unprecedented moves targeting the Cambodian regime's true vulnerabilities. This culminated last week when Thai authorities raided 19 properties, seized luxury cars, froze assets, and issued an arrest warrant for a key Cambodian scam patron. Kok An, the so-called 'Godfather of Poipet,' is a CPP senator, close associate of the Hun dynasty, and one of Cambodia's wealthiest men. He is also one of the 28 political elites highlighted by respondents to my May 2025 study as meriting international accountability for their role in the scam industry. (The list is included in Appendix A to the report.) While it would be tremendously gratifying to see the remaining 27 actors get the same treatment, it remains to be seen how far Thailand is willing to take this approach. Indeed, Thailand's own elites are enmeshed with Cambodia's so this knife of accountability will likely only cut so deep. Yet, whatever its limitations, Thailand's strategy has demonstrated something Washington seems unwilling to acknowledge: the Cambodian regime will not be moved through traditional diplomatic means or pressure on its formal economy alone. The State Department's approach to tariff negotiations, like so much U.S. diplomacy before it, fails to distinguish between the façade and the true engine of the state-party. Garment exports – the main target of U.S. trade policy – employ hundreds of thousands of workers but contribute only peripherally to the ruling elite's survival strategy. Indeed, tariffs risk collapsing the country's last licit industry and hurting ordinary Cambodians, pushing the regime deeper into its own criminal ecosystem and further into Beijing's orbit. This potential tariff-induced labor disruption certainly makes Phnom Penh nervous, but the CPP has repressed garment workers before and – with all the coercive power in the country consolidated into its hands – will do so again. The 'state-society schism' is vast in Cambodia and the voice of the people holds little sway. The scam economy is far less expendable to the CPP elites, who have also fully captured Cambodia's formal institutions. Accordingly, it is difficult to imagine senior party officials putting up much resistance in trade negotiations were their tariff-proof cash cow (defrauding Americans via slave labor) meaningfully pressured. That's why Thailand's moves strike closer to the mark, hitting the criminalized patronage networks that actually sustain the CPP. And, to be clear 'hitting' those networks doesn't mean cozying up to the regime or hoping against reason that their efforts to deny, obfuscate, or repress their way out of mounting international pressure will now somehow abate. Despite its paper-thin posturing, this is a hostile, criminal regime and we need to move past protracted suspended disbelief about its true nature. Just because Prime Minister Hun Manet is touting his latest 'high-level taskforce to combat scams' (the third such artifice enacted in the last year alone), the embassy will not somehow now manage to 'protect American citizens' or 'hold perpetrators accountable' via 'close cooperation with Cambodian law enforcement.' None of this suggests that Washington should abandon engagement altogether. But it does imply that if the U.S. wants to make progress – whether on trade, human rights, or regional security – it must start asserting its leverage through adversarial (as opposed to purely dialogical) diplomacy where the regime is most vulnerable: its vast poly-criminal enterprises. This indicates need for a strategic pivot away from status quo carrots and 'collaboration.' That means aggressively pursuing transnational accountability for its scam-linked elites and their networks – targeted asset seizures, public exposure campaigns, and transnational investigations into money laundering through casinos and real estate. It means strengthening regional cooperation with neighboring states to disrupt these networks collectively rather than piecemeal. Most critically, it means abandoning the illusion that the Cambodian regime can be swayed by treating it like a normal trading or diplomatic partner. It is not. The CPP is a sophisticated criminal enterprise wrapped in a flag. And, it has made clear that it will protect its illicit economies at all costs – because those economies are what, in turn, protect it. If you want to move such a regime – to end a border dispute, balance a trade deficit, uphold basic universal commitments to rights, or any other end – you have to hit it where it hurts.

11-07-2025
- Politics
Cambodian lawmakers pass constitutional amendment allowing government to revoke citizenship
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia -- Cambodian lawmakers passed a constitutional amendment that would allow the government to draft legislation seeking to revoke the citizenship of anyone found guilty of conspiring with foreign nations to harm the national interest. The 125 members of National Assembly unanimously passed the proposal Friday and legally amended Article 33 of Cambodia's constitution, enabling the government to immediately draw up a bill allowing citizenships to be stripped for the first time. The latest legal move by supporters of Prime Minister Hun Manet was viewed by critics as a way to suppress internal dissent and eliminate policital opponents of his administration and the ruling Cambodian People's Party. The change would apply to lifelong Cambodian citizens, people with dual citizenship in Cambodia and another nation and people from other countries who have been granted Cambodian citizenship. Some government critics and opposition politicians are known to have dual citizenship. Justice Minister Koeut Rith said government officials will urgently draft a bill to revoke the citizenship of any individual found guilty of treason or collaborating with foreign entities to seriously harm the interests of Cambodia and its people. He claimed some Cambodians have colluded with a foreign country to harm their nation's interests. The comment appeared to be a reference to a May 28 confrontation between the armed forces of Cambodia and Thailand in which one Cambodian soldier was killed in a relatively small, contested area on the border. Thailand's Constitutional Court suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra from office earlier this month pending an ethics investigation over a leaked phone call about the border dispute with Cambodian Senate President Hun Sen, the influential former prime minister and father of Hun Manet. The leaked phone call set off political turmoil in Thailand as Paetongtarn faces growing dissatisfaction over her handling of the conflict. Last month Cambodia submitted an official request to the International Court of Justice in The Hague to resolve the ongoing border dispute involving several ancient temple sites. The consitutional amendment in Cambodia comes after Hun Sen last week called for the Ministry of Justice to explore legal avenues in response to frequent government criticism by opposition figures. Hun Sen and Hun Manet both said the legal change was necessary, comparing it to similar laws in several other countries. Speaking to villagers and government officials last week in northern Kampong Thom province, Hun Manet claimed that among nearly 200 United Nations member states, 150 countries have laws allowing citizenship revocation, including the United States. 'Please don't be concerned if you are a patriot and do not oppose the interest of country. But if you have conspired with foreign powers to destroy Cambodia then, yes, it is true you should be worried, and in such case you are not a Cambodian.' Hun Manet said. 'No true patriot would ever plot with foreign powers to destroy their nation.' Amnesty International said it was deeply concerned the Cambodian government will use the 'repressive amendment' to render its critics stateless. 'Judicial independence is key to safeguarding people's rights including the right to nationality and reversing a culture of impunity. This has enabled the government's authoritarian practices to continue unchecked, such as its persecution of opposition leaders, activists and independent journalists,' Regional Research Director Montse Ferrer said in a statement. Former opposition leader Sam Rainsy was one of those named by Hun Sen as making comments detrimental to the nation. Rainsy for decades has been a harsh critic and one of the most popular opponents of the Cambodian People's Party, which fueled Hun Sen's rise to power. Rainsy has been in exile since 2016 to avoid serving prison sentences on defamation, treason and other charges, which his supporters consider politically motivated. Rainsy said recent comments by Hun Sen about the border dispute with Thailand were not patriotism but a personal and political reaction rooted in fear and panic over the potential collapse of a regime deeply entangled with international criminal networks. 'Hun Sen's anti Thai rhetoric is nothing more than a political smokescreen. While he presents the dispute as one of historical grievance and national dignity, the real motive behind his indignation is Thailand's concerted effort to dismantle Chines-run cyber-scam operations based in border areas — operations that have become a vital source of illicit funding for the current Phnom Penh regime,' Rainsy said in a June 28 online post.