Thaksin should have no fear as Hun Sen's house guest

Fri, Oct 23, 2009
The Nation/Asia News
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Thaksin should have no fear as Hun Sen's house guest.

Bangkok's threat to invoke both countries' extradition treaty once Thaksin sets foot on Cambodian soil, however, may not scare anyone.

If Thaksin, who thanked Hun Sen in a Twitter message but stopped short of elaborating his future plans, decides to come and stay closer to home, he can rest assured it won't be a walk into a trap.

First and foremost, the one who invites him and who would be his host is the most powerful man in Cambodia, thus the chance of Thaksin being stabbed in the back and extradited is virtually zero. Hun Sen's message following his meeting Wednesday with Chavalit Yongchaiyudh, Thaksin's virtual representative, left no doubt about whether the Cambodian leader is the man Thaksin can trust.

Hun Sen talked about great friendship dating back to the days Thaksin was just a businessman, about how his [Hun Sen's] wife cried over Thaksin's political misfortune, and about how much the first Cambodian couple would love to give the ousted Thai leader a "home that deserves his honour".

Combine the apparently heart-felt message with Hun Sen's stormy relations with the current Bangkok leaders, an extradition request should either bounce back to the senders or head straight to a diplomatic oblivion.

The countries' extradition treaty does not oblige them to send back someone like Thaksin as long as he can be deemed a political victim in his own country.

The legal agreement is like most other extradition treaties in essence. It says extraditable offences are punishable under the laws of the two countries by the penalty of imprisonment for a period of more than one year or by any heavier penalty.

"The Contracting Parties undertake to extradite to each other, in accordance with the provisions of this Treaty, persons found in the territory of one of the Contracting Parties who are wanted for prosecution, trial or for the imposition or execution of punishment in the territory of the other Party for an extraditable offence," the treaty says.

If the above article can make Thaksin squirm, there exists another article that is likelier to come into play.

According to Article 3, extradition will not be granted when:

"The Requested Party considers the offence for which the request for extradition is made by the Requesting Party as a political offence.. ...

"(Or) The Requested Party has well-founded reasons to suppose that the request aims to institute criminal proceedings against or execute punishment upon the person sought on account of race, religion, nationality or political opinion of that person, or that the position of the person sought in judicial proceedings will be prejudiced for any of the reasons mentioned above.

"(Or) The offence for which the request for extradition is made is exclusively an offence under military law of the Requesting Party and does not constitute an offence under criminal law of that contracting party."

On the surface, it's in favour of Thaksin, but he will have to read the above very carefully, especially because he was convicted under a law that has been in existence long before the military coup that ousted him. Then again, while those letters could be a cause for concern, Hun Sen has all but said Thaksin shouldn't be scared.
-The Nation/Asia News Network