Earlier this month, the leaders of Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, and host country Thailand gathered for the first-ever Mekong River Commission (MRC) summit to discuss the future of the Mekong, one of the world's longest and most resource-rich rivers.
There was much to discuss. The Mekong -- which flows through China, Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Thailand, and provides food, water, and transport for about 65 million people -- is now at its lowest level in two decades due to a prolonged drought. Its future is also in peril due to a host of natural and man-made threats. Unless riparian states make a concerted, joint effort to manage the river's resources prudently and sustainably, their actions risk threatening food security, destroying livelihoods, and heightening regional tensions.
The main threat is from hydropower. China, which already has five operational dams, plans to construct about 15 more large- to mega-sized hydropower dams upstream, while Southeast Asian states themselves mull building 11 of their own further downstream. While these dams do not deplete the river's water supply outright, they affect the hydrology of the Mekong by altering the natural timing and volume of the river's seasonal flows. According to a recent report (.pdf) by the Stimson Center, a Washington-based think tank, resulting reductions in silt deposits downstream could threaten one of the most productive regions of wet rice cultivation, while erratic water currents may block the spawning migration of fish in what is now the world's largest freshwater fishery.
Other trends are equally, if not more worrying. Demographic and development pressures will further increase demand on the river's already threatened resources. According to projections (.pdf) by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), the population in the Lower Mekong is expected to swell to 90 million by 2025, with over a third living in urban areas. Total irrigation water requirements for the region, which stood at about 43,700 million cubic meters in 2002, will rise to about 56,700 million cubic meters by the end of this year.
Disruptive climate change threats also hover in the longer-term future. Global conservation group WWF predicts intense floods and droughts, coastal erosion, higher seas and heat waves for the Mekong Delta. Vietnam's own Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment says that if sea levels rise 30 inches by 2100, 20 percent of the Delta and 10 percent of Ho Chi Minh City could be swamped.
The six riparian states now seem to grasp the growing threats to the Mekong as well as the coming crisis they might spawn. At the first summit convened in the MRC's 15-year history this month, Thai Prime Minister and host Abhisit Vejjajiva declared that the Mekong "will not survive" if nations do not "take joint responsibility for its long-term sustainability." Leaders of the four Mekong Basin nations -- Thailand, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam -- also agreed on areas for "priority action," including researching threats related to climate change and intensifying efforts toward flood and drought management. China, for its part, also began releasing previously withheld data on water flows in its section of the river last month, in response to claims that its dams upstream were causing the current protracted drought.
Yet far bolder efforts will be needed to save the Mekong. China and Myanmar must become full members of the MRC, instead of just dialogue partners, in order to truly participate in cooperative river management. China may be right that its dams are not causing the current drought, but suspicions linger over Beijing's actions precisely because it has refused to share data with downstream nations or sign on to the 1995 Agreement on the Cooperation for the Sustainable Development of the Mekong River Basin. If China does not show signs of addressing other riparian states' concerns, the perception -- accurate or not -- will remain that Beijing is reaping the upstream benefits of hydropower while leaving downstream nations to bear the costs.
Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand and Laos must themselves strike a better balance between their individual economic needs and environmental responsibilities. At times, government planning and decision-making reportedly takes place without adequate local input or comprehensive cost-benefit evaluations. In Cambodia and Laos, experts complain that government officials lack the governance capacity and skills necessary to conduct or comprehend research about the scale of potential environmental damage. Commercial or geostrategic imperatives may also lead these governments to disregard knowledge even when it is available, since some dam proposals are linked to powerful domestic interests in Laos or to the Chinese government, Cambodia's largest aid donor. Greater participatory planning and more-detailed assessments must be conducted before decisions are made about mammoth infrastructure projects, in order to accurately assess their implications and make plans to address any fallout.
Trans-boundary river management also ought to extend beyond research and contingency planning. Countries must consult each other about any major development projects they are undertaking as outlined in the 1995 agreement, since the Mekong is a shared resource. Riparian states should also try to agree on a basin-wide standard for environmental and socio-economic impact studies, as the Stimson Center report advocates. As for the MRC, it should broaden its cooperation with countries such as the United States, which could potentially assist Lower Mekong Basin states with human-capacity-building or research technology. The introduction of the Lower Mekong Initiative by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at the 2009 ASEAN ministerial meeting in Thailand, as well as the addition of a position on Mekong affairs to the staff of the State Department's East Asia/Pacific Bureau, means that sufficient political will, interest and resources exist in Washington for engagement on this issue.
The threats to the Mekong should be clear to all by now. It is up to riparian nations, international organizations and other interested countries to cooperatively ensure that these grim scenarios and gloomy predictions do not crystallize into reality. Otherwise, one of the world's greatest rivers will be endangered, with profound implications for the region.
Prashanth Parameswaran is research assistant at the Project 2049 Institute, a Washington-based think tank that covers Asian security issues. He is also a research fellow for Asia Chronicle, a daily online journal, and blogs about international affairs at GlobalEye.
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Friday, April 30, 2010
Avoiding Crisis in the Mekong River Basin
Cambodia to boost global rice sales
PHNOM PENH (Commodity Online) : In an attempt to boost its international rice sales, Cambodia has decided to axe rice export licenses to exporters.
Country’s Prime Minister Hun Sen issued a new order in this regard to replace an old order of 2008.
The document ordered would-be exporters to apply to a Ministry of Commerce-run company called Green Trade for a permit.
All traders who wanted to sell more than 200 tones of the grain had to apply for a permit, in an attempt to secure Cambodia's rice and paddy supply.
The government wants to sell more rice into international markets to develop the economy.
According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Cambodia plans to increase paddy yield by as much as 3 tones per hectare by 2012.
This farm year, April statistics show, the Kingdom could have 3.5 million tones of paddy left over for export, a 10.75 percent increase from the 3.16 million tones last year.
Cambodian Small and Medium Industries Association (CSMIA), said four rice buyers from Sweden, Lithuania and Belgium will arrive in Cambodia on May 9 to meet with 100 rice mill representatives to discuss export capability.
