THE draw for the West Asia qualifying tournament for next year's Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Futsal Championship will be held on July 22 at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur, it was announced yesterday.
Bahrain are one of seven teams set to compete in the tournament, which will be held in Doha in October. It will mark the kingdom's international debut in futsal.
The competition feature four ranked nations in the sport and three unranked teams - one of them being the Bahrainis. Lebanon are the favourites. They are currently classified as the top team in the West Asian region and eighth overall in the AFC.
Iraq (14th), Kuwait (16th) and hosts Qatar (19th) are the other ranked teams. Jordan and Saudi Arabia join Bahrain as those without ranking.
Qualification
Apart from the West Asian event, qualifying tournaments will also be taking place in the Asean and East Asian regions.
The Asean teams, which will be divided into two groups, are Australia (ranked fifth), Malaysia (10th), Indonesia (11th), Vietnam (18th), Brunei (21st), Cambodia (NA), Myanmar (NA) and Philippines (NA).
The East Asian squads are Japan (third), China (fourth), Korea Republic (13th), Chinese Taipei (15th), Macau (17th), Hong Kong (NA) and Guam (NA).
The top three teams from each of the four qualification groups will advance to the AFC Futsal Championship, along with four nations who have already pre-qualified.
The squads that are already in are Iran, Thailand, Japan, and the host Uzbekistan. Iran, Thailand and Japan are in based on their top three rankings in the 2008 tournament, while Uzbekistan qualify automatically as hosts.
Bahrain's national futsal team, coached by Brazilian Gustavo Zloccowick, are scheduled to begin their daily training programme soon. Zloccowick has named a preliminary training pool of 35 players.
Read more!
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
AFC Futsal draw to be conducted in Malaysia
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
GLP Worldwide Expedition Offers New AMA Waterways Vietnam, Cambodia & Riches of the Mekong Tour Program
Toronto, July, 2009 - Cruise along the Mekong River, one of the world’s longest rivers as you pass through wetlands to famous cities like Ho Chi Minh City (formerly Saigon) - temples, palaces, fishing villages and significant historic sites fill the days of your journey into this mystical land. AMA Waterways, represented in Canada by GLP Worldwide Expedition Travel and Tours, has launched a spectacular new land and cruise tour program called “Vietnam, Cambodia and the Riches of the Mekong.” Explore the fascinating region of South East Asia in this new 16-day itinerary.
“The South East Asia region has been gaining in popularity the past couple of years and we are thrilled to offer this exotic journey to Canadian travellers looking to explore this region but seeking the comfort and exceptionally high standards of AMA Waterways cruise ships and tour personnel,” said Patrick Tsung, president of GLP Worldwide Expedition Travel & Tours.
This exclusive 15-day itinerary is priced from as low as $5,560 per person CAD for the April 2010 departure - other departures available starting in September 2009 - prices vary).
The price includes air from Toronto and components listed in the Tour Highlights below but exclude taxes, visas and fuel surcharges. There is also an optional 8-day Central Vietnam pre-extension and an optional 4-day Hong Kong post-extension.
Tour Highlights:
• 2 nights in Vietnam’s bustling capital of Hanoi, famous for its graceful colonial architecture, verdant
parks, tranquil lakes and ancient temples;
• An overnight cruise onboard a luxurious traditional Junk in Vietnam’s Ha Long Bay, a UNESCO
World Heritage Site renowned for its spectacular limestone cliffs;
• 3 nights in Siem Reap,Cambodia, gateway to the Angkor Archeological Park, a UNESCO World
Heritage Site and home to the legendary Angkor Wat;
• An unforgettable 7-night cruise on the Mekong River aboard the luxurious, new 92-passenger MS La
Marguerite, the most deluxe vessel on the Mekong;
• An overnight in historic Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon), Vietnam.
AMA Waterways has redefined European river cruising since its founding in 2002. In 2009, two brand-new 148-passenger vessels, MS Amalyra and MS Amadolce, joined the luxurious
AMA Waterways fleet in Europe, which consists of the MS Amacello and MS Amadante (2008), MS Amalegro (2007) and MS Amadagio (2006). In 2010 AMA Waterways will welcome MS Amabella and continue to offer popular itineraries on the historic Danube, Main, Rhine and Mosel rivers, as well as the Douro River in Portugal, the
Rhône in France and the Volga-Baltic waterways in Russia.
Agents can find the sailing schedule, pricing, detailed itineraries and full terms and conditions in the 2009 Waterways of Europe brochure. To obtain a copy of the Vietnam, Cambodia and the Riches of the Mekong brochure, please contact GLP Worldwide Expedition Travel and Tours. You can also visit the website www.europeanwaterways.ca for complete details on the various cruises and pricing or email: info@europeanwaterways.ca.
GLP Worldwide Expedition Travel and Tours is based in Toronto, Ontario and acts as the Canadian representative for various niche cruise operators such as AMA Waterways, Go Barging, Hurtigruten, Fred. Olsen Cruises and Lüftner Cruises. Information on GLP Worldwide Expedition Travel and Tours can be accessed at www.glpworldwide.com or by calling (866) 760-1987.
Read more!
Cambodia marks anniversary of temple's world heritage listing
PHNOM PENH (AFP) - Cambodians on Tuesday noisily celebrated the first anniversary of the UN's world heritage listing of an ancient temple which has stoked nationalist tensions with neighbouring Thailand.
Posters of the 11th century Preah Vihear temple were plastered in pagodas, schools and prominent locations around the capital Phnom Penh while celebrators screamed, "Long Live Preah Vihear temple as a World Heritage Site!"
"As Cambodian people, we are very proud of Preah Vihear temple. We must celebrate this day, it is historic for us," Phnom Penh governor Kep Chuktema said after a traditional dance ceremony at a pagoda in front of 1,000 people.
PHNOM PENH (AFP) - Cambodians on Tuesday noisily celebrated the first anniversary of the UN's world heritage listing of an ancient temple which has stoked nationalist tensions with neighbouring Thailand.
Posters of the 11th century Preah Vihear temple were plastered in pagodas, schools and prominent locations around the capital Phnom Penh while celebrators screamed, "Long Live Preah Vihear temple as a World Heritage Site!"
"As Cambodian people, we are very proud of Preah Vihear temple. We must celebrate this day, it is historic for us," Phnom Penh governor Kep Chuktema said after a traditional dance ceremony at a pagoda in front of 1,000 people.
Waving colourful Cambodian flags, Buddhist monks, nuns, students and teachers gathered at pagodas and schools nationwide and promptly beat drums and rang bells at 11:00 am (0400 GMT) to herald the listing, officials said.
"I am very happy and proud of Preah Vihear temple. The temple belongs to Cambodia. Thailand has no right to claim it," said student Hang Dalune as at another event as hundreds of people sang and danced to nationalist songs, waving Cambodian flags.
Soldiers, villagers, monks and officials at Preah Vihear also celebrated the listing despite a standoff nearby between Cambodian and Thai troops, Cambodian commanders said.
The neighbouring countries have been at loggerheads over the land around the Preah Vihear temple for decades, but tensions spilled over into violence last July when the temple was granted UN World Heritage status.
