CRACKDOWN

A regional press watchdog has criticised last year’s crackdown on government critics, saying it has resulted in a “severely compromised environment for free expression” in Cambodia. In its annual report for 2009, released on Saturday, the Bangkok-based Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SAPA) said the government’s actions in 2009 had seen a narrowing of the democratic space for the media, the courts and for opposition politicians. “The challenges for the Cambodian media in 2010, therefore, will remain and will be heightened by an emboldened government that has limited and narrowed the space for free expression … with passivity as well as deliberate campaigns to silence its critics,” the report said.