I am mindful that 12 December 2015 marks the beginning of the fourth year of your disappearance.
I found in the course of my travels over the past year that your absence has not faded the reputation of your splendid development efforts. It may have strengthened it instead. Development specialists — ranging from a film-director to several policy-researchers — have asked about you after discovering that I am from the ASEAN Region.
Your wisdom about sustainable development issues has again been proven in the debates leading up to the 2015 Paris Climate Talks. ASEAN’s and Laos’ position would have been so much stronger if we had you speak up on the challenges that now confront our Region.
We, the youths of Mekong, has come together for Sombath Somphone and Beyond Project since 2013 after the tragedy that occurred to our uncle Sombath Somphone on the fifteenth of December 2013 in Vientiane, Laos. From what we have heard, seen, and witnessed, we come to realize that the lifetime commitment and dedication either in the fields of education or development uncle Sombath has been doing is for nothing but peace in this region.
We, too, believe in peace. This is why we have come together and organized various activities in the past three years from Concert for Peace, Tea Talks, Finding Sombath Around the World, Peace Talks under the title “Liberty, Freedom, Same Same but Different”, a peace journey “Two Years, I remember” from Bangkok all the way to Mekong in Nhong – Khai province, with academic forums to raise awareness for every activity that we held. We have a dream to make peace come true. Peace that allows freedom of expression. Peace that protects one another person. Peace that permits the state and law to fairly govern us. As small action as this might seem to be, we hope this rock we cast will create many ripples across the water. Continue reading “Message from Thai Youth to Lao Friends”
Lao People’s Democratic Republic – Sombath Somphone’s enforced disappearance and demands for his safe return
The Asia Europe People’s Forum International Organizing Committee remains deeply concerned about the safety and wellbeing of Mr. Sombath Somphone. It is now three years today since his enforced disappearance.
Sombath is one of the most respected and influential voices for sustainable people‐centred and just economic and social development in Laos. He is the founder and former Director of the Participatory Development Training Centre (PADETC), and the winner of the 2005 Ramon Magsaysay Award for community leadership. He was the most prominent Lao co‐organizer of the Asia Europe People’s Forum 9 (AEPF9), which was held in October 2012 in the Lao capital Vientiane, before the Asia‐Europe Meeting, ASEM9.
On 15th December 2012 Sombath Somphone disappeared, taken away in a truck by unknown persons after being stopped by police in Vientiane. Nobody has seen or heard from him since. Continue reading “Statement from AEPF”
Sombath Somphone, pictured here with Desmond Tutu. Wikimedia Commons
The Diplomat talks with Ng Shui Meng, the wife of disappeared Lao activist Sombath Somphone.
Today marks the third year anniversary of the enforced disappearance of Sombath Somphone, an internationally-renowned civil society leader in Laos.
Despite the availability of CCTV footage showing Sombath’s abduction in the early evening of December 15, 2012 at a police checkpoint in Vientiane, no progress has been made in locating him and returning him to his family. Rights groups say the fact that the police officers who witnessed the abduction failed to intervene suggests some level of complicity by Lao authorities.
Ng Shui Meng, Sombath’s wife, continues to campaign for his release. Ahead of the third anniversary and Laos prepares to officially take over as chair of ASEAN in 2016, she spoke with John Quinley III. An edited version of that interview follows.
Can you tell us your personal feelings on the third anniversary of the disappearance of your husband Sombath?
His enforced disappearance took place three years ago. I am still confused why someone like Sombath who has worked for 30 years openly in Laos in a very non-confrontational manner would experience enforced disappearance at that time of his life. Continue reading “Interview: Remembering the Disappearance of Sombath Somphone”
The enforced disappearance of Sombath Somphone, a Lao activist who disappeared in December 2012, will be probed until there is an answer, a forum was told.
“We will never stop asking questions about the enforced disappearance of Sombath,” according to his wife, friends, and colleagues despite continued rebuttals by the Lao government which will assume the Asean chairmanship in the next two weeks.