Although the World Court ruled in 1962 that it belonged to Cambodia, the most accessible entrance to the ancient Khmer temple with its crumbling stone staircases and elegant carvings is from northeastern Thailand.
Thousands of people were also expected to gather in Phnom Penh's Olympic Stadium Tuesday evening for an anniversary ceremony complete with a fireworks display, official speeches and patriotic songs.
Relations between Thailand and Cambodia worsened last month when Bangkok announced it would ask UNESCO to reconsider its decision to list Preah Vihear as a world heritage site, as the surrounding land is still in dispute.
Read more!
Robert McNamara, architect of Vietnam War whose regrets made him opponent of Iraq War, dies at 93
Photo: President John F. Kennedy sits in his favorite rocking chair in the Oval Office during a meeting with Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, center, and Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson on March 16, 1961. Credit: Associated Press
As The Times noted in its obituary, McNamara, who stayed on as Pentagon chief into the Johnson administration, oversaw the massive buildup of U.S. forces in Vietnam between 1964 and 1968, earning him the sobriquet as the war's architect.
But perhaps the greatest legacy of McNamara's tenure -- one that could echo in the post-mortems over President George W. Bush's war in Iraq -- is that in later years he disavowed his decisions, particularly his conviction that if Vietnam fell to communism other Southeast Asia nations would also be vulnerable. "We were wrong, terribly wrong," he said. "We owe it to future generations to explain why."
It isn't often you hear a major public official acknowledge mistakes of his own making, but two decades after the last helicopter lifted off the roof of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon with loyalists rushing to get aboard and communism, McNamara began to speak out.
He gave a series of interviews at UC Berkeley in which he confessed he no longer believed in the domino theory. "It was certainly the conventional wisdom among the foreign policy establishment," he said. "I think we were wrong, and certainly misjudged it."
He wrote a memoir, "In Retrospect: The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam," again questioning the "domino theory," an underpinning of U.S. policy that held that if South Vietnam fell to Communist control, other countries in Southeast Asia would too. "My aim is neither to justify errors nor to assign blame," he wrote in the book, "but to identify the mistakes we made."
Later, interviewed by filmmaker Errol Morris for a documentary called "Fog of War," McNamara said: We all make mistakes. I don't know any military commander, who is honest, who would say he has not made a mistake. There's a wonderful phrase: "The fog of war." What "the fog of war" means is: War is so complex it's beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend all the variables. Our judgment, our understanding, are not adequate.
The experience of being wrong on a epic scale -- more than 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam, along with hundreds of thousands in Vietnam and Cambodia -- made McNamara an opponent of the Iraq War. Concerned that the Bush administration officials had failed to heed the lessons of Vietnam when they went into Iraq. he told a reporter for Canada's Globe and Mail in 2004, "We're misusing our influence. It's just wrong what we're doing. It's morally wrong, it's politically wrong, it's economically wrong."
Rest in peace.
-- Johanna Neuman
Evaluating McNamara
He was always Bomber Bob, Bob McNamara - Robert Strange McNamara - the man who, perhaps more than any other, was responsible for the killing of millions in Vietnam and Cambodia more than four decades ago.
Of course, much later in life, well after those insane years of the Indochina conflict in which the United States participated without any sense of history or sensibility of local cultures, McNamara would publicly express some regret over his role as Defence Secretary in the administrations of Presidents John Fitzgerald Kennedy and Lyndon Baines Johnson from 1961 to 1968. Regret, but never remorse.
McNamara died on July 6 at the age of 93. By conventional criteria, it was a long life of accomplishment. A Californian by birth, he went on to obtain an MBA from the Harvard School of Business.
Hired by the Ford Motor Company, he was one of the 10 so-called “whiz kids,” smart young executives who accelerated the automobile manufacturer’s fortunes. McNamara was widely considered to have invented a form of system analysis in business, something that he eventually applied to government - something that, to this day, is known as policy analysis in the corridors of power, a method through which the obtaining and allocation of resources for decision-making is quantified and streamlined.
He took that system with him when President Johnson named him President of the World Bank in 1968; there had been rumours that McNamara had had differences with Pentagon military leaders and that, in fact, he was leaning toward ending the bombing of Indochina, while U.S. Secretary of State Dean Rusk, already a hawk, was becoming increasingly hawkish.
Moving from the Pentagon to the World Bank was as if the villainous Darth Vader of George Lucas’ Star Wars suddenly had a metamorphosis - McNamara became the benign Luke Skywalker.
He travelled around the globe, proclaiming his concern for the dispossessed and the disease-ridden. He committed vast sums of development money to the very nations whose societal fabrics he had been earlier responsible for shredding.
He worked vigorously to draw attention to the endemic problem of river blindness, especially in Sub-Saharan countries in Africa. He took the late Mahbub ul Haq, the Pakistani economist, as his developmental guru, and initiated the publication of the much-acclaimed annual World Development Reports. He transformed the World Bank from a bloated behemoth into a bureaucracy with a heart. He was always running, always peripatetic.
Perhaps McNamara did this, I think, because he seemed to be always trying to expunge his war days from his conscience. During an interview that I did with him, well after he had retired from the World Bank, McNamara bristled when I asked him about Vietnam. “That was an unfortunate war, and it’s best relegated to history,” he said to me. I don’t think there was a trace of remorse in his voice; he spoke as he always did - firmly, crisply, and to the point.
When Susan Tolchin, a Professor of political science at George Mason University near Washington, reviewed Deborah Shapley’s extraordinary book, Promise and Power: The Life and Times of Robert McNamara, for a newspaper that I published and edited for a dozen years, The Earth Times, I was summoned by one of McNamara’s best friends, the Canadian tycoon Maurice F. Strong.
Strong had been my friend, too, and he was a noted environmentalist who had been a moral and intellectual supporter of my newspaper.
He tore into me for running Tolchin’s critical review in which she had recalled McNamara’s heavy-handed conduct during the Indochina years and his subsequent “conversion on the Road from Damascus - like St. Paul” during his tenure at the World Bank. “Bob is a good man,” Maurice Strong told me, his voice quivering. “Your paper shouldn’t be carrying such criticism of him.” Implicit in what Strong said, of course, was that some sort of apology was due to McNamara.
Neither Susan Tolchin nor I ever issued such an apology. What for? Yes, Bob McNamara had served admirably well as the World Bank’s President, and later as a board member of the Washington Post Company and the Washington-based liberal think tank, the Brookings Institution. Yes, he made contributions to philanthropies. And yes, he came out against George W. Bush’s military adventure in Iraq.
But one’s past is not cleansed so readily. I know that a 93-year-old man has passed away peacefully in his sleep, and I know that it is traditional to view such a man’s life through the prism of kindness.
I’m sorry, but I can’t do that. Too many of my friends died in Indochina. Too many of them came home without limbs. Their lives never got to be celebrated in the manner in which Robert McNamara was feted in his later years. That’s why, for me at least, he will always be Bomber Bob. (Courtesy: The Hindu)
The writer is a veteran international journalist and author who has worked for The New York Times, Newsweek International, and Forbes.
