Ministry of Interior officials will meet with representatives of the Cambodia National Rescue Party on Wednesday to discuss the ministry’s ruling that an extraordinary congress held to elect a new president last month violated the party’s bylaws.

Last week, the ministry released a statement saying the party’s decision to hold a congress in March to elect Kem Sokha as president, along with three deputies, breached its 2013 bylaws, which mandated an 18-month waiting period before election of a new president.

However, the CNRP had amended the article at the same congress, allowing it to bypass the waiting period, but the ministry only considered the old statute. Political observers saw the intervention as part of a pattern of harassment of the opposition.

Prak Sam Oeun, director for the administration department, said he and two colleagues would meet the CNRP on March 29, but maintained that the party had erred by not submitting the amended statue to the ministry before organising the extraordinary congress.

“The Interior Ministry wanted the CNRP to send the amended [statute] first and then the CNRP could hold extraordinary congress later. Then the CNRP would not have been wrong,” he said.

CNRP spokesmen could not be reached yesterday.