By Lauren Crothers
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia
The leader of a Cambodian dissident group has denied links to a 2009 bomb plot in an interview with Anadolu Agency on Tuesday.
Sam Serey, head of the Khmer National Liberation Front, or KNLF, was accused of ties to the Tiger Head Movement by a senior security official, the Cambodia Daily newspaper reported Tuesday.
The Tiger Head Movement, like Serey’s group, opposes the government of Prime Minister Hun Sen, which both organizations view as a puppet of Vietnam.
Internal security director Chhay Sinarith told the newspaper documents seized from Tiger Head members arrested for the bomb plot identified Serey as a member. The alleged plot was uncovered when explosives were found in front of the Council of Ministers building and a TV station in Phnom Penh.
Serey, who lives in exile in Denmark, told an Anadolu Agency correspondent in a telephone interview that the allegations were baseless. "The KNLF and I have never used any violence and what they accuse us [of]," he said. "They want to discredit us and [the] KNLF in order to stop the international community supporting us."
He added: "We act in accordance with international laws and the Constitution of Cambodia."
The claims against Serey come a day after 10 of his group's members were charged with plotting to incite violence.
They were arrested last week on suspicion of conspiring to plant bombs at the Thai-Cambodian border. Serey said the families of those arrested believe the case against them is unjust.
He said last week that the suspects had been planning to demonstrate outside the Vietnamese Embassy in Phnom Penh when they were arrested.
After banning the Khmer National Liberation Front last year, Sen's government has cracked down on the group. In April, a Cambodian court sentenced 13 group members to five to nine years in prison after finding them guilty of plotting to overthrow the government. Serey was one of six convicted in absentia.
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