Read more!
Thailand’s foreign minister reports to police to hear charges over 2008 Bangkok airport siege
BANGKOK — Thailand’s foreign minister reported to police Monday to hear charges related to his involvement in mass demonstrations that climaxed with the seizure of Bangkok’s airports last year.
Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya and 35 other leaders of the “yellow shirt” protest movement face criminal charges including terrorism, illegal assembly, attempts to stir unrest, and breaches of aviation law for the eight-day siege of Bangkok’s two airports in November and December.
They were summoned to report to police on July 16 to hear the charges, said Police Lt. Gen. Worapong Chiewpreecha. But Kasit reported on Monday because he will be on official duty abroad on the scheduled date, Worapong said.
Kasit declined to comment on the allegations.
The charges brought a controversy surrounding Kasit’s appointment as foreign minister to the forefront as opposition members in Thailand’s Parliament called for his resignation.
“The charges are very serious. How could he represent our country as a foreign minister? He has no credibility left,” said Prompong Nopparit, spokesman of the opposition Phuea Thai Party.
Kasit spoke at several rallies by the protesters, who sought to topple the previous government allied with former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. They accused Thaksin, who was toppled in a military coup in 2006, of massive corruption and abuse of power.
The protesters occupied the prime minister’s office compound for three months and shut down Bangkok’s airports. Kasit later hailed the blockade — which stranded more than 250,000 travelers — as an “innovation in public protests.”
On Sunday, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said Kasit will remain in office while he fights the charges.
“There is no reason for him to resign at this point. He was only summoned to hear charges and at this stage, he is only a suspect,” Thepthai Senpong, Abhisit’s spokesman, said Monday.
Jatuporn Phrompan, a member of Parliament from Phuea Thai Party, said the lack of immediate response from the government “sends a signal that they do not take these charges against the yellow shirts seriously.”
Thailand was destabilized by months of protests by both supporters and opponents of Thaksin.
Abhisit’s government took control in December after a court ruled the previous pro-Thaksin ruling party was guilty of election fraud. The court decision prompted protesters to abandon the airports siege.
Abhisit’s six-month-old government has since faced street protests by Thaksin’s supporters, known as the “red shirts,” this year. Rioting in April left two dead and more than 120 injured.
Monday, July 06, 2009
Cambodian party leaders meet with Chinese official
Leaders of Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and Funcinpec Party on Monday met separately with the visiting Communist Party of China (CPC) delegation headed by Liu Qi, member of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee and secretary of the Beijing Municipal Committee of the CPC.
They exchanged views on Sino-Cambodian relations, the relations between two countries' ruling parties, and on other issues of common concern.
Liu spoke highly of the great achievements made by the Royal Government of Cambodia in various fields, and thanked Cambodia for its commitment to strengthen the friendly cooperation of the two countries and stick to one-China policy. He also praised Cambodia for their deepening coordination and communication with China on the international affairs.
Liu emphasized that the Chinese government attaches great important to its traditional relations with Cambodia, and will work with Cambodia to further promote the long-term and sound growth of bilateral comprehensive and cooperative partnership.
During the meeting, CPP's Honorary President Heng Samrim, Vice President Hun Sen, also the Prime Miniser of the Royal Government of Cambodia, and Funcinpec Party Chairman Ke Puth Rasmey expressed their heartfelt thanks to CPC, Chinese government and Chinese people for China's long-term great assistance and support for Cambodia's cause of independence, peace, reconstruction and development.
All the Cambodian party leaders reiterated their stance to stick to one-China policy, to further strengthen the traditional friendship with China as well as to deepen the development and cooperation on various areas.
Liu, who arrived Cambodia on Saturday afternoon for his four-day visit, makes the goodwill visit at the invitation of Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and the Funcinpec Party of Cambodia.
During his stay in Cambodia, Liu also paid a courtesy call on Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni. Cambodia is the first leg of Liu's four-nation visit which will take him to the Philippines, Malaysia and Indonesia.
Source: Xinhua
Read more!
Indonesia attends money laundering meeting in Brisbane
Brisbane, (ANTARA) - An Indonesian delegation headed by Chairman of the Financial Transactions Reporting and Analysis (PPATK) Yunus Husein along with delegations from 38 countries and other territories on Monday (Jul 6) started the 12th annual meeting of the Asia Pacific Group for Monday Laundering (APG-ML) in Brisbane, Australia.
The meeting held at Plaza Foyer, the Brisbane Convention and Exhibition Center (BCEC) until July 10 included technical seminars and evaluation preparatory meetings.
PPATK chairman Yunus Husein said the Indonesian delegation consisted of 14 members from relevant elements and interests, like PPATK, Ministry of Law and Human Rights, Bank Indonesia, Attorney General`s Office, Foreign Ministry, and the police.
Besides Yunus, the other delegates were Ferti Srikandi S., Syahrial Ramadhan, Djoko Kurnijanto, Ambar Widiyaningsih (PPATK), Suhari, M.Rofiq of the Corruption Eradication Commission (KPK), Betty J Parinusa of Bank Indonesia (BI), Feri Wibisono (KPK), and Garda Paripurna (doctorate law student of Wollongong University).
Yunus Husein said that he will submit a verbal report on the development of APG 2008 explaining various steps the Indonesian government had taken in combating money laundering.
The meeting in Brisbane also officially accepted membership of Papua New Guinea (PNG) and studied the methods and trends of money laundering and the funding of terrorist acts.
APG-ML is an autonomous international organization set up in Bangkok, Thailand in 1997. With 39 member countries, the efforts of APG-ML had the support of some other international organizations, like the International Monetary Fund, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the World Bank, and the Asian Development Bank.
APG members and observers have a commitment to the application of international standards to combating money laundering and the funding of terrorism.
Besides Indonesia and Australia, the other APG-ML member countries and territories are Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Canada, Taiwan, Cooks Islands, the Fijis, Hong-Kong (China), India, Japan, Korea, Laos, Macau (China), Malaysia, and the Maldives, Marshall Islands, Mongolia, in addition to Myanmar, Nauru, Nepal, New Zealand, Niue, Pakistan, Palau, PNG, the Philippines, Samoa, Singapore, Solomons, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Timor Leste, Tonga, United States, Vanuatu, and Viet Nam.
Read more!
U.S. to provide assistance to reform Cambodia public financial system
PHNOM PENH, The United States government announced Monday its intention to provide technical assistance to the Royal Government of Cambodia to support the country's public management reform program and efforts to improve fiscal controls and promote greater transparency in financial transactions.
The announcement was made after a meeting between Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Economy and Finance Keat Chhon and U.S. Ambassador Carol A. Rodley, and Michael Ruffner from the Treasury Department's Office of Technical Assistance (OTA).
"The assistance is designed to help Cambodia strengthen the enforcement of laws and controls as they relate to budgeting and financial accountability, banking and financial services, the insurance and financial industries, and tax administration and collection," it said in the statement.
It added that the financial management and accountability assistance programs were expected to begin within the next few months.
Read more!
