Prince Holding Group is aware of an article published by Radio Free Asia (“RFA”) titled “Chinese agents hatched brazen plot to kidnap RFA cartoonist” and wishes to make the following statement in response:
1. In its article, RFA has referred to a recent documentary by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (“ABC”) about interviews that ABC had with an individual who claims he was formerly a Chinese spy. RFA has taken quotes from the documentary and presented them, without proper context, in a misleading manner in order make allegations against Prince Holding Group.
2. The RFA article suggests that Prince Holding Group had partnered the Chinese government to entrap individuals, and even planned to kidnap individuals from Taiwan into international waters. This allegation is categorically false.
3. Prince Holding Group does not, has not, and will never participate in any actions that violate human rights or the laws of any jurisdiction, including any kidnapping or extrajudicial renditions. These acts are in direct conflict with the law, as well as the values and ethical standards of Prince Holding Group. Further, Prince Holding Group is a private Cambodian entity and does not have any ties to the Chinese government.
4. The article by RFA is yet another attempt by RFA to unfairly smear Prince Holding Group and propagate false and defamatory allegations against it, in order to advance the author’s geopolitical agenda. It is all too convenient to attack Prince Holding Group when no other details have been disclosed about this alleged scheme, such as the individuals actually involved.
5. This is not the first time that RFA has published online falsehoods and defamatory statements about Prince Holding Group. In February 2024, RFA published a series of three articles, written by a freelance author, Mr. Jack Adamović Davies, containing false allegations and misinformation based largely on “unnamed sources”. Prince Holding Group rebutted and debunked the false allegations in public statements at:
6. It bears mention that RFA’s latest article completely contradicts the false narrative concocted in its previous articles.
7. In the previous articles, Mr. Davies had alleged that the Chinese Government was targeting Prince Holding Group, and that the Chinese police had set up a special task force to investigate Prince Holding Group. Given this, it is surprising that RFA now alleges that Prince Holding Group “has a close relationship with the Chinese secret police”.
8. Neither of the two contradictory narratives are true. They are conspiracy theories concocted by RFA to drive readership sensationalism, at the expense of truth.
9. Prince Holding Group believes that news organisations such as RFA have a duty to be fair and responsible in their reporting, and not to propagate falsehoods and misinformation to the public. RFA’s partisan and sensationalist reporting falls short of journalistic standards. We note that RFA has been discredited in many of the Asian countries it operates or has operated in:
a. The World Bank, Lao PDR, issued a letter to inform RFA that its report about the Nam theun 2 Dam project “contains numerous inaccurate and highly misleading claims”. The letter states that RFA’s reporter had not visited the resettlement site and had made no attempt to verify the information with World Bank staff or other key stakeholders involved in the dam project. The offending article appears to have been removed from RFA’s website, which displays the error message “404 – Page Not Found” .
b. In January 2024, the Hong Kong Police Force wrote publicly to criticise RFA for an article that contains “one side and false statements, damaging the professional image of the [Hong Kong] police force”. Hong Kong’s Secretary for Security has also criticized a report by RFA, stating that he wanted to alert the public to wrong information peddled by “foreign forces” . RFA closed its Hong Kong bureau in March 2024 after being thoroughly discredited.
10. Prince Holding Group reserves its rights to take all necessary actions to protect its reputation and further respond to the article at the appropriate juncture.