CSMIA said Russian company Prod Gamma is set to order 20,000 tones of rice from Cambodia this year. The company wants to order 10 percent broken rice from Cambodia at $430 per tone.
The CSMIA has exported 2,500 tones of rice to European markets since the beginning of the year.
The association plans to export another 1,200 tones in May. The group has also signed export agreements with companies from Germany, Lithuania and Latvia.
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Cambodia court rejects bail for K.Rouge leaders
PHNOM PENH: Cambodia's UN-backed genocide court on Friday denied bail for three former Khmer Rouge leaders, saying they may commit serious crimes and their detention was necessary to prevent trial tampering.
Judges rejected appeals from former Khmer Rouge head of state Khieu Samphan, foreign minister Ieng Sary and his wife, minister of social affairs Ieng Thirith, who all asked for release ahead of their trial expected next year.
The three leaders, who have been charged with genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, murder, torture and religious persecution, appealed against their detention late last year and earlier this year.
"The Pre-Trial Chamber of the (tribunal) dismissed appeals lodged by the charged persons," a statement from the court said.
The tribunal said detention of the ageing suspects "remains a necessary measure" to prevent the suspects from fleeing the trial and to ensure their security.
Khieu Samphan, 78, Ieng Sary, 84, and Ieng Thirith, 78, were arrested in November 2007 over their roles in the 1975-79 Khmer Rouge government, and have appealed annually for release from detention at the court.
The three leaders are being held along with the Khmer Rouge former "Brother Number Two" ideologue Nuon Chea and the regime's main prison chief Kaing Guek Eav, alias Duch.
Up to two million people were executed or died of starvation, disease and overwork as the 1975-79 Khmer Rouge movement emptied cities and enslaved the population on collective farms in its bid to create a communist utopia.
Final arguments in the court's first trial, of Duch, ended in November and a verdict is expected later this year.
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Scientist: China avoiding honey tariff
COLLEGE STATION, Texas, April 30 (UPI) -- Honey from China is being shipped into the United States illegally to avoid expensive tariffs, a Texas scientist who tracks the origins of pollen alleges.
China, the world's largest honey producer, is sending honey to other countries for labeling and then into the United States to avoid paying U.S. tariffs of up to 500 percent, Vaughn Bryant, a Texas A&M professor, said.
Bryant, a palynologist or a pollen specialist, analyzes honey samples from around the world to determine their origin.
Honey samples labeled as coming from Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia and Laos usually turn out to be "a little honey from those countries" with the majority of the blend coming from Chinese sources, Bryant said in a release Thursday.
The high U.S. tariffs on Chinese honey were instituted about two years ago when China nearly ruined the U.S. market by selling its honey for about half of what it costs U.S. honey producers to sell their product.
"Now there are lots of shenanigans going on to avoid having to pay those tariffs," Bryant said.
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Ways to Celebrate National Arbor Day 2010
Today, Friday, April 30, is officially Arbor Day 2010, which means it’s time to break out the shovels, seeds, and water and plant a tree. Arbor Day first began in the United States in 1872, and has since spawned similar tree planting days around the globe from China to Brazil and Cambodia.There are dozens of ways to celebrate Arbor Day this year, and here are just a few.
Buy a tree. The national Arbor Day 2010 website offers a simple and straight forward tree buying shop. Click on their ‘Tree Store’ link, and you’ll be guided to an online shop filled with a variety of flowering trees, fruit trees, nut trees, shade trees and other popular trees to choose from. Prices start from as low as $6.
Or buy a gift tree. If not for yourself, give the gift of a tree to a friend, family, guests or even employees. The Arbor Day website includes a variety of trees for all climates and hardiness zones. Custom labels and packaging is also available.
* UN Program Aims To Plant One Billion Trees
Go local. See what Arbor Day events are going on in your town and check them out. Often, libraries will have special Arbor Day readings for kids; and cities will hold special tree planting ceremonies.
Whatever you choose to do, celebrate Arbor Day 2010. Be creative. Be a leader. It’s a way to give back to the Earth and help the community out too.
Written by Lani Shadduck
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Thursday, April 29, 2010
Cambodia's tourist arrivals surge in first Q1
PHNOM PENH, International tourist arrivals surged by almost 10 percent in the first quarter of this year, compared to the same period in 2009, showing key growth in the number of visitors from South Korea, China and Japan, local media reported on Thursday.
Government figures quoted by the Phnom Penh Post as showing that 683,692 tourists came to Cambodia from January to March 2010, a rise of 9.87 percent on the 622,288 arrivals in the same period of 2009.
Potentially high-spending visitors from South Korea were up 31. 5 percent, Chinese arrivals were up 27.2 percent, and Japanese visitors rose by 4.7 percent.
Air arrivals increased 10.83 percent to 371,506, up from 335, 213 last year, with 10 percent more visitors entering the Kingdom at Siem Reap airport.
Total arrivals in the home province of Angkor Wat rose 22.8 percent, to 366,102.
Kong Sophearak, director of the Statistics and Tourism Information Department at the Ministry of Tourism, attributed the rise to the resurgence of global travel following "the darkness" of the financial crisis.
Luu Meng, president of Cambodia's Hotel Association (CHA), was quoted as saying that occupancy within the hotel industry had risen by up to 10 percent quarter-on-quarter.
Ang Kim Eang, president of Cambodia's Association of Travel Agents (CATA), predicted that the trend will continue. "I am optimistic that the foreign tourists will keep increasing. People are just getting to know our country after the long-lasting civil war," he was quoted by the Post as saying.
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Tigress gives birth to quadruplets at Thai nature reserve
Bangkok - A 7-year-old tigress has given birth to four cubs at a nature reserve in west-central Thailand in the country's largest tiger delivery to date, media reports said Thursday.
Khao Chi delivered the cubs last month in the Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary, which is home to South-East Asia's largest population of wild tigers, the Bangkok Post reported.
"It is unbelievable to experience the astonishing delivery of four tigers at one time," National Parks Department officer Sakit Simcharoen said.
