Tag: Sombath’s Family

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Dear Sombath…from Shui Meng (23)

My dearest Sombath,

It has been awhile since I last wrote you. Even though I have not been writing to you much, I have not forgotten you, nor have I given up on the struggle to get truth and justice for you.

Since March 2020, our world has been turned upside down by the global Covid-19 pandemic. Many countries have closed their borders to travel and many countries have also mandated lockdowns to control the spread of the virus.

Many human rights organizations and activists across the world have seen their international and regional meetings and conferences, and advocacy and mobilization activities greatly reduced or even halted.  This has caused a great blow to the continued momentum and growth of human rights movements and activities nationally, regionally and globally.

Following the cessation of most international face-to-face events, my participation in many of these human rights and enforced disappearances activities have also become largely reduced to only a few zoom meetings and webinars. Hence, I have become less active, and my voice has not been heard much at regional and international human rights meetings and conferences.  But this does not mean I have given up seeking truth and justice for you and for other victims of enforced disappearance.

I need to find ways to keep up my struggle and I know that one way is to keep reminding people that you are still missing and the facts of your unjust disappearance is still hidden by a wall of denial and lies.

My dearest Sombath, let me reassure you once more that as long as I still draw breathe, you will not be forgotten. Recently, I spoke at opening of the 13th AEPF Meeting through Zoom. I told those who attended the meeting that despite my disappointment of the lack of progress, and my anger at the injustice done to you, I also know that to give up on fighting for truth and justice is not an option. To give up is to give in to what the perpetrators most want; and to lose hope is to lose part of my dignity, my humanity, and my love for you.

So, my dearest Sombath, I promise you that I will soldier on against all odds and to continue my fight for truth and justice for you and to continue my plea for solidarity and support for the resolution of this inhuman and unjust crime.

The last week of May each year is dedicated as the International Week of the Disappeared to remind everyone that there are hundreds of thousands of people who have been unjustly disappeared and whose families are still waiting for their return. So I too want to use my letter to you to remind people who remember and love you that we too will not forget you. We too want you to come home to us.

Dearest Sombath, words cannot express how much I continue to miss you and pine for your return. Be well and stay healthy til the day we meet again.

Love you so much

Shui Meng

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Remarks by Shui Meng Ng at 13th Asia-Europe People’s Forum

17 May 2021

Good day to all. We are gathered together again for another AEPF, the 13th AEPF. This is the 4th time I have been asked to speak at the opening of an AEPF Meeting. While I am grateful that the organizing committee has once more given me the space and time to speak at such an important forum for development activists and practitioners, I must admit, it does not give me much pleasure to give another commemoration talk about my husband, Sombath Somphone, who was disappeared on 15 December 2012, two months after he co-charied the 9th AEPF in Vientiane.

Nine years have passed since Sombath was abducted right in front of a police post in Vientiane, and with evidence of his abduction by uniformed police recorded on CCTV. Yet the Lao government has kept up the charade and denied any knowledge of what happened to Sombath, while at the same time refusing to conduct any thorough and transparent investigation. Over the past 9 years, I have travelled the globe giving countless talks about Sombath – who he is, his life and his work, and his enforced disappearance. I have knocked on the doors of world leaders, representatives of United Nations organizations, and appealed to almost all human rights agencies to take up Sombath’s case and pressure the Lao government and officialdom to give me answers as to what happened to Sombath and to return him safely to me and my family. After 9 years of struggle and campaign to get truth and justice, I still have gotten no answers of Sombath’s whereabouts or his fate. All I get from the Lao officialdom is a wall of silence and lies.

In fact with the passing of time the official smear campaign against Sombath has become more viscious. Whenever confronted with demand for answers of Sombath’s disappearance at international and UN meetings, the Lao officials regularly mouthed the official line of their continued investigations, while at the same time casting aspersions of Sombath’s character by accusing him of amassing wealth though dubious means. Even though such baseless lies gained little credibility among people who know Sombath and are aware of the background and circumstances of the case, these lies nonetheless cause me great pain and anger.

I am enraged by the fact that the perpetrators of such a heinous crime and violation of Sombath’s and my rights could continue to get away with such impunity. I am enraged at the futility of international laws and pressure, against authoritarian governments who could disregard international standards and the rule of law.

Yet, despite my disappointment of the lack of progress on Sombath’s case, and my anger at the injustice caused to my husband and my family, I also know that to give up on fighting for truth and justice is not an option. To give up is to give in to what the perpetrators most want; and to lose hope is to lose part of my dignity, my humanity, and my love for Sombath. So I soldier on against all odds and continue my fight for truth and justice for Sombath and continue my plea for solidarity and support for the satisfactory resolution of Sombath’s case.

This is why I have overcome my despondency and agree to address you at this 13th Asia-Europe People’s Forum. I believe that is also what Sombath wants.

