Cambodia denies it issued a passport to former Thai prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra, despite evidence in Hong Kong corporate filings

Interior ministry says Cambodia ‘never’ issues passports to foreigners, though it did to over 1,500 between 2014 and 2017

The former prime minister, who fled Thailand in 2017, used a Cambodian passport to register as the director of a Hong Kong company

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Yingluck Shinawatra was deposed as prime minister of Thailand in a military coup in 2014. She fled the country in 2017 ahead of her sentencing to five years in prison for mishandling rice subsidies. Photo: EPA

Published: 8:30am, 11 Jan 2019Updated: 9:56pm, 11 Jan 2019

Cambodia has denied that it issued a passport to Thailand’s former prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra, who has been in self-imposed exile since 2017, even though official corporate filings clearly show that she is a Cambodian passport holder.

General Mao Chandara, director general of the identification department at the interior ministry, made the claim to the Phnom Penh Post on Thursday, a day after the South China Morning Post cited Hong Kong corporate filings that showed Yingluck used a Cambodian passport to register as the sole director of a Hong Kong company that was incorporated in August last year. The Post also reproduced a copy of the filed document.

But Cambodian spokesman Chandara said on Thursday: “We don’t know whether it is fake or not, but we never issue passports to foreigners.”

A passport can be issued to only foreigners who have been naturalised via a royal decree by King Norodom Sihamoni, Chandara added on Thursday.

“Who in the world doesn’t know that Yingluck is a Thai national and the former prime minister of Thailand? How could she use a Cambodian passport to register for a company as a Cambodian citizen? We don’t know what is happening in this story,” he said.

Yingluck used a Cambodian passport to register as director of a Hong Kong company last year. Photo: Shutterstock