"Usually, a tiger delivers one or two cubs at a time," he said.
The birth has given hope to park officials at Huay Kha Khaeng, 175 kilometres north-west of Bangkok, that they might achieve their ambitious goal of doubling the sanctuary's tiger population by 2022.
The park's wild tiger population of 100 is under constant threat from poachers, who killed three of the animals last month alone.
At a meeting in Hua Hin, Thailand, in January, ministers from 13 countries where Asian tigers are still found in the wild committed themselves to doubling the wild tiger population to about 7,000 by 2022 and protecting their fast-diminishing habitats.
The countries - Bangladesh, Bhutan, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Nepal, Russia, Thailand and Vietnam - are scheduled to meet again for a tiger summit planned for September in Vladivostok, Russia, to map out their plans for saving the species.
There were an estimated 100,000 wild tigers in Asia 100 years ago, but now about 3,500 are left.
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Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Cambodia tells diplomats it is no 'banana republic'
PHNOM PENH — The Cambodian government has told all foreign diplomatic envoys to avoid criticising the country, insisting it is not a "banana republic", in a letter seen by AFP Wednesday.
The foreign ministry letter sent to all diplomatic missions in Cambodia asked them to "avoid interfering in the internal affairs" of the country, regardless of the power of their home nations.
"There have been many occasions, in which some heads of diplomatic missions behaved like a 'proconsul' of his/her country to the Kingdom of Cambodia. They indulged themselves to criticise or to give lessons to the Royal Government of Cambodia," the letter said.
"Such behaviours are not acceptable for Cambodia as a sovereign country and a member of the United Nations. Cambodia is not a BANANA REPUBLIC," it added.
Asked about the letter dated April 26, foreign ministry spokesman Koy Kuong told AFP it was issued to remind all diplomats not to "exceed the limit of their mandate".
Cambodia last month threatened to expel a United Nations envoy if UN agencies continued "unacceptable interference" in the country.
The move came after UN agencies in Cambodia urged "a transparent and participatory" process as parliament debated an anti-corruption law that was criticised by the opposition and rights groups.
Ranked one of the world's most corrupt countries, Cambodia passed the anti-graft law in parliament on March 11, more than 15 years after legislation was first proposed, but only days after the draft was shared publicly.
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CAMBODIA: Strict penalties planned for acid attacks
Source: IRIN
Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone.
PHNOM PENH, 28 April 2010 (IRIN) - Keo Srey Vy's brother-in-law had been planning to sell his child so he could buy a new motorbike. When she threatened to tell the police, he went to the restaurant where she worked as a cook and doused her face with acid.
She reported the attack to police, but gave up after they demanded a bribe to investigate.
"I didn't consider revenge, but I wanted a law that would catch him and bring him to justice, and that law did not exist," Keo Srey Vy, who is severely scarred, told IRIN. A year after the attack, she may have reason for hope.
While countries such as Bangladesh and India have enacted severe laws and banned the open sale of chemicals, Cambodia had not taken any serious steps to curb the crime.
Under a new draft law on the use and management of acid, perpetrators of acid attacks would receive life sentences, the government said. Attacks resulting in minor injuries would come with a minimum five-year sentence.
"The law that we have today is not enough," Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak said. "I think that stronger punishment will make them [perpetrators] more afraid of the law."
Statistics on acid attacks are unreliable since many cases go unreported. For most years since 2000, the Phnom Penh-based Cambodian Acid Survivors' Charity (CASC) [http://cambodianacidsurvivorscharity.org/index.htm] recorded 12-24 attacks. But between December 2009 and January 2010, 11 cases were recorded, raising the national profile of the problem.
Comprehensive law
The new law, according to the drafting committee, includes improved medical care and social integration programmes for survivors. The opening of a state-run medical centre for acid survivors is also being considered, although funding resources remain unclear.
Drafting committee deputy chairman Ouk Kimlek, who is also deputy national police commissioner, told local media the committee was planning to create "an acid foundation to generate money from all sources and NGOs to help provide skills and capital for them". He did not elaborate on the level of the government's contribution.
Rights groups believe acid attacks abound in part because the caustic chemicals are readily and cheaply available. The draft law thus stipulates that importers and sellers of acid have to be at least 20 years old and licensed to carry out any transaction involving the chemical.
To assist police in criminal investigations, vendors would also have to record the details of anyone who buys acid. Retailers who fail to comply would be subject to fines and lose their licence to sell the product.
Enforcement
Local rights and survivors' groups hailed the legislation as a necessary step in curbing attacks but sceptics questioned the government's ability to ensure police enforcement of the new law.
"We have impunity in Cambodia for rape and murder; most victims are paid compensation, or the criminal is never caught," Pung Chhiv Kek, president of the local rights group Licadho [http://www.licadho-cambodia.org/] said. "If you have a good law but it's not enforced, it's useless."
Illegal out-of-court settlements are common practice in Cambodia, and rights groups say they undermine efforts to discourage the crime.
"They pay US$200 or $300, which is hardly anything. When you have to eat, buy medicine, feed your family, [financial compensation] is never enough," said Chhun Chenda Sophea, CASC's programme manager. "They need to enforce the law strictly. If it's being enforced, then people will be scared of committing the crime."
Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak agreed, saying the new legislation needed to coincide with an effort to "make the court system more responsible".
The government has yet to set a deadline for completion of the final draft, which needs approval from two government offices, followed by a vote at the National Assembly.
Meanwhile, Keo Srey Vy sold her home to pay her medical fees, and now, at 36, she depends on the CASC. Three of her children live with her mother, and another boards with an NGO.
"I was very happy to hear about this new law because it can help reduce this crime," she said. "I believe that if people know about the law, they wouldn't dare attack people."
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Cham Son Seeks Tribunal ‘Justice’ for Father
Cambodian Muslim, known as Chams visiting Choeung Ek S21 prison of Khmer Rouge
Sann Math Ly was a villager leader, well known, and he was unhappy with the Khmer Rouge and their treatment of the Chams.
Ly Sukei’s father was a well-educated Cambodian Muslim who died at the hands of the Khmer Rouge in 1975.
