Twice-Convicted Belgian Pedophile Deported

Police have deported twice-convicted Belgian pedophile Philippe Dessart, ending a months-long campaign by several child protection NGOs seeking his ouster from Cambodia, officials said yesterday.

National police spokesman Kirth Chantharith said yesterday that the 49-year-old Dessart, who was released in April after serving three years in prison for sexually abusing a 13-year-old Cambodian boy in 2006, was expelled from the country last week. Mr Chantharith said that he could not recall the exact date of the deportation.

Child protection groups were outraged when, shortly after his release from prison, Dessart moved into the Banteay Meanchey province home of his former victim and even married the teenager's mother. Dessart previously served a three-year prison sentence in Belgium for child rape and torture in fee 1990s.

?We had enough legal grounds,? Mr Chantharith said. ?He used to be in prisons and under the Immigration Law, a person who has been jailed, we don't allow to stay in our country,? he said.

"We didn't decide to deport him to Belgium; we just decided that he should be out of our country. Wherever he went to, it was his right.?

Dessart?s lawyer Dun Vibol said that the police deportation had ?abused a citizen?s rights? and he derided child protection groups? concerns about his client as ?assumptions.?

?He was with his wife; police came to invite him to a commune national commissioner orders you to be expelled,? the lawyer said, adding that police had then transported the Belgian to Phnom Penh International Airport where he was put on an outbound flight.

?[Dessart] reached Thailand and called me saying that he's got nothing with him and said that they don't respect law in Cambodia,? Mr Vibol said.

Mr Vibol added that Dessart wants to return to the country ?because his family is in Cambodia.?

Action Pour Les Enfants, one of the seven NGOs that initiated the Aug 4 expulsion petition, welcomed the police action.

?Cambodia has already done what Cambodia should do,? APLE Country Director Samleang Seila said.

Sourced = The Cambodia Daily