Cambodia: RSF calls on government to put an end to the trolling campaign against exiled media
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) urges the Cambodian government to do everything in their power to end the trolling campaign targeting the country’s main exiled media outlets, and to allow these media to operate within the country once again.
"Dogs,” "idiots," "traitors to the nation"... Since the beginning of 2024, the Facebook posts of several Cambodian media operating in exile have been flooded with insulting comments. On 30 July, the Cambodian Journalists Alliance (CamboJA) revealed that tens of thousands of hate messages had been posted by accounts actively supporting the army and the government on the websites of Cambodia Daily, Voice of Democracy (VOD), and the Khmer service of Radio Free Asia (RFA), three online media forced to operate in exile for several years due to their ban by the Cambodian authorities.
Earlier in July, online media outlet VOD reported on a voice message from an unidentified source urging members of the Cambodian army to comply with "superiors’ instructions" by posting insults on the Facebook pages of these sites to "retaliate and support the government.” When contacted by CamboJA, the spokesperson for the Cambodian Ministry of Defence denied any responsibility for this online hate campaign, claiming that "no one at the ministry is following this case.”
“The Cambodian government cannot remain inactive in the face of this infamous online hate campaign against independent media that it has itself stigmatized by forcing them into exile. We urge the government to take action against this cyberbullying of the media and to immediately remove the administrative bans targeting these outlets.
An independent press in ruins
Prime Minister Hun Manet, who has been in power for a year, appears to be continuing the policy of media repression introduced by his father Hun Sen, who ruled the country for 40 years. In 2017, Hun Sen’s administration closed the offices of Cambodia Daily and the Khmer service of RFA, which were forced to continue their activities from the United States. The Cambodian online media Voice of Democracy suffered the same fate in February 2023. According to a recent CamboJA report, cases of legal harassment against journalists, particularly those covering environmental issues, are rising in Cambodia.
Having fallen nine places in two years, Cambodia is now ranked 151st out of 180 countries in RSF’s 2024 World Press Freedom Index, placing it in the category of nations where threats to press freedom are deemed "very serious."