Now Ly Sukei is one of 228 Chams filing as civil parties at the Khmer Rouge tribunal, as the UN-backed court prepares to try at least four jailed leaders of the regime for genocide and other atrocity crimes.
“I filed a complaint to find justice for my father,” Ly Sukei told VOA Khmer at his home in Kampong Cham province, where many Chams lived and died under the Khmer Rouge.
He remembered the day soldiers came looking for his father, Sann Math Ly, in the village of Svay Klaing in Krouch Chhmar district.
Sann Math Ly was a villager leader, well known, and he was unhappy with the Khmer Rouge and their treatment of the Chams.
By 1975, the Khmer Rouge were shuttering mosques and forcing Muslims to cut their hair, burn their Qurans and eat pork. They were not allowed to prayer or wear head-coverings. Anyone who refused was the target of arrest.
“A group of around 20 armed Khmer Rouge cadre surrounded my house, and one of them ordered me in the Cham language: ‘You, go call upon your father,’” Ly Sukei said.
As his father left the house and walked toward the waiting soldiers, he made a sign behind his back telling his son to go home and not follow. Ly Sukei, who is now 44, never saw his father again.
Sann Math Ly became one of an estimated 500,000 Chams killed under the Khmer Rouge. Tribunal judges are now trying to determine whether such killings can be prosecuted as genocide.
Ly Sukei has been haunted by that day and has frequently followed the tribunal process by TV and radio. He wants to know what happened to his father.
“He was killed without any reasons, so I cannot do nothing,” Ly Sukei said. “I must allow him to rest in peace.”
Now a father of five, Ly Sukei has tried to find out more about Sann Math Ly and even searched for his photograph among those hung at the Tuol Sleng torture museum. He found nothing there and expects to find little else.
Still, he attended the tribunal proceedings last year against Kaing Kek Iev, or Duch, who underwent a trial for atrocity crimes committed at Tuol Sleng when it was a torture center for the Khmer Rouge. Ly Sukei said he has faith the tribunal can at least help him.
“I just want one word from the tribunal: that’s ‘justice,’” he said. “For those killed, including my father.”
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Rare Khmer Bronzes To Show in Washington
An art exhibition of Cambodian bronzes to open in Washington next month, featuring Khmer sculptures and ritual objects from late prehistory through the Angkorian period.
An art exhibition of Cambodian bronzes opens for the first time in Washington next month, featuring Khmer sculptures and ritual objects from late prehistory through the Angkorian period.
Thirty-six masterworks from the National Museum of Cambodia’s collection of some 7,000 bronzes will show at the Smithsonian’s Sackler Gallery under “Gods of Angkor: Bronzes from the National Museum of Cambodia.”
“This exhibition presents the stunning accomplishments of Khmer bronze casters,” Louise Allison Cort, the gallery’s curator of ceramics, said in a statement. “These bronzes are among the most exquisite expressions of Khmer ideals of religious imagery and ritual implements.”
The works include a rare and highly valued urn and bell, seven diverse bronze figures, ritual paraphernalia and Buddhist and Hindu sculpture.
The exhibition, a collaboration between the Freer and Sackler galleries and the National Museum of Cambodia, explores significant developments in bronze casting, as well as cultural and religious developments that coalesced during the Angkor period into a recognizable Khmer style.
The exhibition will show from May 15 through Jan. 23, 2011, in Washington and is scheduled to travel to the J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles in February 2011.
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Tuesday, April 27, 2010
World Bank To Inspect Lake Land Management
The World Bank’s inspection arm will conduct an inquiry into a land administration project, following complaints that the plan failed to protect the land rights of residents around the Boeung Kak lake development.
The Center of Housing Rights and Eviction says the $23.4-million Land Management and Administration Project failed to register land titles for the lake residents and in fact weakened their rights to customary land ownership.
The center requested an inquiry last year, and in a final report on the World Bank Web site, the Inspection Panel said the request warranted an investigation to assess management’s compliance with World Bank policies and procedures “and related issues of harm” with the project.
“The Panel would need to conduct an appropriate review of all relevant facts and applicable policies and procedures,” the report concludes. “This can only be done in the context of an investigation of the issues of compliance and harm raised by the Request.”
Some 4,000 families in the Boeung Kak community, the majority of them impoverished, face eviction from their land around the lake, which is slated for residential and commercial development by Shikaku, Inc. Some of them say they have lived in the area for 20 years.
The Center of Housing Rights and Eviction, which filed the complaint on behalf of the residents, welcomed the decision, but urged immediate action.
“The housing rights of hundreds of families are at stake at this very moment,” Salih Booker, the group’s executive director, said in a statement Friday.
World Bank officials have previously met with government officials, including within the Phnom Penh municipality, to address the concerns of Boeung Kak residents, but so far the sides have not been able to break the impasse.
Some residents say they have received fair compensation for moving, while others say they don’t want to move to a relocation site on the far outskirts of the capital.
Nonn Theany, director general of the Ministry of Land Management, the key government partner in the land management project, said the World Bank had a right to inspection but should inspect “its own staff.”
“The government has already terminated our partnership on the LMAP project,” she said.
The government ended the program in late 2009, claiming it contained too many conditions. Nonn Theavy said when the government worked with the World Bank on the project, “they didn’t say how we were doing.”
“But when there was an inspection team coming, they would just find our faults,” she said. “We had annual evaluation reports. Only recently, when an NGO spoke out about the eviction at Boeung Kak lake, they linked the work to that case.”
The project could only register undisputed land, she said.
“When we saw a disputed piece of land with the ownership not clearly determined, we had to skip that place,” she said.
David Pred, Cambodia’s director for Bridges Across Borders Southeast Asia, which works with the lake residents, said the Cambodian government had “walked away from these families and refused to partner with the World Bank to find a positive solution for them.”
“The Bank cannot walk away from these families now just because the government has closed the door,” he said. “The Bank has a moral and a legal responsibility to provide reparations to the people it has acknowledged have been harmed by this project. This is an important test of the accountability of the World Bank.”
