Nearly 50 women’s rights NGOs met yesterday to discuss the UN’s Beijing 2015 Development Agenda and Beijing+20 Action Plan to set out a plan for women’s rights and violence issues and create a petition to be presented to the government next month.

Thida Kus, executive director of the local rights group Silaka, said that Cambodian women face violence daily, as highlighted by the recent assault of former TV presenter Ek Socheata, better known as Ms Sasa, by real estate tycoon Sok Bun.

“We urge the government to find solutions, because recently, there have been many women [are] subjected to violence. It is bad.

It prevents social development in our country,” she said.

The Beijing+20 Action Plan and the 2015 development agenda, launched by the UN in 1995, set goals for each country to improve the status of women worldwide and to prevent discrimination and violence.

The original declaration included 12 “strategic objectives”.

“There are 160 countries participating, and we’ve set out 17 objectives.

The most important target is preventing violence in all aspects against women . . . Women in Cambodia are victims of this problem, so much so that we need an updated set of goals”, Kus added.

Former social researcher and grassroots political aspirant Kem Ley remarked that while the attacker in the recent Ms Sasa case was arrested and is facing charges, other victims who are poor or not well-known rarely see such outcomes.

“The government must not discriminate against women,” Ley said. “I urge the government to push for women’s rights and prevent violence.”