Many of the AEPF participants and development activists already know of Sombath and his work, and many of you, especially those in the Asia region, have also worked with him to promote a more equitable, just, and sustainable development that places people, and not profits, at the center of the development agenda.

Sombath’s development vision and aspiration did not come from theory but are learned from direct experience of growing up in a poor rural family and working in communities all over Laos.  His ideas and approaches are not shaped by any political or development imperatives from outside or from above; they have been learned from consultative partnerships and practical experimentation with communities and families, and especially with young people with whom he placed the greatest hope for real change. Sombath always urged the young people to remain mindful of their traditional values and wisdom even as global forces grow stronger. Development is good, he used to say, but for development to be healthy, it “must come from within.” That was what made Sombath’s work so authentic and so trusted by those he worked with.

Now, even though Sombath’s vision and voice has been silenced for more than 9 years, I am struck at how relevant and important they still are. He had warned that past and ongoing development and political mistakes are the root causes of many of the current political, social, economic, and religious fissures across many of our societies, and why we are now living in such a destabilized world where the social fabric of our communities have become torn by hate and distrust.

Nine years ago, at the 9th AEPF Opening speech, he said, “our development model is not balanced, not connected, and definitely not holistic. We focus too much on economic growth and ignore its negative impacts on the social, environmental, and spiritual dimensions. This unbalanced development model is the chief cause of inequality, injustice, financial meltdown, global warming, climate change, loss of bio-diversity, and even loss of our humanity and spirituality. …We are blinded by the power of money and let the corporations rule the world and even over-ride the power of the state. Ordinary people, and civil society, have very little say in all this”

What Sombath believed and worked for to change all his life is becoming even more urgent today, as we face the global crisis of the Covid-19 pandemic. As we are now forced to work-from-home, meet through zoom, have our children learn online, close our businesses, and lose our jobs, we need to think about how we can survive this crisis as families, as communities, as societies, and as a globalized world.

Unfortunately, the Covid-19 pandemic has made it more convenient for authoritarian regimes to use the pandemic as an opportunity to disregard people’s democratic rights and escalate political and physical repressions and violence against their opponents.  These autocrats know well that with the domestic challenges posed by the pandemic, international attention is less focused on their violations and they can get away, just as we are witnessing happening in Myanmar, in Palestine, and in Kashmir.

What should we do under such circumstances? As Sombath would often say, “we must think outside the box”. Indeed the old strategies may not be enough for the challenges we face today. Sombath may not be here to brainstorm or share his ideas with you, but he always believe in the collective wisdom and experience of sincere and committed people who havespent their lives working on the ground and know the kinds of challenges people face.

This 13th AEFP will provide opportunities for policy makers, dedicated practitioners, and ordinary people to share and debate and put forth new strategies to address and overcome thechallenges we face today.  Indeed through strategic networking, and solidarity of purpose between the people of Asia and Europe, we will strengthen our collective resistance against the trampling of our rights, and the political, social, economic, environmental, and public health injustice we face today.

I close by once more by thanking the organizers of the 13th AEPF and I wishing you great success in your deliberations.

Thank you.

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The Forced Disappearance of Sombath Somphone

The Wrath-Bearing Tree:  by J. Malcolm Garcia

Ng Shui Meng speaks of her husband Sombath Somphone in the present tense, with a firm matter-of-fact tone about his disappearance, a way, I presume, for her to maintain control in a situation where she has none and knows nothing but heartbreak. Yet I hear the deep sentiment behind the words. To her, Sombath is much more than the internationally acclaimed, award-winning development worker who vanished one night years ago. He is her partner, companion and mentor, a man with a quiet presence whom she relies on even in his absence. Although short and thin, he stood out in a crowd partly because of his shock of silver white hair. Most older Lao men dye their hair, she explains. Government officials all have black hair but Sombath has this head of white hair, and he always wears a cotton peasant jacket and yet there is something about him that makes everyone feel deferential toward him. That may have been a contributing factor to his disappearance, Shui Meng muses, this deference, the tranquil influence he has. He would never call himself an activist. He is not confrontational. Sombath believes in cooperation and works with Lao officials. In private he can be critical of the government but never in public. He’s a pragmatist and strategic about what he does. Although he is not political, he inspires people. Perhaps that is what led to his undoing.

On December 15, 2012, Somphone was stopped at a police checkpoint in Vientiane, the capital of Laos, and was never seen or heard from again. Lao officials denied any involvement. Officials with human rights organizations believe Somphone was the victim of a forced disappearance by the government. Then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton demanded answers and the European Parliament expressed its concern but to no avail. The Lao government insisted it knew nothing. Almost nine years later, his fate and his whereabouts remain a mystery. His friends can only speculate on why he was taken. Continue reading “The Forced Disappearance of Sombath Somphone”

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Laos Snubs Wife of Missing Rural Expert in ‘Unconvincing’ Stance on Disappearance

Radio Free Asia: 15 December 2020

The wife of missing Lao development expert Sombath Somphone on Tuesday marked eight years since his disappearance with no information on the case from the communist government in Vientiane whose agents are believed to have taken him away.