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Cambodia re-allows S. Korean men to marry Cambodian women+
PHNOM PENH, April 27 (AP) - (Kyodo)—Cambodia has lifted its suspension of processing of marriages between South Korean men and Cambodian women after revising its marriage regulations in an effort to prevent human trafficking, a government official said Tuesday.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Koy Kuong told Kyodo News his ministry has notified all foreign embassies in Phnom Penh of the new marriage regulations that require a foreign man wanting to marry a Cambodian woman to be present with her in Cambodia during all stages of the marriage process.
The temporary suspension was announced last month for fear that Cambodian girls from the countryside were still being trafficked as prospective brides for foreign men, South Koreans in particular.
In 2008, Cambodia issued a similar temporary suspension on international marriage processing but it applied to all marriages with foreign men, not specifically those involving South Korean men.
That move followed a report by the International Organization for Migration that warned about networks of brokers or matchmaking businesses that had been arranging "fake, deceitful" marriages to bring Cambodian women to foreign places like Taiwan or South Korea to work as housemaids or prostitutes.
The report said from 2004 through 2007, some 2,500 Cambodian women had married South Korean men through brokers, while a Cambodian fact- finding mission sent to Taiwan in 2007 showed that 5,219 Cambodian women were living there, some of whom had been trafficked outright and many of whom claimed they had endured abuse.
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Total pays Cambodia 28 mln dollars for oil exploration: PM
French oil company Total has paid 28 million dollars for the rights to explore an area in the Gulf of Thailand, Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen said Tuesday.
The Cambodian government, during a visit by Hun Sen to Paris, announced its decision in July last year to grant Total the right to search for oil and natural gas in the country's offshore "Block 3".
Disclosing the price paid by Total for the first phase of the search for oil in the area, Hun Sen said that eight million dollars of the money would go towards a "social fund".
"Total offered the highest (bid) among the companies," he said.
Total will pay an additional 20 million dollars if it starts drilling for oil in the offshore area, Hun Sen added.
At the same time the premier denied Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton paid a large bribe for an exploration contract in Cambodia, saying that money had also gone into a social fund.
Total "also has paid this kind of money," Hun Sen said during a meeting between the government and private sectors.
Following the discovery of oil in 2005, Cambodia was quickly feted as the region's next potential petro-state, but production has stalled as the government and Chevron appear to have failed to agree over revenue sharing.
Hun Sen said earlier this month he would terminate his country's contract with Chevron if the US energy giant does not begin oil production from offshore fields by late 2012.
Concerns have also been raised over how Cambodia -- one of the world's most corrupt countries -- would use its new-found oil and gas wealth.
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Monday, April 26, 2010
Thai king speaks out for first time in crisis, tells judges to work faithfully to bring peace
Thai king speaks for 1st time in political crisis
BANGKOK — Thailand’s ailing king spoke Monday for the first time since his country descended into political chaos, but the man seen by many as the best hope for securing a peaceful resolution failed to address the deadly crisis that has shut down parts of Bangkok.
Speaking from the hospital, where he has been for more than seven months, King Bhumibol Adulyadej told newly appointed judges that they should faithfully carry out their duties and help keep the country stable.
“In the country, there might be people who neglect their duties, but you can set an example that there are those who perform their duties strictly and honestly,” the 82-year-old king said.
His vague comments could be seen as a possible reference to accusations that the government has failed to keep order when faced with the militant protesters who have taken over part of central Bangkok.
The king’s lack of clear statement, however, signaled he was not prepared to take an active role in resolving the crisis, as he did in 1973 when he stopped bloodshed during a student uprising and again in 1992 during antimilitary street protests.
The U.S.-born Bhumibol, the world’s longest reigning monarch, has been hospitalized since Sept. 19, when he was admitted with fatigue and loss of appetite. The palace has said he is recovering from a lung inflammation, but not explained why he has been hospitalized for so long.
At least 26 people have been killed and nearly 1,000 wounded since protesters called Red Shirts began occupying parts of the capital, closing down five-star hotels and shopping malls and devastating the country’s vital tourism industry.
The government said it hoped to resolve the problem peacefully, despite a breakdown in negotiations, but added it could not allow the protests to go on indefinitely.
“We’re required to keep peace and return the area to normalcy,” government spokesman Panitan Wattanayagorn said.
The Red Shirts consist mainly of poor, rural supporters of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and pro-democracy activists who opposed the military coup that ousted him in 2006. They believe that Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva’s government — backed by the urban elite — is illegitimate.
The conflict has been characterized by some as class warfare, and a pro-establishment group known as the Yellow Shirts have demanded that authorities crack down on the demonstrators — even implying they might take matters into their own hands.
“The government has the responsibility to protect the people, but instead shows its weakness and inability to enforce the law,” said Suriyasai Katasila, a leader of the Yellow Shirts.
Thousands of “Red Shirt” protesters have shed their signature crimson attire as their leaders warned they should be prepared to blend in if the government cracks down on their enclave. Many Red Shirt supporters outside the capital have tried to prevent police reinforcements from moving into Bangkok.
In at least six places around the country, Red Shirt supporters scattered nails along roads, set up checkpoints and searched vans and buses for police officers headed to the capital.
Some police heading to Bangkok were forced to return to their bases, while police in the central province of Phitsanulok, impatient after a 5-hour standoff with the Red Shirts, broke through a cordon of protesters who hurled rocks and wooden sticks at them, Thai media reported.
While there was no violence in the central Bangkok shopping area where protesters remained camped for a 24th day, an explosion injured eight people late Sunday near the home of former Prime Minister Banharn Silapa-archa, who is allied with the ruling coalition.
Thaksin, who fled Thailand ahead of a conviction on corruption charges, said Monday that he is in contact with the protesters and he defended their cause.
“We just fight for democracy. Let them fight for democracy and justice,” he said in Montenegro, one of a handful of countries that have offered him a passport. Others, such as Germany and Britain, have barred him.
Meanwhile, the government appeared to have left itself few immediate ways out of the crisis.