German troops honored for bravery, 1st since WWII
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, center, and Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung, right, present Bundeswehr Master Sgt. Alexander Dietzen, left, with the Cross of Honor for Bravery in Berlin, Germany, Monday, July 6, 2009. Chancellor Angela Merkel was presenting four German soldiers with the new decoration for bravery on Monday, the nation's first such honor since World War II.
By PATRICK McGROARTY, Associated Press Writer Patrick Mcgroarty
BERLIN – Chancellor Angela Merkel presented medals for bravery on Monday, marking the first time since World War II that the nation has bestowed such an honor, long tainted by the Nazi military effort.
Merkel honored four soldiers who rushed to aid injured soldiers and civilians after a suicide bombing in Afghanistan, saying that the Cross of Honor for Bravery is an "important innovation" in Germany's military tradition and that they were deserving of the award.
It is another sign of Germany's emergence from its post-WWII diplomatic and military shell since the country's reunification in 1990, as it has taken on more responsibility in conflicts around the world.
"An army in deployment needs such an honor," Merkel said in the ceremony at the chancellory. "Our soldiers need to receive more recognition for their service."
The soldiers — Staff Sgt. Markus Geist, 28, and Master Sgts. Jan Berges, 29, Alexander Dietzen, 33, and Henry Lukacz 28 — were half a kilometer (mile) from a German ambulance struck by a suicide bomber on Oct. 20, 2008 in Afghanistan's northern Kunduz province. The blast killed two German soldiers and five Afghan children. Two other soldiers and a child were injured.
Merkel said the soldiers raced to the scene of the explosion, risking their lives to save the injured as the vehicle burned and the munitions it was carrying exploded.
After her brief remarks, Merkel pinned the medal on each soldiers chest. It features a golden Maltese cross with a German eagle in the center, on a ribbon in the colors of the German flag — black, red and gold — and decorated with double oak leaves.
The military has had no medal for bravery since it stopped awarding the Iron Cross, which was first issued in 1813 but bestowed so frequently under the Nazis that it become inexorably associated with Hitler's regime.
Since reunification, Germany has taken cautious steps toward becoming more engaged militarily.
In 1992, Former Chancellor Helmut Kohl broke a taboo against sending troops abroad by deploying military medics to support the U.N. mission in Cambodia.
Today, the country has some 7,200 troops outside of Germany, including 3,830 in Afghanistan as part of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force and more than 2,000 in Kosovo. Smaller contingents are deployed in Bosnia, in naval patrols off Lebanon and the Horn of Africa, and elsewhere.
Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung introduced the cross last year, saying the German military's role in the world was expanding and soldiers in the line of fire in global hot spots deserved recognition for their sacrifice.
"Through their service, they are an example of justice and freedom for their comrades," Jung said of the soldiers honored Monday at the ceremony.
Ulrich Kirsch, leader of a union representing German soldiers, told television broadcaster ARD that the medal is a fitting recognition of the military's increasing role.
"The soldiers are so close to death and injury — that's not the situation in other jobs," Kirsch said. "We consider this honor absolutely appropriate," he added.
The new order is an extension of the Bundeswehr's current range of four decorations, which are given for "loyal services and in appreciation of exemplary soldierly acquittal of duty."
Read more!
McNamara's Retreat
By Max Frankel
IN RETROSPECT The Tragedy and Lessons of Vietnam. By Robert S. McNamara with Brian VanDeMark. Illustrated. 414 pp. New York: Times Books/Random House. $27.50.
IN his 79th year, Robert S. McNamara at long last offers the public a glimpse of his aching conscience. The most willful Vietnam warrior in the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations, he was also the first at the top to admit defeat, in private. He then stood silent on the war for a quarter-century and drowned his sorrow in good works at the World Bank. Mr. McNamara personified the slow maturing of America's foreign policy from cocky interventionism to cost-conscious realism, yet for a generation he refused to explain his conversion, explore his mistakes, judge his colleagues or instruct posterity. The pain, or the guilt, was simply too great. As he states in the preface to "In Retrospect": "This is the book I planned never to write."
Until now, he contends, the story of how "the best and the brightest" got it wrong in Vietnam has not been told. But David Halberstam, who applied that ironic phrase to his rendering of the tale 23 years ago, told it better in many ways than Mr. McNamara does now. So, too, did the Pentagon Papers, that huge trove of documents assembled at Mr. McNamara's behest when he first recognized a debt to history. The contemporary analyses in the papers, which were leaked to The Times in 1971, stand up so well that they now serve their patron as a major source.
What Mr. McNamara adds to the public record are some White House documents and tape transcripts revealing, most notably, his own agonized attempts in 1967 to persuade President Lyndon B. Johnson to stop sending more men to the slaughter: the Secretary of Defense who had come to tame the Pentagon with managerial wizardry ended up desperately begging for a fig leaf for withdrawal, in the form of a coalition that would inevitably give the Vietcong dominance in Saigon. Mr. McNamara says he does not know to this day whether he thus quit or was fired. "Maybe it was both."
But he left with a whimper, not a bang. So why speak out now? The main reason, he says, is that he has "grown sick at heart witnessing the cynicism and even contempt" with which so many Americans view their institutions and leaders. He knows how much Vietnam contributed to that disaffection; he would never deny the war's terrible damage. But he hopes to prove that the mistakes were "mostly honest," even if traceable to a ghastly ignorance of the Vietnamese people, culture and terrain, and the historical forces of that time.
Why should the rest of us relive his agony? Mr. McNamara, characteristically statistical, points to "11 major causes for our disaster in Vietnam" in a chapter called "The Lessons of Vietnam." But implicitly his book screams another lesson: Though cynicism and contempt for power are destructive of government, a respectful skepticism is essential, and rarely wrong.
BY delaying his war memoir so long, Mr. McNamara has greatly compounded the difficulty of his mission. Now that the Soviet Union lies in ruins and American corporations beg for business in China and Vietnam, no one under the age of 50 can be expected to fathom the fears and phobias of the 1960's to which he rightly ascribes the Indochina disaster. President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the most venerated American of the time, had taught -- and the Kennedy and Johnson teams never dared to doubt in time -- that if South Vietnam was "lost" to Communism, Laos, Cambodia, Thailand and Malaysia would fall like dominoes, imperiling India, Burma, Indonesia and the Philippines, if not also Japan, and emboldening the Russians and Chinese to extend Communist conquests by military force or subversion in ways that would sooner or later provoke a nuclear World War III, the very destruction of civilization.
Yes, that is how America's leaders spoke to each other and, all too persuasively, to the public. Mr. McNamara's book reminds us that they even repeated the litany in memos to their Presidents, to inoculate them against any temptation to retreat from Vietnam. And if all those dominoes were not cause enough, there were promises to be kept in order to preserve the value of America's other diplomatic threats and commitments.
