២៨ មករា ២០២៥ / 28 January 2025 - Khleang Huot
ហ៊ុន សែន បានបញ្ជាផ្ទាល់ ឃ្លាំង ហួត ឲ្យសម្លាប់ លោក លិម គិមយ៉ា។
Hun Sen personally ordered Khleang Huot to kill Lim Kimya.
Who is Khleang Huot, Hun Sen's hatchet man, who recently organized the assassination of Cambodian political opponent Lim Kimya in Bangkok on January 7, 2025?
After the end of the Khmer Rouge regime in 1979, Khleang Huot spent part of his youth in a refugee camp in Thailand, near the Cambodian border. His family was involved with FUNCINPEC, a royalist resistance movement led by the former King Norodom Sihanouk and his son Norodom Ranariddh. He participated in political training courses organized by Thai authorities, who supported the Cambodian Resistance against the regime of Hun Sen, the Prime Minister from 1985, backed by communist Vietnam. This is why Khleang Huot speaks fluent Thai and can blend in with the local population in Thailand.
Along with hundreds of thousands of other refugees, Khleang Huot’s family was repatriated to Cambodia in 1992, following the 1991 Paris Peace Agreements.
Following FUNCINPEC's victory in the 1993 elections organized by the United Nations, an unusual power-sharing arrangement was imposed, forcing FUNCINPEC to divide all positions at every level with Hun Sen's Cambodian People's Party (CPP), despite the CPP's electoral defeat.
In 1997, Hun Sen orchestrated a bloody coup d'état to eliminate his government partner, FUNCINPEC, and seize full control of power. During the coup, Thach Khorn, Khleang Huot's father and a FUNCINPEC general, defected from his party and pledged allegiance to Hun Sen. As a reward, Hun Sen appointed him Governor of Banteay Meanchey Province, which borders Thailand, in 1998. He now holds a high-ranking position within the government.
Since his father's defection, Khleang Huot's career has also advanced rapidly within Hun Sen's regime. He was successively appointed Governor of several districts in Phnom Penh before becoming Deputy Governor of the capital, Phnom Penh, in 2022.
On August 28, 2023, he was appointed as a personal advisor to Hun Sen in his capacity as President of the ruling CPP.
Even without being prominently in the spotlight, Khleang Huot plays an important role for Hun Sen as an enforcer for dirty work. His two main assets are, on one hand, his fluency in the Thai language and his connections with certain circles in Thailand, and on the other hand, his affiliation with the “Phnom Penh City Hall Connection”, where Hun Sen’s henchmen are recruited—operatives who work in the shadows and do not hesitate to resort to violence.
This "Phnom Penh City Hall Connection" network originates from the Governor of Phnom Penh himself, Khuong Sreng, a CPP stalwart who enjoys Hun Sen's absolute trust. He is known for orchestrating continuous violent repression against striking workers and political opponents who gather in the streets, often being attacked—sometimes fatally—by anonymous assailants.
This "Phnom Penh City Hall Connection" network extends down to low-ranking municipal employees, such as Pich Kimsrin, the deputy head of the local Psar Kandal market, a staunch supporter of the CPP. He was recruited to act as a spotter, identifying Lim Kimya for his assassin, Ekkalak "Sergent Em" Paenoi, in Bangkok on January 7, 2025.
But what Hun Sen values most in Khleang Huot—the key element he relies on him for—is his Thai Connection, which allows Khleang Huot to play a crucial role, sometimes acting as a Missus Dominicus, when dealing with allies, partners, or accomplices based in Thailand.
Khleang Huot is well-acquainted with Thaksin Shinawatra, who considers him a personal friend. He was the discreet yet highly effective intermediary who facilitated Thaksin Shinawatra’s sister, Yingluck Shinawatra's escape to Cambodia in 2017, following the 2014 coup d'état led by Prayuth Chan-o-cha.
There are numerous photos of Khleang Huot in the company of Thaksin Shinawatra and/or Yingluck Shinawatra, sometimes with Hun Sen and sometimes without—despite Khleang Huot holding no official government position.
Hun Sen also tasked Khleang Huot with discreetly but appropriately taking care of the supporters of Thaksin Shinawatra, the Red Shirts, who sought refuge in Cambodia after the 2014 coup d'état led by Prayut Chan-o-cha.
However, Hun Sen is a man without faith or loyalty, who never hesitates to betray his friends when it serves his interests. For several years, he cooperated—at least tacitly—with his Thai counterpart, Prayut Chan-o-cha, to eliminate certain Red Shirts who had taken refuge in Cambodia.
As a result, Hun Sen entrusted Khleang Huot with orchestrating the abduction (and subsequent secret killing) of Wanchalearm Satsaksit, a pro-Thaksin activist who had fled to Cambodia, in 2020.
But diplomatic favors are a two-way street. In November 2019, as I prepared to return to Cambodia via Thailand, Prayut Chan-o-cha, then the Prime Minister, publicly announced during a press conference—at the request of Hun Sen—that "Sam Rainsy would not be permitted to enter Thailand."
In late 2024 – early 2025, when it came to organizing the assassination of an "insolent" political opponent named Lim Kimya in Bangkok, no one but Khleang Huot could carry out this delicate mission.
In a leaked audio message from September 2024, Hun Sen ordered the same Khleang Huot to bring back to Cambodia, "dead or alive," another Cambodian dissident, Phorn Phana (or Phan Phana), who was then in Thailand and has since secured refuge in the United States. He instructed Khleang Huot and his accomplices to coordinate with the Red Shirts in Thailand but not to involve the Thai police.
Since September 2024, Hun Sen has never denied the authenticity of his voice in this recording, which has now become highly incriminating following the assassination of Lim Kimya.
You can listen to or replay this message by clicking on this link
https://www.facebook.com/rainsy.sam.5/videos/586710827402595
To be continued …
Sam Rainsy
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