Panitan, the government spokesman, said the government could not tolerate the protesters’ camping out in the city anymore, but appeared to rule out sending in security forces anytime soon because that would likely lead to violence.
He also said political negotiations to resolve the crisis peacefully would remain on hold until the government had arrested Red Shirt leaders accused of inciting violence. Warrants have been issued for two dozen leaders.
Over the weekend, Abhisit rejected a compromise offer by the Red Shirts, dashing hopes for a peaceful end to the standoff.
“There will be no negotiations until shadowy elements are contained,” he said.
Associated Press writer Predrag Milic in Podgorica, Montenegro, contributed to this report.
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On Island of Massacre, Chams Remember
On an island in the Mekong River in Krouch Chhmar district, about 50 km from Kampong Cham provincial town, lies a Cham village that is little more than a few bamboo, thatched-roof houses.
On an island in the Mekong River in Krouch Chhmar district, about 50 km from Kampong Cham provincial town, lies a Cham village that is little more than a few bamboo, thatched-roof houses.
The village is on Koh Phal, or “Island of Harvest,” where Cham Muslims resisted the Khmer Rouge in an uprising in September 1975, just five months after the radical Maoists took power in Cambodia.
“The reason for the rebellion was that there was no more Islam,” Chet Sman, a 75-year-old widower and the head of one of the four families living here, told VOA Khmer in an interview recently. “The Khmer Rouge collected our Quran for burning and cut women’s hair, including my mother’s. This is the reason.”
Chet Sman sat in front of an old black-and-white TV in his cottage, smoking tobacco and describing the uprising, which led to a massacre of the Chams on the island. These killings, and others like them, will be a part of the Khmer Rouge tribunal’s upcoming trial against four jailed leaders of the regime.
The Khmer Rouge shut down mosques, forbid prayer and abolished head-covering for women, he said. They also forced the Chams to raise pigs and eat the pork, a deeply offensive act to the traditional Muslims.
Before the Chams of Koh Phal were pushed to rebellion, the Khmer Rouge went house to house, collecting swords, knives and other tools that might be used as weapons, Chet Sman said. But many villagers hid theirs, or quickly constructed new ones, as they decided to resist.
“The desperate villagers who dared fight against the Khmer Rouge with their swords or bamboo wanted to die as our religion disappeared,” he said, his own long knife and axes lying nearby.
In response, the Khmer Rouge surrounded the island with artillery and weapons. Within a week, they had killed the rebellious villagers, burned down their homes, religious schools and mosques and then turned the name of Koh Phal to Koh Phes, or “Island of Ashes.”
Then, two weeks later, Cham villagers in Svay Klaing, 10 kilometers away, rose up as well, after their teachers and religious leaders were arrested by the Khmer Rouge. Many more were killed in a single day and night.
Ysa Osman, author of “The Cham Rebellion,” which chronicles the uprisings, said the Khmer Rouge then sent survivors to four prisons in Kroach Chhmar district, in areas prone to malaria.
“At that time, there were not enough prisons to put people in, as there were thousands of people both young and old,” he said in an interview last week. “So the Khmer Rouge used schools and pagodas as detention centers for the rebellious villagers.”
Among an estimated 1.7 million people who were killed or died of starvation, overwork or torture under Democratic Kampuchea, an estimated 500,000 are believed to be Chams, according to the Documentation Center of Cambodia.
In late 2009, the UN-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal added the charge of genocide for four former Khmer Rouge leaders awaiting trials. The four, Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith, had previously been charged with crimes against humanity, murder, torture and religious persecutions.
As part of the trial, which could begin next year, Yusos Pinyamin, a survivor of the Svay Klaing massacre, was among those who have filed complaints as civil parties, and he said recently he wants justice done more quickly.
He worries the old leaders will die before they see trial.
“I knew that I could not win, but it was not worth living any longer,” the 56-year-old “hakim,” or village elder, said of the 1975 rebellion. “I was so desperate that I could not wait to be killed.”
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Remembering 'Year Zero' when Beijing-backed regime rammed socialism through
UNITED NATIONS — Thirty-five years ago this week, the guns fell silent in Cambodia. The capital city Phnom Penh was captured by the Khmer Rouge communists and the war was finally over. Then an unfathomable reign of terror commenced pulling Cambodia into yet lower levels of the Indochinese inferno. Now a generation later, an UN-backed tribunal is trying key Khmer Rouge leaders “accused of mass killings and other crimes during the country’s genocide.”
During the rule of the Beijing-backed Pol Pot regime between 1975-1979, nearly two million Cambodians were killed by their own people in the name of communist utopianism. The Year Zero as it was called, was to forcibly transform Cambodia into a socialist state, which rivaled the radicalism even of Mao’s Cultural Revolution in Mainland China.
Neighboring Vietnam’s invasion of its old ethnic rival, Cambodia and the instillation of a puppet regime in 1979, interrupted the sanguinary rule of Democratic Kampuchea. Despite the illegality of the invasion and the dubious legitimacy of the rulers, (many of them former Khmer Rouge defectors), from a human rights perspective, and for the average Cambodian, the situation improved.
Yet Democratic Kampuchea was still the UN-recognized representative holding the seat of Cambodia. An annual political General Assembly debate brought together representatives of the Pol Pot regime, genuine nationalists, and the mercurial if bizarre Prince Sihanouk. The People’s Republic of China backed the Khmer Rouge, the U.S. Administration of Jimmy Carter had just recognized Beijing and thus was playing the China Card, and most developing countries opposed Hanoi’s invasion too. Thus there existed the political clout to produce resounding majorities contemning Vietnam’s illegal occupation of Cambodia.
In light of the condemnations of Vietnam, it almost became an afterthought that the Khmer Rouge had presided over the infamous Killing Fields, an indisputable genocide which tore the once gentle heart from this Indochina land, making the very name Cambodia synonymous with forced starvation, torture and death.
