Cambodia 's National Assembly passed amendments to its citizenship law on August 25, 2025, that allow the government to silence dissent by reworking Cambodian citizenship, Human Rights Watch said today. The amended citizenship law strips nationals, naturalized citizens, and dual citizens of the most basic protections of nationality if convicted by ruling Cambodia People's Party-controlled courts of treason or "collusion with foreign powers."
"The Cambodian government has created a dangerous tool to silence dissent by giving the courts sweeping powers to decide who is and isn't Cambodian," said Bryony Lau, deputy Asia director at Human Rights Watch. "This law undermines the fundamental right to nationality and risks leaving activists, journalists, opposition politicians, and ordinary citizens stateless."
The former prime minister and current Senate president, Hun Sen, announced on June 27 that he had instructed the justice minister to study revoking citizenship for Cambodians who "side with foreign nations to harm our country." He said that "if you have a plan to conspire with a foreign country to destroy Cambodian interests, then you should be [afraid]. And, if you are like that, you should not remain a Cambodian."
On July 2, the Constitutional Council approved an amendment to Article 33 of the Constitution that removes the prohibition on depriving a citizen of their nationality. On July 11, Cambodia's National Assembly voted unanimously to amend article 33 to allow the "acquisition and loss of Khmer nationality, including the revocation of Khmer citizenship, [to] ... be determined by law." The Senate endorsed the change on July 15, and the king signed it into effect later that month.
Following the constitutional amendment, the implementing law - the amendment to the Nationality Law - was debated and passed by the National Assembly on August 25, 2025, with all 120 lawmakers present voting in favor.
On August 24, a coalition of 50 Cambodian nongovernmental organizations issued a joint statement warning that the law was "vaguely worded ... to target people on the basis of their ethnicity, political opinions, speech, and activism," and that the government "should not have the power to arbitrarily decide who is and is not a Cambodian."
Interior Minister Sar Sokha attempted to reassure critics, stating that the law applies "only to traitors." Human Rights Watch has long documented that Cambodian authorities routinely use the politically motivated terms "treason" or "collusion with foreign powers" to harass or prosecute critics of the government and political opposition leaders.
While countries have broad discretion to determine citizenship, Cambodia's new law violates international human rights law restrictions on citizenship rights, Human Rights Watch said. Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is widely considered reflective of customary international law, guarantees that "everyone has the right to a nationality" and "no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality."
The principle is also embedded in Article 12(4) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and Articles 7 and 8 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, both treaties Cambodia has ratified. The United Nations refugee agency (UNHCR) has underscored that the right to a nationality and the prohibition on arbitrary deprivation are "fundamental principles of international law" binding on all states.
The law also risks creating statelessness. UNHCR notes that stateless people are often denied basic rights and services, including health care, education, and freedom of movement. Stateless people may be unable to get a job, go to school, marry, migrate, or return to their own country. Cambodian civil society groups warned that "if we are stripped of citizenship, we will lose the foundation for every right we have in our home country.... We risk becoming stateless, rightless, and prisoners in our own homeland."
"The Cambodian government is disregarding its international human rights commitments by wielding the threat of citizenship loss as a political weapon," Lau said. "Concerned governments should publicly weigh in with the Cambodian government to reverse this latest assault on dissent."