Angkhana Neelapaijit, a National Human Rights Commissioner, read a message from Shui-Meng, Mr Sombath’s wife, at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand in Bangkok Monday on the eve of the third anniversary of his disappearance.
“The pain and burden have continued, not lessened with time. Nothing can take the pain away … but I’m exhausted by the search for an answer as the state refuses to come clean,” read the message.
“There are times when the burden and pain are too heavy, but families of other enforced disappearance victims have continued to stand with us. So it’s no longer a personal struggle, it is for the sake of humanity and it is our right to pursue answers and the truth.”
Ms Angkhana is a member of “The Sombath Initiative” which has been pushing for an answer from the Lao government. The 2005 Magsaysay laureate was last seen on the evening of Dec 15, 2012 in Vientiane.
Sam Zarifi, International Commission of Jurists’ (ICJ) Asia Pacific regional director, showed new CCTV camera footage which was obtained from the area near the police checkpoint on the day of the abduction. Continue reading “Lao activist case moving slowly”
Shui-Meng contempla un cartel en el que se solicita ayuda para encontrar a su marido, el líder comunitario Sombath Somphone, en Vientiane (Laos). | Foto: Carlos Hernández.
El líder social más influyente de Laos desapareció el 15 de diciembre de 2012. Las imágenes de las cámaras de tráfico revelan que fue la propia policía laosiana quien le secuestró en pleno centro de la capital. eldiario.es ha entrevistado en Vientiane a su esposa Ng Shui-Meng que, pese al terror impuesto por las autoridades comunistas, sigue luchando para conocer el paradero de Sombath Somphone.
La mujer, de aspecto frágil, irradia una tristeza infinita. Nada más entrar en una semivacía cafetería de Vientiane, se dedica a buscar el rincón más alejado de miradas y oídos indiscretos. Solo cuando se siente segura, aflora en ella la fuerza y la determinación que le han permitido seguir adelante durante estos durísimos tres años: “Nací en Singapur. Sombath y yo nos conocimos mientras estudiábamos en Estados Unidos, en Hawai. Él fue, probablemente, el único laosiano que regresó a su país. El resto de estudiantes se quedaron para siempre en Norteamérica, pero él quería trabajar por Laos. Era de una familia muy humilde y quería ayudar a sus vecinos a salir de la pobreza, a desarrollarse, a involucrarles en la preocupación por el medio ambiente”.
Esa decisión de volver a casa marcó para siempre sus vidas. Sombath Somphone aprovechó su extensa formación académica para trabajar, codo con codo, con los más humildes. Sus idas y venidas a Hawai le llevaron a una situación paradójica: el régimen comunista de Laos sospechaba que era un agente de la CIA mientras que en Estados Unidos le tachaban de marxista. Continue reading “Tres años del secuestro policial del ‘Mandela de Laos’”
The family of Sombath Somphone, a Laos civil society leader who went missing in the capital Vientiane three years ago, urged the government to do more to probe into his disappearance.
Sombath Somphone, an award-winning campaigner for sustainable development in Laos, pictured in 2005.
Sombath Somphone, an award-winning campaigner for sustainable development in Laos, pictured in 2005. (Photo: AFP)
Within days after his disappearance, the Laos government released footage showing his Jeep had been driven out of the capital Vientiane.
However, a new piece of evidence released on Monday (Dec 14) by an advocacy group, the Sombath Initiative, revealed his car had been turned around and driven back towards the city centre.
Presented at a press conference entitled “Three Years On: Demanding Answers for the Enforced Disappearance of Sombath Somphone in Laos” in Bangkok was new footage his family retrieved from closed circuit TV cameras (CCTV) along the road where he is believed to have disappeared.
His family claimed they had presented state investigators the new evidence, adding the authorities have yet to examine it.
