Cambodia's Supreme Court dissolved the country's main opposition party and banned more than 100 of its politicians from office for five years on Thursday, in a case blasted by rights groups as politically motivated. 

The court "decides to dissolve the CNRP and ban 118 leaders... from politics for five years starting from the date of the verdict," said Judge Dith Munty, referring to the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP).

The judge said the party, by failing to send any lawyers to the trial, had effectively confessed to government allegations of plotting.