Mr. McNamara and his generation came to power convinced that the "appeasement" of Nazi Germany -- the failure to block its early grasp for Europe's dominoes -- had led inevitably to a catastrophic World War II. Averting another such disaster, they were sure, required punishing anything resembling Communist aggression in its earliest stages, when the cost would be tolerable. That was their creed as they rebuilt Western Europe and stood toe to toe with the Soviet armies across Germany, fought to a bloody stalemate against China in Korea, threatened war over Berlin and risked war to force Soviet missiles out of Cuba. Thus "contained," the Soviets and Chinese took to endorsing "wars of liberation," thereby qualifying even distant uprisings as threats to American security. Mr. McNamara's first assignment from President John F. Kennedy was to augment America's nuclear power, whose use was unimaginable, with the forces and weapons they were sure would be needed to fight "conventional" wars.
From this bed of doctrine grew what Mr. McNamara considers his team's most fateful error: mistaking Ho Chi Minh's nationalist drive to unite Vietnam as the challenge of a monolithic Communist world. That misjudgment foreclosed any discussion of how an American withdrawal from Indochina could be made strategically tolerable. It even prevented analysis, before the plunge, of how high a price the commitment was worth. Mr. McNamara's dry rendering of those fateful tenets of containment fails to convey the passion with which they were embraced. And he mostly ignores their powerful resonance in domestic politics.
Kennedy, no less than Johnson, subscribed to these simplistic doctrines and the misjudgments they inspired, even though Mr. McNamara, without persuasive evidence, deems it "highly probable" that Kennedy would have pulled back from massive intervention in a second term. This presumes that had Kennedy lived, the same cast of senior officials would have avoided what Mr. McNamara describes as a second tier of error: the failure to live by the mantra that the battle in Vietnam was political, a fight for the "hearts and minds" of an abused peasantry, and that Americans could assist but never supplant the South Vietnamese.
In this pew, Mr. McNamara himself was a prominent sinner. His can-do spirit found no mission impossible, even as Saigon's governments and armies crumbled. His domineering intellect and predilection for systems analysis made him a pathetic victim of erroneous and deceptive military audits of bodies counted, weapons captured, sorties flown, supply lines ruptured. Soon enough, as the press decided, it became "McNamara's war," and certainly America's.
Mr. McNamara deplores the absence of political advice from old Asia hands who had been driven from Government service in the McCarthy purges. But as he proves again in this memoir, he did not easily integrate political wisdom and intuition into his analyses. Even in retrospect, he does not associate the drift into war in Vietnam with the Republican taunts that Democrats had "lost" China to Communism. (Kennedy was afraid to recognize not only China but even Outer Mongolia!) Mr. McNamara cannot bring himself to believe that the election calendar affected Johnson's willingness to escalate the war in 1965 but not in 1964 or, as Johnson eventually confessed to Doris Kearns, that he stayed the course in Asia because he feared losing effectiveness at home -- like Truman after the "loss" of China -- as much as he feared the repercussions of defeat abroad.
Finally, Mr. McNamara recounts a third tier of error -- an escalating pattern of military misjudgment. He is hard on the Joint Chiefs of Staff for their misplaced optimism in the early years, their always excessive faith in high-tech weapons and their later expectations that massive bombing and frontal battles could wear down the Vietnamese enemy. He is remiss in not fully rebutting the postwar claims that timid civilians had tied the military's hands with unreasonable limits on troop commitments and bombing targets. Mr. McNamara emphasizes how little was accomplished by bombings heavier even than those in World War II. And he explains Johnson's caution in target selection by recalling the fear that a more rapid escalation could provoke Chinese intervention. But Americans who cannot accept David's triumph over Goliath draw more belligerent "lessons" from this history, which Mr. McNamara should have engaged more directly.
Even more disappointing is Mr. McNamara's unwillingness to explore the human tragedies and political legacies of this longest American war. What was it like to send tens of thousands to their deaths in an increasingly dubious cause? How did the strain affect the men in charge? We get a glimpse of Jacqueline Kennedy beating him on the chest in protest against the war, and of angry insults hurled on the ski slopes, but no real introspection. Mr. McNamara says the war tore deeply at his own family, but quickly adds: "I am not comfortable speaking in such terms."
What then of the political legacy? How, without growing cynical, can citizens protect themselves against the stubborn ignorance and misplaced zeal of their leaders? In the darkest days, Mr. McNamara remembers, he watched the demonstrators from his Pentagon window and insisted that his subordinates show respect for the freedoms of speech and assembly. But he took refuge -- and takes it even now -- in opinion polls that recorded support from the majority of Americans who, as he well knew, had been misinformed and denied vital information at every major turn.
"Looking back," he writes, "I clearly erred by not forcing . . . a knock-down, drag-out debate over the loose assumptions, unasked questions and thin analyses underlying our military strategy in Vietnam. I had spent 20 years as a manager identifying problems and forcing organizations -- often against their will -- to think deeply and realistically about alternative courses of action and their consequences. I doubt I will ever fully understand why I did not do so here."
YET even now Mr. McNamara means he should have stirred debate only inside the small circle of Presidential counselors led by himself, Secretary of State Dean Rusk and McGeorge Bundy, the national security adviser (later succeeded by Walt Rostow). Mr. McNamara blames Johnson for going to war furtively, with no regard for the rights of Congress and the public, but he rejects any obligation to resign in protest or, once out of office, to share his policy disagreements with the country. Cabinet officers, he contends, should have a constituency of one: the President -- from whom they derive all authority and through whom alone they can be held accountable.
That is surely the right ethic for normal times. Unelected officials should not steal their President's mandate to pursue an independent course. But a thousand dead Americans a month create their own constituency. Even military discipline admits a higher duty than hierarchical loyalty when power is badly used and puts lives at risk.
Mr. McNamara relieved his private turmoil by reading poetry, and shared his misgivings with Robert F. Kennedy and a few other intimates. But he refused to abandon or attack the President whom he had helped to guide into quicksand. He and Johnson "loved and respected" each other, in a bond that even now, in retrospect, keeps the public at a distance looking on, with skepticism, I hope.
Read more!
Sunday, July 05, 2009
Local Rotary gets $300K grant for Cambodia project
By Christopher Curry
Staff writer
Since 2005, the Rotary Club of Gainesville and locally run nonprofit organization Sustainable Cambodia have worked together to improve the quality of life in impoverished villages of rural central Cambodia's Pursat province.
They have established a school for children, funded the construction of wells for clean drinking water supplies and crop irrigation and helped bolster the area's sustainable food supply with gardens and the donation of livestock to village families.
But their past ventures together have never had the one-time infusion of funds the groups just received - a $300,000 grant from Rotary International.
Richard Allen, the president and co-founder of Sustainable Cambodia and a member of the Rotary Club of Gainesville, said the majority of the money will go toward additional water wells in the dry region, where drought lasts some five months a year.
Drinking supplies, crops and the survival of livestock all depend on those wells, Allen said.
"Water, over there, is the linchpin of everything that takes place," Allen said.
To date, Sustainable Cambodia has funded more than 100 water wells in the Pursat province.
The grant money will fund 80 additional wells and 8,000 water filters to supply clean water to the region.
It will also fund construction of 800 new latrines, 20 community ponds for farming fish, raised gardens able to withstand floods, and road repairs in the Pursat's Kravanh district, according to a press release from the Rotary Club of Gainesville.
