Cambodia: World Heritage Committee must ensure UNESCO decision addresses Angkor forced evictions

Member states at next week’s UNESCO World Heritage Committee must address human rights violations carried out by Cambodian authorities affecting thousands of families at the Angkor historical site, Amnesty International said.

A UNESCO World Heritage Centre draft decision on the site was issued ahead of the UN agency’s 46^th World Heritage Committee session, which takes place in New Delhi, India, from 21 – 31 July 2024.

An Amnesty International report published in November 2023 revealed that Cambodian authorities, citing the need to protect the roughly thousand-year-old site from damage that could imperil Angkor’s UNESCO World Heritage status, had engaged in forced evictions on a massive scale and in a gross violation of international human rights law.

“Member states at the World Heritage Committee session must unequivocally condemn the human rights violations being committed by the Cambodian government at Angkor,” said Kate Schuetze, Amnesty International’s Acting Deputy Regional Director for Research.

“They must also follow up on the UNESCO draft decision with a view to preventing further violations and ensuring that victims of forced evictions can access their right to effective remedy.”

UNESCO’s draft decision expresses concern about “possible forced population displacements” and requests Cambodia to invite a joint Reactive Monitoring Mission to Angkor to assess the state of conservation and “the conditions of the relocated communities”.

The draft decision also calls on Cambodia to ensure that it communicates the ongoing relocation programme to local communities by outlining, among other issues, “its commitment to ensuring that the conditions of relocated populations comply in all respects” with human rights.

However, the decision falls short of calling on Cambodia to make an explicit commitment not to engage in forced evictions in Angkor. Neither does it call for Cambodian authorities to put in place all necessary corrective measures to ensure full respect of human rights for the communities affected. UNESCO had raised both these issues in a press release in November 2023 in response to Amnesty International’s findings.

Whitewashing by the Cambodian government

Following the publication of Amnesty International’s 2023 report, UNESCO World Heritage Centre requested that Cambodia submit a report on the relocation programme that addressed “allegations of forced evictions” and “the processes for identifying legal residents from illegal encroachments”. It also requested that the report “should include a response to the Amnesty International allegations.”

In February 2024, the Cambodian government released its State of Conservation report. However, in the report, the government of Cambodia refused to engage substantively with Amnesty International’s findings of forced evictions.

The State of Conservation report fails to provide any verifiable information on how individuals and families were selected to be relocated and instead asserts that only “squatters” in Angkor were subject to the relocation programme. The report also fails to provide accessible links to previous research, maps, land surveys, satellite imagery or interviews with affected people that could indicate how the government undertook its assessment of “illegality” of households within Angkor. It seeks to scapegoat the residents of Angkor and is marked by stigmatizing and derogatory views of people living in poverty.

“The onus is on the Cambodian government to clearly demarcate the traditional villages that are allowed to stay at the Angkor site – not to assert without evidence that everyone who was moved was at Angkor ‘illegally’,” Kate Schuetze said.

In its draft decision, UNESCO World Heritage Centre does not express concern over the Cambodian government’s refusal to respond meaningfully to its request. Instead, it merely “acknowledges” the Cambodian government’s report and “recognizes the complexity of managing this vast World Heritage property, with living resident communities”.

“The report is propaganda which does not fulfil its mandated purpose, and the draft decision should have at the very least highlighted this gap instead of simply noting it without any questions or criticism,” Kate Schuetze said.

“The Cambodian government failed to respond to the findings of Amnesty’s report because they are attempting to whitewash the situation. But human rights violations cannot be ended by ignoring them.”

Debt and despair at resettlement site

Amnesty International’s report ‘Nobody wants to leave their home’: Mass forced evictions at Cambodia’s UNESCO World Heritage site of Angkor, showed that the Cambodian authorities had failed to adequately inform people or engage in genuine consultations with them prior to the evictions. They also intimidated and threatened many into not questioning the evictions and to relocate to places that did not have housing, adequate water, sanitation facilities and access to livelihoods.

In April 2024, an Amnesty International delegation visited Angkor and the two resettlement sites, Run Ta Ek and Peak Sneng. The delegation found that Run Ta Ek resettlement site still lacked basic infrastructure such as roads and drainage, and many houses did not have access to piped water.

The most common complaint was that many relocated families struggled to earn a living and had taken on debts that they now could not repay. The debts were usually taken to build their houses or toilets at the resettlement site after being forced to destroy their homes at Angkor and relocate to Run Ta Ek.

The costs incurred due to the failure by the Cambodian authorities to provide adequate housing, and lack of work available to families who had been removed from the tourist economy, had created a predictable cycle of poverty and indebtedness. This has led to families using their social security cards as collateral for loans, skipping meals, selling their houses, and using children’s education money to repay loans.

One man with three young children broke down as he told Amnesty International he had to use money for his young daughter’s schooling to pay off their debts.

“If we can’t pay back the loan then we will sell half the land. We don’t eat sometimes to try and pay back the loan,” he said.

“Member states of the World Heritage Committee, and the international community at large, must condemn this painful chapter in Angkor’s proud history and uphold the human rights of the people of Angkor,” Kate Schuetze said.

“The current UNESCO draft decision may be a first step towards acknowledging and addressing the rights violations that have taken place at Angkor. However, UNESCO and the member states of the World Heritage Committee still have more to do to ensure human rights – which are at the heart of the entire United Nations system – are not forgotten.”