Mr Sombath Somphone, an award-winning Laos civil society activist, with his Singaporean wife Ng Shui-Meng. Mr Sombath was driving his jeep near a busy intersection in Vientiane when he went missing on Dec 15, 2012. COPYRIGHT: NG SHUI-MENG
There was an awkward silence at this week’s press conference on the now three-year-long disappearance of Laotian civil society activist Sombath Somphone.
The roomful of journalists at the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Thailand – who traditionally compete for their turn at the microphone – had no more question after the first was asked and answered on Monday (Dec 14).
Like so many other incidents of enforced disappearances around the region, the case of Mr Sombath was one that has drawn many queries and yielded little answers since he vanished after being stopped at a police checkpoint on Dec 15, 2012.
Human rights activists allege that key individuals or groups in the landlocked communist state have been intimidated against talking about the case.
The Laotian authorities, say human rights activists, have stopped providing updates about the investigation and have shown little inclination to pursue a case that according to the International Commission of Jurists’ representative Sam Zarifi is “eminently solvable”.
Mr Sombath is a well-respected advocate for sustainable development who received a Magsaysay Award in 2005 for his community leadership. But his work was thought to have upset powerful interests in the country.
His disappearance has left his wife, Singaporean-born Ng Shui Meng, in a limbo. She was not present at the press conference. Poignantly, her reflections were voiced by one of Thailand’s national human rights commissioners, Ms Angkhana Neelapaijit, whose own husband “disappeared” 11 years ago.
“It is like a knife that is permanently embedded in my heart,” she read.
The spouse of someone who is neither officially dead nor missing fights a constant battle against fading public memory.
Speaking via Skype from Jakarta on Monday – Dr Ng said that the district office that oversees the couple’s neighbourhood in Laos last year (2014) sent a family registration book that did not include Mr Sombath’s name.
After Dr Ng went to the police to query it, the police stamped the old family registration book to keep it valid.
“You hope that he won’t be forgotten. You hope that the case remains in the public consciousness, you hope that the government which has promised that it would continue the investigation lives up to its promise,” says Dr Ng.
“How can you forget a person who has lived with you for so many years? A person that is the most important or precious person in your life? … Time cannot erase that person from your memory. So even though everybody else may forget, I cannot forget.”
The couple first met in the 1970s as students in Hawaii. These days, Dr Ng spends most of her time running a handicraft social enterprise in Laos, as well as advocating against enforced disappearances.
People around her “try to be as helpful as possible”. “But everybody has his or her own life to lead. And you just have to cope with this very painful situation,” she says.
“You always feel alone even though other people reassure you that they are with you, that they are thinking about you and they are thinking about Sombath.”
Mr Sombath was a kind, caring husband whose sense of humour made “life a pleasure”. His last words to her, before he disappeared that day in 2012, was “let’s go home for dinner.”
Three years have passed, and Dr Ng clings on to the hope that he is still alive.
A 2005 photo of Sombath Somphone in the Philippines.
Friends and supporters of missing Lao civil society activist Sombath Somphone marked the third anniversary of his disappearance on Tuesday with celebrations of his life and work and renewed calls for an investigation into his fate.
Sombath’s Dec. 15, 2012 abduction at a police checkpoint in the capital Vientiane is widely believed to have been carried out by police or some other government-linked group, though authorities in the one-party communist state have consistently denied playing a role in his disappearance.
On Dec. 11, a Vientiane-based civil society group founded by Sombath, PADETC (the Participatory Development Education Training Center), marked the anniversary with an event remembering his achievements.
The event was attended by over 100 people and included colleagues and friends, foreign diplomats, and representatives from other development agencies, sources said.
Speaking to RFA’s Lao Service on the day before the event, a PADETC official said that Sombath “worked only for the betterment of society, and never for himself.”
“I am happy that I once had the opportunity to work with him and to witness his dedication to development,” the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Even though he is not here with us now, PADETC will definitely continue his work for [Lao] society.” Continue reading “Supporters Mark Third Anniversary of Lao Activist’s Disappearance”
