PHNOM PENH, June 26 (Xinhua) -- A Cambodian court on Wednesday sentenced a Cambodian news fixer for Russia Today channel to two years in prison for making a fake documentary production on sex-trafficking, according to a verdict.
Rath Rott Mony, 48, was arrested in Thailand in December last year and sent back to Cambodia at the country’s request.
Cambodian authorities accused him of helping produce a fake documentary about sex-trafficking for the Russia Today channel that was broadcast in October last year.
The film Mony worked on, titled “My Mother Sold Me”, featured a poor Cambodian girl, who claimed in the film that her mother sold her into sex work and the girl’s mother also confessed in the film that she sold her due to financial difficulty.
The film went viral on the Internet, prompting the Cambodian authorities to launch a probe into the case.
At that time, the girl and her mother were invited for questioning, and during the police interrogation, they said their statements in the film were fabricated after they were paid 200 U.S. dollars to lie.
“Rath Rott Mony was found guilty of inciting to cause discrimination,” said the verdict pronounced by Phnom Penh Municipal Court’s Presiding Judge Koy Sao. “The court decided to sentence Rath Roth Mony to two years in jail.”
According to the verdict, the court also ordered Mony to pay 70 million riel (17,500 U.S. dollars) in compensation to the two of the mothers who appeared in the documentary.