Given massive international political pressures, Vietnam withdrew from Cambodia and allowed a UN peacekeeping and political process with led to free and fair elections in the early 1990’s. Not surprisingly the old Kingdom of Cambodia was reestablished. By 2003 the UN and Cambodia agreed to a joint judicial Tribunal, tasked with trying leading Khmer Rouge figures. The Tribunal is composed of both Cambodian and foreign judges.
Recently the UN’s Chief Legal Counsel, Patricia O’Brien, visited the Phnom Penh-based Tribunal, officially called the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, (ECCC). After holding discussions with Cambodian officials, she stressed the continuing importance of the Tribunal, but called on donor countries to provide funding to support the ongoing judicial process.
The ECCC budget for 2010 stands at $45 million and is paid by both the Cambodian government and foreign donors. The Tribunal provides a full and proper legal frame- work with Trial and Appeals Chambers.
A trial of the notorious leader Kiang Guek Eav also known as “Duch” has finished and he is awaiting sentence. He was charged with crimes of torture and premeditated murder at the infamous S-21 camp. There will be at least a few more trials before the Tribunal winds down its mandate in 2015.
According to a statement, “The ECCC has confirmed its ability to conduct complex international criminal trials to international standards.” Yet the obvious question arises; with so many of the perpetuators of the Khmer Rouge genocide still alive, and many living openly in Cambodia, why is the Tribunal’s mandate so narrow?
Clearly there are large numbers in Cambodian society who are willing to turn the page on the past, or who more likely, fear returning to that past. Confronting the living ghosts of the Pol Pot regime raises fears and a specter of a Cambodia which existed before probably most of the current population was even born. The fragile peace, fractious democracy, and fluctuating economic development have moved forward but could quickly wilt in the hot-light of recriminations or perhaps worse. Revenge for the crimes of the genocidal regime is not the issue, but justice should be the indisputable goal.
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US Embassy in Cambodia Says Remains Are Not US Photographer
The surviving journalists and photographers who covered the war in Cambodia between 1970-75 gathered in Phnom Penh last week. They are seen here at a memorial to mark the 37 local and foreign colleagues who died during that time.
In 1970 war photographer Sean Flynn, the son of legendary Hollywood actor Errol Flynn, was in Cambodia covering the country's drift into civil war.
On April 6th that year he rode out of Phnom Penh with U.S. journalist Dana Stone. The two were not seen again, and were presumed captured and killed by the Khmer Rouge.
But last month two amateur excavators said they had found Flynn's remains in southeastern Cambodia.
On Monday, the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh said that military scientists tested the remains and found they are not Caucasian, and therefore could not be Flynn or Stone.
"And limited analysis suggests that they may be indigenous. Further testing is underway," embassy spokesman John Johnson said.
The excavation of the remains caused controversy. It came just weeks before a group of 27 journalists and photographers who covered Cambodia in the 1970s arrived here for a reunion, the first since Phnom Penh fell to the Khmer Rouge in April 1975.
Some of the journalists, many of whom knew Flynn and Stone, were angry at the way the excavators recovered the bones, especially their use of heavy earthmoving equipment.
The Embassy's Johnson says the use of a backhoe - a mechanical digger - caused problems.
"The remains are badly fragmented due to the manner in which they were recovered," Johnson said.
During their visit here last week, the group of returning journalists unveiled a memorial to the 37 Cambodian and foreign colleagues who died or disappeared during the war.
Among the names read out at the ceremony were those of Sean Flynn and Dana Stone, whose fates still remain unknown.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
World Health Organization (WHO) recommends traveller “insect repellent”
World Health Organization (WHO) recommends traveller “insect repellent” as one of the basic medical kit.
Apr 25, 2010 – Moz Away mosquito repellent spray is a 100% natural made mosquito repellent spray with deet free and no side effect to adults, children and babies. Because it is natural, safe and effective, Moz Away mosquito repellent spray has becoming popular household brand in the market today.
Why Moz Away Mosquito Repellent Spray is your choice
• 100% natural plant oil (DEET FREE)
• Long protection hour
• Suitable for indoor and outdoor
• Non greasy, staining and alcohol free
• Safe for baby and children
• Suitable for all skins
• Easy to use and carry especially when you travel
Moz Away mosquito repellent spray is made of natural ingredients, non- greasy, non- alcohol and DEET FREE. MOZ AWAY is specially formulated to pH5.5. It is chemical free and no artificial fragrance and suitable for all skin. It is gentle on all skin and washes off easily. It is safe for children and babies.
Alert! Mosquito disease seriously reported in Africa, United States, Canada, Caribbean, Mexico, Mauritius, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, China, Korea, Philippine, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia, Myanmar, India, Nepal, Malaysia, Australia, Singapore, Indonesia, Middle East countries. World Health Organization (WHO) recommends traveller “insect repellent” as one of the basic medical kit.
Active ingredients:
Citronelle oil 15% and Neem oil 2%
Indications:
Long lasting protection from mosquitoes and harmful insects. It is suitable for indoor and outdoor use.
Direction for use:
Spray onto exposed areas such as arms, legs and face. For face and lower limbs, it is easier to spray on the hands before apply.
Quantity:
75ml per bottle
Usage instructions with tested and result provened:
1) Hand/ Leg/ Body/ Face (External only)
Spray on hands, legs and body when mosquitoes are active. For face, spray onto hands before apply.
2) Shoe cabinet/ wardrobe
Mosquitoes like to stay in the shady and windless area such as shoe cabinet and wardrobe; you may spray few times into cabinet or wardrobe to cut down mosquitoes to fly in.
3) Clothes
Spray onto clothes before wear especially when you intend to go out at night.
4) Plants/ Flowers
Mosquitoes like to hide around home plants or flowers; you may spray onto plants or flowers to repel mosquitoes and harmful insects immediately.
5) Car
Mosquitoes like to fly into car at night or early morning, spray few times into car then leave the door open for 1- 2mins before get in.
6) Bedroom
Mosquitoes are active at night, spray few times into bedroom before go to bed.
7) Window / Door
Mosquitoes always fly into house through doors and windows, spray few times to the side of doors and windows to cut down mosquitoes fly into the house.
