Cambodia’s journalist Mech Dara gestures to media representatives as he sits in a automotive upon his launch from Kandal Provincial jail close to Phnom Penh on October 24, 2024. FILE PHOTO/Agence France-Presse
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — A high-profile Cambodian reporter who received a world award for uncovering alleged cyber scams instructed AFP Tuesday that he’s quitting journalism, saying he has misplaced “braveness” after being arrested by the authorities and freed on bail.
Police arrested Mech Dara on September 30 on costs of inciting social dysfunction, drawing condemnation from around the globe.
He was launched on bail three weeks later after apologizing to Cambodia’s former chief Hun Sen and his son Prime Minister Hun Manet in a video shot whereas he was in jail.
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“I’ve determined that I’m retiring from journalism due to the arrest, the questioning and imprisonment,” Dara instructed AFP.
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“I’m nonetheless afraid,” he stated, including that authorities used extreme drive throughout his arrest, then questioned him all evening afterwards.
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“I’ve misplaced my braveness. It has attacked my spirit, and I’ve no extra braveness,” Dara stated, referring to the arrest and time he spent in jail.
He additionally urged the courtroom to drop the fees towards him.
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Hun Manet on Monday posted photos of him assembly Dara, together with one displaying the pair embracing each other.
Dara stated he knowledgeable Hun Manet of his resolution to stop journalism in the course of the assembly, which passed off a day after his launch.
Rip-off farm reporting
Police detained Dara, 36, after stopping a automotive carrying him and his household from Sihanoukville, a coastal metropolis the place many suspected cyber rip-off operations happen.
His reporting has appeared in varied worldwide information shops and he labored for the impartial Voice of Democracy in Cambodia earlier than the authorities shut it down in February 2023.
Dara has since used his social media platforms to share information content material, significantly across the proliferation of “rip-off farms” — prison operations that defraud victims on-line for huge sums of cash and gas human trafficking throughout the area.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken final 12 months offered Dara with a Hero Award, which acknowledges efforts towards human trafficking, for investigations into exploitation on the on-line rip-off compounds.
The award hailed his “brave reporting on human trafficking for the aim of compelled criminality”, saying it had led to the federal government enhancing its response to the issue.
His arrest got here a day after he posted a picture on social media purportedly displaying a vacationer web site demolished to make means for a quarry, in line with the Cambodian Journalists’ Alliance Affiliation.
Native authorities labelled the now-deleted photos “pretend information” and known as for Dara to face punishment for his or her publication.
After asserting costs towards Dara, the Phnom Penh Municipal Court docket accused him of posting messages on social media platforms designed to “ignite anger (and) to make folks misunderstand concerning the management of the Cambodian authorities”.
The cost of incitement is steadily utilized by Cambodian authorities towards activists, and Dara might resist two years in jail if convicted.
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Cambodia locations close to the underside of worldwide press freedom rankings and rights teams have lengthy accused the federal government of utilizing authorized circumstances as a software to silence dissenting voices.
