Why was a Cambodian opposition politician killed in Bangkok?

He had all the makings of a cold-blooded, professional killer.

A security camera video shows a man parking his motorcycle near a popular temple in Bangkok’s historic royal district, removing his helmet so his face can be clearly seen, and calmly walking down the road.

A few minutes later shots are heard. Another man falls to the ground.

The killer quickly gets back on his motorbike, seeming to drop something as he does so, and drives away.

The victim was Lim Kimya, a 73-year-old former member of parliament from Cambodia’s main opposition party. CNRP, banned in 2017. Two bullets hit him in the chest, according to Thai police. He had just arrived in Bangkok with his wife from Cambodia on a bus.

A police officer tried to revive him, but he was pronounced dead at the scene.

“He was brave, he had an independent mind,” Monovithya Kem, daughter of CNRP leader Kem Sokha, told the BBC.

“No one wanted to kill him except the Cambodian state.”

Lim Kimya held dual Cambodian and French nationality, but chose to remain in Cambodia even after his party was outlawed. The CNRP – the Cambodia National Salvation Party – was previously a merger of two opposition parties, and in 2013 it came close to defeating Hun Sen’s party, which it called the “strongman” who had ruled Cambodia for nearly 40 years. Before handing over to his son Hun Manet in 2023.

After a close call in the 2013 election, Hun Sen accused the CNRP of betrayal, shutting it down and subjecting its members to legal and other harassment. In 2023 Kem Sokha, who had already spent six years under house arrest, was sentenced to 27 years in prison.

High-profile political assassinations, while not uncommon, are relatively rare in Cambodia; In 2016 a well-known critic of Hun Sen, Kem Ley, was shot dead in Phnom Penh and in 2012 an environmental activist. Chut Wutty was also killed.

From security camera footage, Thai police have already identified Lim Kimya’s killer as a former Thai army officer now working as a motorbike taxi driver. Finding him shouldn’t be difficult.

Whether the murder is fully investigated, however, is another matter.

Dozens of activists fleeing repression in Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos and Thailand in recent years have returned after seeking sanctuary, or in some cases have died or disappeared. Human rights groups believe there is an unwritten agreement between the four neighboring countries to allow each other’s security forces to pursue dissidents across the border.

Last November, Thailand sent six Cambodian dissidents, along with a young child, to Cambodia, where they were immediately imprisoned. The United Nations recognized them all as refugees. Earlier this year Thailand also sent a Vietnamese Montagnard activist to Vietnam.

Thai anti-monarchy activists have been kidnapped and disappeared in Laos in the past, many believe Thai security forces are operating outside their borders. In 2020, a young Thai entrepreneur fled to Cambodia, Wanchalerm Satsaksit, kidnapped and disappearedonce again the Thai agents take over.

Cambodian authorities did little to investigate, and announced last year that the case had been dropped. The same may now be happening to Lim Kimya.

“Thailand has presided over a de facto ‘swap deal,'” says Phil Robertson, director of Human Rights and Labor Advocates in Thailand Asia.

“Dissidents and refugees are traded for political and economic favors with neighboring countries. The growing practice of transnational repression in the Mekong sub-region must be stopped in its tracks.”

When US- and UK-educated Hun Manet succeeded his father as Cambodia’s prime minister, there was some speculation that he would rule with a lighter hand. But opposition figures are still being prosecuted and imprisoned, and the small space left for political dissent has almost completely closed.

After his semi-retirement, the figure of Hun Sen continues to dominate his son’s administration; he is now calling for a new law to label anyone who tries to replace him as a terrorist.

Thailand, which lobbied hard for and won a seat on the UN Human Rights Council this year, will now be under pressure to show that it can bring to justice those behind such a heinous killing on the streets of its capital.