A 25-year-old member of the Kuoy ethnic minority has been fined 6 million riel, about $1,500, for “insulting” his own community’s traditions.

Municipal court judge Heng Sokha yesterday said Theam Sotthea, an activist with the League for Democracy Party, had been fined for a Facebook post in which he took Kuoy and other ethnic minorities to task for ceremonies conducted in Ratanakkiri for World Indigenous Peoples Day on August 9, slamming their sacrifices of, and prayers to, buffalos and pigs as “crazy and stupid” as well as “cruel”.

The suit against Sotthea was brought by several rights groups including the Cambodian Indigenous Youth Association, whose president, Pheap Sochea, yesterday said an appeal would be filed as the sentence was “too light”.