Int’l rights groups stand behind Chan Soveth

International human rights groups continued to rally around the local rights worker Chan Soveth on Friday, two days after it emerged that the Adhoc staff member summoned by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on charges of aiding an unnamed perpetrator with an unidentified crime. In a statement, the Geneva-based Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders called on the government to cease its "harassment" of Mr. Chan Soveth, wgo is set to be questioned at the court next Friday. "The Observatory expresses its deepest concern about these acts of judicial harassment of Mr. Chan Soveth, since they seem to merely aim at hindering his human rights activities, in a context of continued governmental harassment against human rights defenders, including against other Adhoc members," the statement said. ...