This is no country for decent and outspoken men. On 10 July, at just after half-past eight in the morning, Dr Kem Ley, a prominent Cambodian political commentator and grassroots organiser, was shot and killed while drinking coffee at a Caltex service station in downtown Phnom Penh. The bullets were fired from close range by an unemployed former soldier who was picked up in the street by police shortly afterwards, blood streaming from his head after being pummelled by an angry mob. When asked for his name, the sinewy forty-three-year-old offered a chilling sobriquet: “Chuob Samlap” — literally, “Meet Kill”. Meanwhile, Kem Ley died almost instantly, sprawled backwards on the shiny mini-mart floor.

Kem Ley’s killing was striking for being so unexpected, yet so chillingly familiar. Violence has declined in Cambodian public life in recent years, but killings like this have stained the past quarter-century, rhyming in many of their specifics: high morning, a busy public place, the shots expertly and lethally placed. When Mr Meet Kill met his target, and delivered on his deadly promise, Cambodia lost another from its small pool of free-thinkers and consensus-breakers.

• Tags: Cambodia, Issue 4, Kem Ley, Sebastian Strangio