8) Dustbin
Because of the wastage foods, other than flies, mosquitoes also like to fly into dustbin, spray few times into it to cut down mosquitoes and flies.
# # #
Moz Away mosquito repellent spray is a 100% natural made mosquito repellent spray with deet free and no side effect to adults, children and babies. Because it is natural, safe and effective, Moz Away mosquito repellent spray has becoming popular household brand in the market today.
Visit our websites for more details.
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Exploring Cambodia
Laura Tanna, Contributor
A tear slid down his cheek as Ly Sarith described the constant battle of wits for survival. If they shout "Attention!", don't stiffen like a soldier. They'll kill you. If they ask you to read something, don't. They'll know you're educated and kill you. His father was executed. He survived.
Too often we think of Cambodia as the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge, and for us it was a rarely moving experience to speak with such a holocaust survivor, though our purpose for visiting Siem Reap was to view magnificent temples.
The Khmer empire once stretched in the west from the Burmese border with Siam, now Thailand, and north to Laos. Khmer kings traded with the Chinese and adopted the religion of Indian scholars. In their quest to attain benefits from the gods in this world and the next, Khmer royalty created both Hindu and later Buddhist monuments from the 9th through the 15th centuries, the ruins of which remain part of Cambodia's remarkable heritage. Frequently at war with their neighbours, the Siamese and the Viet, the Khmer kings often moved their capitals. Today the best known of these glorious Khmer temples are Angkor Wat, 'the town which is a temple', and Angkor Thom, 'the great town', located near Siem Reap, a name which translates as defeat of the Siamese.
Elegant residences
Both the Grand Raffles Hotel
d'Angkor and the boutique Amansara Hotel serve as elegant residences, while more basic hotels and bed and breakfasts also accommodate an increasing number of international visitors who fly into this city to visit these historic sites.
Our Amansara Hotel provided an experienced guide, a two-seater motorcycle rickshaw and morning and afternoon expeditions which started with the wind blowing through our hair as we sped four miles to the various temples. What I wasn't expecting was the immersion into rural Cambodian life. Our first afternoon at 3:00 we headed east of Siem Reap, past a dry countryside resembling Guyana, the wooden houses built high above ground on stilts to protect from floods in the late May to November rainy season. Then the now-parched fields become rice paddies, plowed using white bullocks whose ribs are showing. Occasionally, a brown-water buffalo appears. Rural houses have walls of woven banana fronds, sometimes blue tarps or plastic rice bags hanging side by side to supplement these.
The Peoples' Party of Cambodia enclaves always seem to be better built of proper wood. One yard enclosed in grand wrought-iron fencing with gilt prongs was identified as belonging to someone who had escaped to 'foreign' and sent money back. Poverty speaks of the brutal killing fields where the educated were butchered, over one million and a half people dying during the reign of the Khmer Rouge, from 1975 to 1979, where their extreme Communism sought to eliminate all but an agricultural peasantry from which to build a new state.
Many who survived the violence died from starvation, and though the Vietnamese overthrew the Khmer Rouge in 1978/79, civil war continued until the Viet withdrawal in 1989. After the Paris Peace Accord of 1991, Angkor Wat became a World Heritage site in 1992 and restoration of the magnificent temples slowly began. Today, small farmers have a few bananas, coconuts, maybe corn and mangoes but despite the horror of their suffering over the decades, when we walk the country lanes people wave. Lying in hammocks or gathered beneath the houses, pet dogs and children play in the dirt. Wells are cement gifts from foreign aid. Many foreign organisations provide assistance for orphanages and schools. Just as today the world is responding to Haiti's need after the devastating earthquake, the world is assisting Cambodia in small ways after ignoring the holocaust that destroyed a generation.
I first heard of Angkor Wat when Jacqueline Kennedy visited in the '60s. You may have seen Ta Prohm, the temple in the jungle where Angelina Jolie was filmed in Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. Here ancient forest consumes man's efforts to venerate his gods as huge trees with gigantic roots envelope the temples. Already I understand why the actress adopted a Cambodian son. The children are adorable - not demanding, not annoying - just delightfully asking one to buy their postcards or guidebooks, they wait by temple entrances to earn a dollar. Yes, Siem Reap uses US dollars as its main currency.
Temples are built from lava, sandstone and covered in stucco. The higher each platform level, the smaller are the repeated designs, so an illusion of great height is attained, creating temples of rare beauty. Sadly, some lay in complete ruin on the ground. Like a gigantic jigsaw puzzle, 400,000 blocks of stone are assembled in one area, awaiting restoration by dedicated archaeologists from France, Germany, Switzerland, China, Japan, India, American NGOs and other countries, each restoring different sites. The most famous, the 500-acre rectangular Angkor Wat, built from 1113-50 AD, once a Buddhist then a Hindu temple, has vast walls of bas relief carvings portraying scenes from the Ramayana and other mythological and historic themes, including depictions of King Suryavarman II's army, reminiscent of ancient Egyptian bas relief on the tombs of Pharohs. In fact, experts dispute whether this complex was actually designed as a temple or a tomb.
Favourite site
My favourite site was Bayon, in the exact centre of the last capital, the royal city Angkor Thom, built a mile north and years after Angkor Wat. As the administrative and religious centre of the Khmer empire from the end of the 12th century, with 54 towers and more than 200 huge carved heads depicting the Buddhist concept of the cosmos, Angkor Thom was reputed to outrival any European city of the time. We walk through the forest at dawn, birdsong as beautiful as the music from Buddhist temples to arrive at one site. Another night we walk through the forest under a full moon to watch the sun slowly rise above the ancient temple towers. Nothing prepares you for the awesome understanding of man's mortality, your own fleeting existence, in the presence of glory and power, diminished to ruined grandeur.
If you're going to Siem Reap, a guidebook is an absolute must as each site depicts such a complex religious and political history that even a few hours of reading will enhance one's appreciation of the art and architecture enormously. Visas may be obtained via the Internet and avoid the rainy season when malaria-spreading mosquitoes are more prevalent. The ambiance, food and service of the Amansara were excellent!
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