Cambodian rights group says tax breaks leading to forced evictions

PHOTO

There are reports of assaults, arbitary arrests and threats during forced evictions. [Supplied: LICADHO]

16/08/2010
Radio Australia

A land rights organisation in Cambodia says EU tax breaks meant to promote trade with poor nations are contributing to evictions at gunpoint in rural areas.

The EU tax-free status of exports from Cambodia to the EU is one of the key factors that's revived Cambodia's sugar industry, after years of war and instability.

But land concessions granted by the Cambodian Government to companies have led to forced evictions involving armed police and soldiers.

At least two people have been shot during these evictions, and David Pred, the Cambodia country director of Bridges Across Borders, has told Radio Australia's Connect Asia program there are many reports of assaults, arbitary arrests and threats.

"We are extremely concerned that instiling this tariff-free status on Cambodia without recquiring any environmental and social safeguards is encouraging the expansion of a model of industrial agriculture, that is in fact very harmful to Cambodian farmers and rural communitites, and has been directly tied to violence and the abuse of human rights," he said.

The European Union has rejected the claims, with the Charge D'Affairs of the EU Delegation to Cambodia, Rafaelo Dochao Moreno, says it's unfair to link its trade initiative to rights abuses in Cambodia.

"It's like accusing for instance, where there's a drunk driver killing a pedestrian, you accuse the manufacturers of cars of this killing," he said.

"There is a relation because the car has killed a person but it is not a direct responsibility of someone that is manufacturing cars."