Phnom Penh, Sep 21 (IANS): Cambodia's military police forcefully ejected Prince Sisowath Thomico from the historical Wat Phnom site where he was sitting on a hunger strike to protest Prime Minister Hun Sen’s victory in the disputed July elections.
"Prince Thomico and over a dozen of citizens and Buddhist monks were forcefully expelled from the site at 10.45 p.m. Friday night," Prince Sisowath Chakrinupol, who accompanied Thomico during the strike, told Xinhua by telephone Saturday.
"We were meditating at the site, but they did not allow," he added.
Thomico, the cousin of King Norodom Sihamoni, began his hunger strike Friday morning, calling for a political solution to the impasse over the July 28 election results that gave victory to Hun Sen's ruling party.
Prince Thomico contested the election as the opposition party's parliamentary candidate for Preah Sihanouk province but failed to win.
The official election results showed that the ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP) of Hun Sen won 68 out of the 123 parliamentary seats while the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP) of Sam Rainsy got 55 seats.
The CNRP rejected the results, claiming serious vote fraud and demanding the formation of an independent poll probe committee but the CPP rejected its request saying the move was against the country's constitution and the election results were already ratified.
Cambodia's king Norodom Sihamoni last week invited all the 123 elected lawmakers to attend the opening session of the parliament Sep 23, but Sam Rainsy announced Friday that his party would not attend the session if there was no solution to the alleged poll irregularities.
Rainsy also called for the resumption of talks with the CPP in order to find out the truth for voters, or there could be another mass protest against the opening of the new parliament.
The leaders of the two parties -- Hun Sen and Sam Rainsy -- held two rounds of talks earlier this week aimed at finding a way to break the political impasse but failed to reach agreement.
Hun Sen has said that his party has enough lawmakers to override any opposition parliamentary boycott and form a new government.