In addition to the infrastructure projects in Cambodia, the Gainesville groups have helped establish a partner organization in Cambodia - the Rotary Club of Pursat.
Elena Casson, chair of the Rotary Club of Gainesville's Cambodia committee, said that, working with the club in Cambodia, planning has already started on the projects the grant will fund so construction work will be able to begin by the end of the year.
The Rotary Club of Gainesville was one of 15 worldwide recipients of the rotary International grant. The local group had to pledge $30,000 in matching funds.
Read more!
Author Attacks Price Cutting Retailers
Here is anothner news about criminal activities in Thailand about Human Right abuse and killing their foreign workers, especially those who came from Cambodia and Vietnam, most cases washed to shores from fishing boats.
By P.J. Gladnick
Your humble correspondent always checks out NeverPayRetailAgain very carefully every morning. That site often provides information about sales bargains that sometimes defy belief. In fact, yesterday at Publix I was able to purchase 2 packages of Ball Park Franks plus a large seedless watermelon for a total cost of just $4.98. $3.99 BOGO (Buy One Get One free) on the hot dogs minus a $1.00 Ball Park coupon so my cost was just $2.99. The watermelon was $4.99 but there was a $3.00 discount coupon if you bought two packages of Ball Park Franks so the watermelon only cost me $1.99. Total cost of everything was $4.98 rather than the regular full price of $12.97. A savings of over 60%.
However, according to Ellen Ruppel Shell, I was guilty of not only bargain shopping but also aiding and abetting in despoiling the environment and taking advantage of cheap labor. Here is Ruppel Shell's assertion in her book, Cheap: The High Cost of Discount Culture, as covered in the New York Times:
Ms. Ruppel Shell argues that our national obsession with bargains has lowered our standard of living and hurt the environment and the quality of American products.
Are you looking for bargains? Shame on you! You have incurred the wrath of one Ms. Rupple Shell. Of course, discount retailer Wal-Mart comes in for its share of slams from the outraged author:
“Cheap” has plenty of targets, and many are usual ones. Ms. Ruppel Shell lambastes Wal-Mart, saying it underpays its workers and enables other retailers to do the same. She criticizes China as tolerating sweatshops with dangerous working conditions. And if you have a weak stomach, you may not get past the chapter entitled “Cheap Eats.” The author goes into wrenching detail about the foul and environmentally noxious conditions at some of the world’s largest factory farms, suppliers to the fast-food industry.
You like eating shrimp at low prices? Ms. Ruppel Shell is not happy with you either and even blames you for the devestation caused by the 2004 South Asia tsunami:
She castigates Red Lobster, saying it patronizes Thailand’s shrimp farms. The Thai shrimp industry has been accused of environmental, child labor and human rights abuses; it attracts migrant workers from Vietnam and Cambodia who labor for next to nothing, Ms. Ruppel Smith writes.
She also writes that Thai shrimp farmers have clear-cut the country’s coastal mangrove forests — a protective wall between land and sea — to make way for more breeding grounds. She cites a United Nations report that says their disappearance exacerbated the effects of the Southern Asian tsunami in 2004 that killed more than 5,300 people in Thailand alone. In other words, many have paid a terrible price so Americans can feast on cheap crustaceans.
Yes, Ms. Ruppel Shell really dislikes those retailers who provide us with steep discounts but, ultimately, she blames YOU for taking advantage of those bargains:
But most of all, Ms. Ruppel Shell indicts all of us for supporting these discounters — particularly those of us who consider ourselves politically and socially aware.
“We rail against exploitation of low-paid workers in Asia” but still drive long distances to save a little money on tube socks, she writes. “We fume over the mistreatment of animals by agribusiness but freak out at an uptick in food prices. We lecture our kids on social responsibility and then buy them toys assembled by destitute child workers on some far-flung foreign shore.”
One of the inadvertently funniest observations made by Ms. Ruppel Shell is her assertion that the shopping cart has "fooled" consumers into buying too much. I kid you not:
...She infers that Sylvan Goldman, owner of the Humpty Dumpty supermarket company, introduced the shopping cart in 1937 to fool his consumers into buying more goods. But how many of us can stand in the checkout line with a week’s worth of groceries in our arms? Mr. Goldman deserves gratitude, not scorn, for his consumer-friendly innovation.
Yeah, something we would really look forward to in the bizzaro Ruppel Shell world; lugging around heavy bags of groceries in the supermarket. Oh, and in her alternate universe, she actually thinks consumers could revolt in favor of being charged higher prices:
In the end, she calls for a consumer revolution. She says that we must spend in a way that is consistent with our principles.
And now I see that NeverPayRetailAgain has listed a "Daily Steal" bargain for FREE insect repellent picnic tablecloths. Should I risk the wrath of Ms. Ruppel Shell for taking advantage of this?
UPDATE: Amazon now has her $25.95 book on (gasp!) sale at $17.13. A savings of $8.82. So how many more trees will be killed due to the extra books sold due to this price cut? Where is the OUTRAGE at your own price cutting book sale, Ms. Ruppel Shell? Read more!
Japanese language proficiency test to be held in Myanmar
YANGON, July 5 (Xinhua) -- A Japanese language proficiency test for Myanmar citizens will be held in the former capital of Yangon in late this year to boost language communication between peoples of Myanmar and Japan, according to Myanmar Association of Japan Alumni (MAJA) Sunday.
Sponsored by the Japanese Embassy and the MAJA, the 11th Japanese language proficiency test will take place on December 6 at the Japanese Embassy here, the sources said, adding that the test will cover four levels.
Meanwhile, the 10th Japanese speech contest was held in Myanmar under the title of "Together Toward the Future, Mekong and Japan" in last May and four winners were produced out of 15 contestants.
Myanmar and Japan have been cooperating closely in the culture sector. Some Japanese film festivals were held over the last few months in Myanmar, while a special piano and flute concert by famous Japanese artists Hiroshi Matsushima and Yoshimi Matsushima is to take place in Myanmar's Yangon and Mandalay in August this year under the Japan-Mekong exchange year program.
The program has introduced music concert, film festival, get-together party, and Japanese speech contest every month since January this year.
Other programs to be added include Karatedo contest, Ekabana flower decoration show, Japanese fashion show, Japanese singing contest, Judo contest and film festivals respectively.
In March this year, a music concert by a 20-member Myanmar Gitamate Music Band, involving Myanmar and Japanese artists, had taken place in Yangon under the program to showcase the cooperation and friendship between Japan and Myanmar.
The Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS)-Economic Cooperation has worked out a plan for development of tourism as part of its economic cooperation in the subregion, designating the year 2009-2010 as GMS tourism year.
The Mekong River is shared by six countries -- China, Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam.
Read more!
Saturday, July 04, 2009
Migrant fishermen fall through cracks in Thai trafficking laws
By Joel Brinkley
Don't ever accept an invitation to go fishing in Thailand. You might not come back.
Almost daily, bodies are washing ashore along the coasts of Thailand, Malaysia, Burma, Cambodia. These are unfortunate migrants, most of them from here in Cambodia. These people were sold to Thai fishermen who took them out to sea, worked them until they starved to death and then threw them overboard. It happens all the time.
