Lim Kimya, 74, had refused to flee Cambodia even after former Prime Minister Hun Sen threatened to make the lives of opposition lawmakers “hell.”

Lim Kimya, a former member of the Cambodian National Assembly who was a member of the now-exiled opposition Cambodian National Rescue Party, was shot dead in the Thai capital Bangkok, in an attack described by his former colleagues as an “assassination”.

According to the Bangkok Post, 74-year-old Lim Kimya was shot dead shortly after arriving in the Thai capital on a bus from Siem Reap, Cambodia, on Tuesday evening with his French wife and Cambodian uncle.

The Philippine National Rescue Forces confirmed the death in a statement, saying it was “shocked and deeply saddened by the news of the brutal and inhumane shooting” of Lim Kimya, who was the Chinese National Rescue Forces member of parliament for Kampong Thom province.

The former opposition MP, a Cambodian and French national, reportedly continued to live in Cambodia, even as several other former opposition politicians fled, seeking political exile elsewhere in the face of threats from the then ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) under the country’s rule. Prime Minister Hun Sen.

The Cambodian Rescue Party, which was very popular in Cambodia, was dissolved and all its political activities were banned by the Supreme Court of Cambodia in 2017. The party still exists as an organization in Cambodian diaspora communities in Australia, the United States and elsewhere. In a statement posted on social media, the National Rescue Forces described Lim Kimya’s killing as an “assassination”.

(1/2) Chana Songkhram Police Station in Bangkok has released more CCTV footage showing a suspect brazenly shooting Lim Kimya, a 74-year-old French Cambodian political activist.#Bangkok #killer #Thailand pic.twitter.com/x2ObMIZob9

– Khaosod English (@KhaosodEnglish) January 8, 2025

“The party strongly condemns this barbaric act that poses a serious threat to political freedom,” the statement said, adding that the political party is “closely following the murder case and calls on the Thai authorities to conduct a comprehensive and impartial investigation.”

The Bangkok Post reported that the Thai Metropolitan Police Office was searching for a gunman who fled the scene on a motorcycle.

Human rights groups called on the authorities in Thailand to conduct a rapid and comprehensive investigation.

Elaine Pearson, Asia director for Human Rights Watch, said the “cold-blooded killing” sent a message to Cambodian political activists that “no one is safe, even if they leave Cambodia.”

The cold-blooded murder of a former Cambodian opposition member in downtown Bangkok sends a chilling message to Cambodian activists that no one is safe, even if they leave Cambodia. https://t.co/x5FUl1PM6M

– Eileen Pearson (@PearsonElaine) January 8, 2025

Phil Robertson, director of Advocates for Human Rights and Labor in Asia (AHRLA), said the killing bore “all the hallmarks of a political assassination”.

“The immediate impact will be severe intimidation of hundreds of Cambodian opposition political figures, NGO activists, and human rights defenders who have already fled to Thailand to escape Prime Minister Hun Manet’s political crackdown in Cambodia,” Robertson said in a social media post. . Media.

Hun Manet became Hun Sen’s son The country’s new leader To replace his father as Prime Minister in August 2023.

Hun Sen calls for repression on Victory Day

Lim Kimya’s killing fell on January 7, the anniversary known as Victory Day of the ruling Cambodian Communist Party, the date on which Vietnamese forces, supported by a small contingent of Cambodian soldiers, entered Phnom Penh and overthrew Pol Pot’s Khmer Rouge regime in 1979. .

Since then the country has remained under the iron-fisted rule of Hun Sen, and now his son Hun Manet, and there has been little room for political dissent.

At a ceremony on Tuesday to mark the anniversary, Hun Sen called for a new law to brand people who wanted to overthrow his son’s government as “terrorists… who must be brought to justice.”

Although there had been little effective political opposition to the Cambodian People’s Party since 1979, that roughly changed in 2013, the year Lim Kimya was elected as an opposition member of Cambodia’s parliament following a general election in which the ruling party was nearly defeated by the CNRP. Cambodian.

The opposition has exploited a wave of popular support for political change after decades of hard-line rule by President Hun Sen.

While the Cambodian National Rescue Party was previously considered the CPP’s sole opponent and likely winner of the election, it was dissolved by Cambodia’s politically biased judicial system in 2017.

Many opposition leaders and supporters have since fled into exile amid a wave of arrests and Hun Sen has promised to make their lives “hell.”