Cambodia won't send troops to Afghanistan, Iraq

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia – Prime Minister Hun Sen said Wednesday he will not send peacekeeping troops to Afghanistan and Iraq.

Hun Sen said some countries, which he did not name, had requested 1,000 Cambodian de-miners be deployed to Afghanistan.

"I will not send Cambodian sons to die in those two countries," he said in remarks at the groundbreaking for a new road in the central province of Kampong Thom. "The Cambodian people have seen enough war and suffered enough casualties from land mines."

Cambodia was wracked by almost three decades of war and unrest after a 1970 military coup and became one of the most heavily mined countries in the world. It has trained a large corps of skilled de-miners.

In April 2006, Cambodia sent 135 soldiers to help U.N. peacekeepers clear mines in war-torn Sudan. Hun Sen, however, rejected requests from the U.S. to deploy Cambodian troops to Iraq that same year. He said he questioned the overall legitimacy of the war in Iraq and that it was too dangerous for Cambodians to operate there.

In early 2009, Cambodia sent several dozen troops to Chad and the Central African Republic.