China’s Ambassador in Phnom Penh says the European Union should not mix politics with trade as it mulls withdrawing Cambodia’s vital preferential single market access in response to the country’s autocratic backslide, VOA News reports. A delegation of the European Commission and the European External Action Service (EEAS) visited Cambodia from 5 to 11 July 2018 to evaluate the situation on the ground following recent worrying human rights and labor rights developments in the country. No amount of diplomacy can explain the reality of Cambodia’s horrific human rights record, writes Brad Adams for the EU Observer. He argues that report after report by the UN and human rights groups have been sounding the alarm for years, yet Hun Sen has continued and intensified his crackdown on fundamental rights.