“December 15th  is the eighth anniversary of my husband Sombath’s disappearance, and throughout these eight years I have still missed him and want him to return to his family,” Sombath’s wife Ng Shui Meng said, speaking to RFA’s Lao Service on Dec. 9.

“So far, I have received no updates from Lao officials on their investigation into Sombath’s disappearance, and I still don’t know where he is,” she said.

Sombath Somphone disappeared on the evening of Dec. 15, 2012, after his jeep was stopped outside a police checkpoint outside the capital Vientiane, with video footage showing him later being forced into a white truck and taken away.

Though police promised at first to investigate, Lao authorities soon backtracked, saying they could not confirm the identity of a man shown in the video driving off in Sombath’s jeep, and refusing offers of outside help to analyze the footage.

Before his abduction, Sombath had challenged massive land deals negotiated by the government that had left thousands of rural Lao villagers homeless with little paid in compensation. The deals had sparked rare popular protests in Laos, where political speech is tightly controlled.

Sombath’s decades of work on behalf of farmers and sustainable agricultural practices helped in him the U.N.’s Human Resource Development Award for empowering the rural poor in Laos, and later the prestigious Ramon Magsaysay Award for Community Leadership.

“To date, Lao officials have given me no updates or answers about Sombath. They don’t meet with me, and they just say that they don’t have any information,” Ng Shui Meng, who lives in Singapore, told RFA. “And we have continued to suffer through all these years.”

Philip Alston, Former UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, told RFA last week that the Lao government’s “persistent refusal to undertake any meaningful investigation is a disgrace.”

He said “overwhelming” evidence of direct government responsibility for the disappearance of Sombath makes official denials “entirely unconvincing and disingenuous.”

Laos “has used the strategy of disappearing its opponents in order to instill deep fear and to deter any criticism,” said Alston.

Rights groups press for answers

Rights groups continue to press the Lao government for answers and information in the case.

“We will never forget Sombath even after eight years, and we’ll keep fighting and asking the Lao government [to explain] what happened to him,” Human Rights Watch deputy Asia director Phil Robertson said on Dec. 14.

“We have never received an answer to this question, so we continue to raise this matter with the governments of other countries and with the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva. No one should forget what the Lao government did to Sombath,” Robertson said.

“I’m calling on the Lao government to do the right thing—to search for answers about Sombath Somphone for the sake of his family,” added Siriporn Saipetr, a member of the Sombath Somphone & Beyond Project., based in Thailand. “From the closed-circuit TV footage, the government must know what happened to him.”

Vanida Thepsouvanh, president of the Paris-based Lao Movement for Human Rights, said that for the last eight years, the Lao government “has never told the truth about Sombath Somphone.”

“Furthermore, the Lao [People’s Democratic Republic]] doesn’t seem to have any intention of ratifying the International Convention for the Protection of all Persons from Enforced Disappearance,” she said.

“I think the Lao government is not willing to reveal the truth about Sombath Somphone’s disappearance,” added Bounthone Chantalavong-Wiese, president of the Germany-based Alliance for Democracy in Laos. “They just say they don’t know anything and haven’t seen anything, and that’s concerning.”

“The Lao government should tell his family the truth,” he said.

On Dec. 13, relatives of Sombath Somphone conducted a Buddhist ceremony at the Nakhoun Noi Forest Temple outside Vientiane to mark the anniversary of his disappearance, one family member told RFA.

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Dear Sombath…from Shui Meng (22)

My dearest Sombath,

Today is again 15 December 2020. Every year as this date approaches, my heart aches even more than normally. Today, eight years ago, you were abruptly and so cruelly taken away from me. The images of how you were taken away flashed across my mind just as vividly now as eight years ago when I first saw the footages of your abduction from the police CCTV camera.

Eight years is a long time to wait for some news of what happened to you and your whereabouts. Are you well? Are you healthy? Are your living conditions okay? And invariably the question that comes to my head everyday, which I inevitably tries to push away as soon as it arises is “Are you still alive?” Continue reading “Dear Sombath…from Shui Meng (22)”

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Dear Sombath…from Shui Meng (21)

Closure of PADETC

My dearest Sombath,

Today I write to tell you that PADETC, the organization you started since 1996, is officially deregistered.  It has been a difficult decision for me to request to deregister PADETC, an organization you had worked so hard to establish and lead for so many years.

However, over the past 7 years since you disappeared, the authorities have denied renewal of PADETC’s license of operation.  In fact some people in government do not even want to hear the name of PADETC mentioned.  For this reason, most of the PADETC staff have left the organization.

