Tim Sakhorn re-ordained in Phnom Penh, then fled to Thailand

16 April 2009
By Moeung Tum
Radio Free AsiaTranslated from Khmer by Heng Soy @ KI-Media

Novice monk Tim Sakhorn is currently in hiding in Thailand and he is seeking a refugee status to avoid being deported back to Vietnam.

Novice monk Tim Sakhorn informed RFA, slightly ahead of this broadcast, that his decision to flee Cambodia was because of the various signs he saw there that indicated to him that there would be no tolerance for him to live in peace with his relatives and his old father, this in spite of the guarantee provided from the upper level of the Cambodian authority allowing him to live legally in Cambodia.

Novice monk Tim Sakhorn said: “The reason was that there is no safety. I went to ask for an ID at the village level, at the commune and district level, all the way to the abbot of the Kirivong district and the provincial police commission. They said, one after another that the Ministry of Interior confirmed in writing about the issuance of an ID for me. But one level of the authority said that it should be done by another level instead, so I was scared and I cannot endure living in Cambodia. So I traveled to Thailand to look for a safe refuge for myself.”

Novice monk Tim Sakhorn was the former abbot of the Wat Phnom Den pagoda, located in Kirivong district, Takeo province. He was defrocked by force by monks sent by the supreme patriarch (Tep Vong and Non Nget) on 30 June 2007. He was deported by force and put in jail for one year in Vietnam. He was accused of undermining the solidarity between Cambodia and Vietnam.

At the end of last week, Tim Sakhorn was re-ordained again as a novice monk in a pagoda in Phnom Penh. Following this ceremony, on that same day, he fled to Vietnam through the Boeung Trakuon pass in Cambodia: “I was re-ordained on 11 April in Phnom Penh. I cannot tell you the name of the monk who officiated my re-ordainment, nor the names of the witnesses and pagoda. After being re-ordained, I traveled by moto-doup (taxi motorcycle) to Thailand.”