The problem got so bad that the United States Senate's Foreign Relations Committee and the United Nations both but put out reports in recent weeks excoriating Thai and Malaysian authorities for selling Cambodian and Burmese migrants to Thai boat captains, sending them to a near-certain death. "If they are unable to pay for their release," the Senate report said, "the refugees are sold into forced labor, most commonly on fishing boats."
Once on the boat, "they don't come back," said Maj. Gen Visut Vanichbut of the Thai police. "All they get to eat is the fish that get left over in the net. They aren't paid. If they get sick, they're thrown overboard."
When they die, from overwork or starvation, their bodies are thrown to the sharks. In most cases, no one knew the victim was on the boat, and so no one claims the body if it washes ashore.
The general told me about this last year. But the United Nations report shows that the hideous problem continues at full force even now. It quotes several Cambodians who watched fishermen decapitate captives or throw them overboard. Several governments, not just Thailand's, are at fault. And by all accounts, the economic crisis is exacerbating the problem.
Until just now, the Cambodian law governing trafficking did not even recognize men as potential victims. The laws were written to protect women and children drawn into sexual slavery. But in June, the government in Phnom Penh announced that it was revising the statute.
"Today we change our strategy also to focus on men," Kong Chhan, a deputy director in the Ministry of Social Affairs, told the Phnom Penh Post.
Now we can only wait for Thailand to change its strategy.
Most of the news you hear from Thailand these days involves the riots and demonstrations to overturn whatever government happens to be in power. No one talks about the fishing-boat problem. The fishermen pay off the police. The police then cover up the crimes, and so hundreds of victims continue to die month after month.
If a victim manages to survive, then Thailand is well-equipped to care for him and then use international agencies to help send him home. The Thai government has shelters and administrators whose jobs are to help human-trafficking victims. I have seen them. The shelters are quite nice. And that serves as a stark illustration of a noxious paradox that afflicts human-trafficking enforcement in Thailand, Cambodia and much of the world.
When human trafficking first came into focus for law-enforcement a decade ago, legal and political officials everywhere put primary emphasis on protecting the victims - the people who were lured into slavery and abused. Stories a decade ago of police and immigration agents jailing and then deporting the trafficking victims along with their captors horrified human-rights advocates, and their complaints were quite influential when the first human-trafficking laws were drafted.
No pressure
That victim-oriented approach has held firm all these years, and "it has proved to work perfectly for the Thai," said Lance Bonneau head of the International Organization of Migration office in Bangkok, his tone oozing disgust. His organization works with the Thai government to send trafficking victims back home to Cambodia, Burma - just as other IOM officers do all over the world.
"If you 'have' the victim," Bonneau told me, "there's no pressure to go after the traffickers" who are paying off the police. "It doesn't upset any of the arrangements the police have" with the fishing boat captains, the brothel and dance-club owners or others who enslave hapless victims. The traffickers can pursue their unconscionable work; the police can continue taking their kickbacks.
When the State Department researches its annual Trafficking in Persons report each year and asks Thailand what it is doing to fight trafficking, the Thai can point to their anti-trafficking laws and to those lovely shelters for victims. Usually, that's enough to save Thailand from a poor rating.
Thailand officials responded to the Senate and United Nations allegations with angry denials. Maybe in Washington's next report, it will look a little deeper at Thailand.
Read more!
Vietnam Plans To Build Border Economic Zone With Cambodia
HANOI, July 4 (Bernama) -- Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung has approved a master plan to build the region along the border with Cambodia into a major economic zone, according to the Vietnam news agency's report.
Under the ambitious scheme, the southwestern border areas, comprised of four provinces in the Central Highlands and six provinces in the southern region, will be developed into an economic zone of national and international importance by 2020.
The border economic zone including Gia Lai, Kon Tum, Dac Lak, Dak Nong, Binh Phuoc, Tay Ninh, Long An, Dong Thap, An Giang and Kien Giang provinces, will act as an entry point for trade, services and cargo transportation between the Greater Mekong's Sub region and the East Sea.
The area, which totals 73,369sq.km, is home to 12,650,000 people and expected to become a national economicdriving force in terms of agriculture, forestry, hydropower and transportation, according to the plan announced by the Government website.
By 2030, the areas along the Cambodia border will become a major economic zone of national and international importance, which can have a special influence to the Central Highlands and the central and southern regions of Vietnam, as well as to other economies in the Gulf of Thailand.
The area is expected to become the nation's biggest natural reserve of biological diversity and ethnic cultures, and one of the major tourist attractions in the ASEAN region, the news agency said.
The cities of Buon Ma Thuot and Pleiku in the Central Highlands, Long Xuyen in the Mekong Delta and Trang Bang Town in Tay Ninh will be developed into the development cores of the region.
Priorities will be given to developing urban centres and economic zones along the border with Cambodia. Phu Quoc Island will become a special administrative and economic zone under the plan, which has a vision through 2030.
Read more!
Border dispute not lead to war with Cambodia: Thai defense minister
BANGKOK, July 4 (Xinhua) -- Thai Defense Minister Prawit Wongsuwan said on Saturday that he was confident that the border dispute with Cambodia will not lead to war between the two countries as some fear.
Thailand's Army Region 2 commander will hold talks with Cambodia's army region 4 commander to ease tension along the border and to reduce military forces of the two countries deployed near Preah Vihear temple, Prawit was quoted by the website of the Bangkok Post as saying.
The area around Preah Vihear Temple, which was inscribed as a World Heritage Site on July 7 last year, has been the scene of a tense standoff between the Cambodian and Thai armed forces. The Cambodian government insisted that Thai troops have deployed on Cambodian soil, while Thailand said its troops are only in the disputed zone.
Early Saturday, Thai Deputy Prime Minister for security affairs Suthep Thaugsuban flew to Cambodia to attend the opening ceremony of No 67 highway, due to be presided by Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen.
This is the second visit to Cambodia by Suthep in two weeks.
Suthep said that Thailand has no policy to cut number of troop deployed along Thai-Cambodia border for the time being.
However, he expressed confidence that the situation along the border will not escalate to violent confrontation between the two countries.
In mid-June, Thai Prime Minister Abhisit said the government would ask UNESCO to review last year's decision to register Preah Vihear as a World Heritage Site when he meets the organization this week in Spain.
On Cambodian side, Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said his country was ready for any situation which might follow the reinforcement of troops on the Thai side of the border.
Tensions have escalated at the Thai-Cambodian border, with Thailand's Second Army Area commander Lt General Wiboonsak Neeparn recently rotated troops at Preah Vihear so that they are fresh and ready for a possible attack from Cambodia.
Cambodia has already boosted its presence in the border area.
Read more!
Friday, July 03, 2009
Tensions Reportedly Rise at Preah Vihear Border
By Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer
Military sources said Thursday Thai troops have reinforced their positions along the contested border near Preah Vihear temple, adding tensions to a military standoff that has resulted in several skirmishes over the past year.