Even though the passing of PADETC is sad, I am sure you would support my decision to deregister the organization.  I remember you telling me back in 2008, that you had to prepare for PADETC to evolve to meet the changing times.

In 2008, you had already started to pave the way for PADETC to devolve from being just a development/training organization dependent on external donor funds to become self-sustaining independent entities.  To prepare for this process, you had started mentoring and coaching your staff, based on their capacities and interests, to branch out and develop their own operation units that would be initially affiliated with PADETC, but over time these would become their own independent organizations or enterprises.  PADETC itself would downsize and be transformed into a small mentoring and coaching center, and would eventually be dissolved.

So between 2009 to 2012, some of your more enterprising staff were already running their own affiliated units, providing consultancy services in the following areas: media training and audio/visual production; community forestry management; community services; organic farming training and operations; finance and management operations; and small business enterprises.

Your enforced disappearance in December 2012, fast-forwarded your plans of pushing his staff out to the real world and establish their own organizations.

Over time most of your staff have left PADETC, some for fear of being associated with you, but a number went off to establish their own organizations, with many continuing to use your development concepts of sustainable development and guiding principles in their own work.

So, my dearest Sombath, despite your disappearance, and despite you not being here to guide and mentor many of the young people and younger staff you have trained, your vision and mission have continued and your concepts on sustainable development have spread far and wide.

As you so often said to me, “everything changes, the only unchangeable thing is change itself”. Once more your foresight has proven correct.

I am sure, wherever you are, you will also be relieved and pleased to know that despite the fact that PADETC is no more, your ideas and your vision of PADETC have lived on in many different forms.  Like a strong steady tree, its seeds have spread far and wide.

Be strong and be happy, my love

Shui Meng

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Dear Sombath….from Shui Meng (20)

Reflections on what it means to be Locked Down

Dearest Sombath,

I don’t know whether you know that the whole world is now facing a serious pandemic caused by a coronavirus named COVID-19.  It’s a Sars-like virus, but appears to be much more contagious, and has so far infected more than a million people world-wide and caused more than 50,000 deaths.

So to slow the spread to the virus, many countries across the globe have declared a lockdown, meaning that people should stay at home and not go anywhere unless really necessary.

In Laos, the Prime Minister announced a lockdown from 01 -19 April. All schools, offices and businesses are closed with people asked to work from home.  Pimai celebrations, parties, and gatherings involving large numbers of people are also forbidden.

So, over the last few days, I, like most residents in Vientiane, have stayed at home. Just 3 days into the lockdown, I begin to feel uneasy, with a sense that the house is like a prison.  Yes, I can walk around in the garden, read, listen to music, watch TV, do everything I can normally do in the house, except go out.

Today, my thoughts suddenly wondered to you – thinking to myself, what it would have been for you these last eight years living a locked down (or more likely locked-up) existence somewhere.  I asked myself, what is your situation – are you kept in isolation in a small room, or are you allowed some freedom of movement.  How are you keeping yourself physically and mentally busy? Are you able to keep healthy; what kinds of food do you have; do you have access to reading and writing material; and how are you keeping mentally alert?

In the past I have also often thought about such things, and even though I know it would be very difficult for you, I could never quite understand how bad or terrible it could be.  But now when my own freedom of movement has been somewhat restricted, the full force of what your deprivation of freedom actually meant, and the toll it would take on your physical and mental wellbeing came to me more vividly than ever.  It hit me in the gut like nothing has ever hit me before, leaving me gasping for air.

My love, I can only hope that you, who I know is strong of mind and of spirit, would be able to draw on your inner strength to sustain you.  I can also only hope and pray that the injustice you were made to suffer will quickly be righted, your freedom restored, and you will come home to us soon.

My dearest, I also hope that wherever you are, you will not be expose to the COVID-19 virus.  I can only hope and pray for the best for you and for those people you are with. May you be well, may you be healthy. and may you be happy.

Praying for you as always.

Shui Meng

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Dear Sombath….from Shui Meng (19)

My dearest Sombath

Today is Valentine’s Day. Lots of people are showing their love by sending red roses and candies to their loved ones.

I recalled one Valentine Day many years ago, I asked you why I did not get any roses from you. You smiled and said “Why would I just give you roses on one day to show my love for you.  Don’t you see, I have planted ‘Star Flowers” for you and when it blooms you will see a constellation of stars like my love for you”.

Today, the Star Flowers you planted are again blooming, and it made me reflect once more on your wisdom and on what really counts.  For you whatever you do, you do with intention which is never shallow or just to please.  Very often in the past, I had wished your were not so bloody pragmatic and practical, but now that you are not here with me, I understand that all you did for me, for our family, and for others, you did them with thoughtful intention and loving kindness. Continue reading “Dear Sombath….from Shui Meng (19)”