“A clash could have happened this afternoon, at 3 pm, but finally tensions were abated,” one officer stationed in Preah Vihear province said Thursday.
On Wednesday night, Thai soldiers arrived in five trucks at the entry of Preah Vihear temple, which is at the center of the disputes that were sparked when the temple was added to a Unesco World Heritage list in July last year.
Cambodian soldiers barred about 10 Thai soldiers from entering an encampment near Keo Sekha Kirisvarak pagoda, which has been occupied by Thai soldiers since July 15, 2008, the officer said, requesting anonymity.
“They came with their truck lights switched off,” he said.
Other military sources said Thai soldiers had reinforced positions near Ta Thao gate, at the entry of the 11th-Century temple, near two areas where fighting occurred in 2008, namely Sambok Khmom and Veal Intry, or Eagle Field.
Gen. Pol Saroun, commander of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, downplayed the rising tensions between the military.
Lt. Gen. Chhom Socheat, undersecretary of state for the Ministry of Defense, said the situation on the border was “normal” on both sides.
In meetings between regional military commanders Wednesday, the Cambodian side urged the Thais to withdraw troops from nearby the pagoda, Sambok Khmom and other areas around the temple, Chhom Socheat said.
Thai commanders said they would take the request under consideration, he added.
Read more!
Opposition Seeks Visit of Jailed Journalist
By Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
Opposition lawmakers on Thursday made a request to Phnom Penh court to visit a jailed opposition journalist who arrested following a verdict last week he had printed false information about a senior official.
Hang Chakra, chief of the Khmer Mchas Srok newspaper, was sentenced to 12 months in prison and fined $2,195, after publishing reports in April and May that implicated Council Minister Sok An in corrupt practices.
Sok An, who is responsible for some of the nation’s most important matters, including the Khmer Rouge tribunal and offshore oil exploration, filed suit, alleging the articles could affect political stability, as they were written about government leaders.
Police arrested Hang Chakra immediately after the verdict was announced, June 26.
“We want to visit him and ask him about some affairs about the arrest,” Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Yim Sovann told VOA Khmer Thursday.
Chhoung Chu Ngy, Hang Chakra’s lawyer, said he had requested release on the grounds that his detention was unjust. He also said he plans to appeal the verdict.
Chiv Keng, chief of Phnom Penh Municipal Court, and judge Din Sivuthy, who handled the case, could not be reached for comment, but a court official who asked not to be named said the court was considering the visitation request.
Read more!
Thailand, Cambodia start military reduction at border
BANGKOK, July 3 — Thailand and Cambodia are starting to reduce the number of military personnel deployed along the shared border on Friday to ease tension between the two neighboring countries, according to Thai Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban.
Mr. Suthep asked the villagers not to panic about the border situation and affirmed he is quite confident in Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen's affirmation to do everything possible to ease border tensions.
The Thai deputy prime minister visited Cambodia last Saturday and met with Cambodian prime minister Hun Sen, who asked him to convey the message to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and the Thai people that Cambodia would try to ease tensions along the border to create a good atmosphere to foster bilateral economic cooperation and good relations.
Mr. Suthep said starting Friday, Thailand and Cambodia would begin to readjust their forces near the ancient Preah Vihear temple to avoid confrontation.
The Thai deputy prime minister said he would visit Cambodia again on Saturday, and expects to meet Mr. Hun Sen for further talks.
"Both governments are responsible to run their countries,” Mr. Suthep said, “so we should trust in each country's affirmation, or what they say, as we are sincere with each other. We have a strong determination to make the people of both nations have good understanding with each other.” (PNA/TNA)
Read more!
Cambodia says it gave UN a plan for Preah Vihear in April
By Supalak Ganjanakhundee
The Nation
Cambodian authorities have dismissed a claim by Thailand's Natural Resources and Environment Minister Suwit Khunkitti in the dispute over the drawing up of a plan to "safeguard and develop" the Preah Vihear Temple. Cambodia says Phnom Penh submitted the plan in April.
Suwit said earlier, after the 33rd session of the World Heritage Committee in Spain, that the committee had delayed its decision to take up the Preah Vihear issue since Cambodia had not yet completed its management plan.
Hang Soth, the general director of Cambodia's Preah Vihear National Authority, said Cambodia had submitted conservation plans to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) on April 4.
"We don't understand why Thai leaders have said Cambodia has until next year to submit the plan," Hang Soth was quoted as saying by the Phnom Penh Post as seen yesterday on its website.
"We have already submitted our projects … Cambodians made the temple. Why can't we conserve it?" he said.
Cambodian Foreign Ministry spokesman Koy Kuong said the Thai statements were meant to cover up their failure at the Unesco meeting in Spain, where they were unable to get their challenge to the Preah Vihear plan on the agenda.
"The Thai leaders' comments are just to hide their failure to review the listing," he said.
The World Heritage Committee meeting in Spain on June 23-30 issued its decision 33COM 7B.74, which has been seen by The Nation and does indeed say that Cambodia submitted its report for the safeguarding and development of the temple in April and the committee reviewed it on April 24.
The committee made a request to the State Party (Cambodia) to submit to the World Heritage Centre by February 1, 2010, a report on the progress made in the implementation of the recommendations by the committee in its decision 32COM 8B.102, for examination by the World Heritage Committee at its 34th session in 2010.
In fact there is no extension of a timetable, as February 2010 was mentioned in the previous decision in the 32nd session in Quebec, in paragraph 16, saying: "further requests the State Party of Cambodia to submit to the World Heritage Centre by February 2010, for submission to the World Heritage Committee at its 34th session in 2010, a full management plan for the inscribed property, including a finalised map".
Read more!
Khmer Rouge henchman denied bail
Judges rejected the former Khmer Rouge head of state's appeal for release from jail before his trial at Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes court.
Khieu Samphan, 77, who is charged with crimes against humanity and war crimes, is one of five top cadres being held by the tribunal over atrocities committed during the regime's 1975-1979 rule.
The former leader appealed in April to be let out of jail but judges ruled his detention was necessary to protect his security and preserve public order.
"There continue to be well founded reasons to believe that the charged person may have committed the crimes with which he has been charged," said the pre-trial chamber ruling.
"The charged person attended at least one meeting where the situation of traitors and their potential execution was discussed," it added.
Up to two million people were executed or died of starvation and overwork as the Khmer Rouge regime emptied Cambodia's cities, exiling the population to vast collective farms in its bid for a communist utopia.
The ongoing first Khmer Rouge trial began in February, when the regime's notorious prison chief, Kaing Guek Eav, better known by the alias Duch, went before the court.
Khieu Samphan was arrested in 2007 but no date has been set for his trial with three other leaders, which is expected to take place next year.
The Khmer Rouge tribunal was convened in 2006 after nearly a decade of fractious talks between the Government and United Nations over how to prosecute the former Khmer Rouge leaders.
Read more!
Thursday, July 02, 2009
Cambodia fails to sell garments to Japan
THE Garment Manufacturers Association of Cambodia (GMAC) announced on Wednesday it has failed to boost local industry by tapping the Japanese clothing market.
Cheath Khemara, GMAC's labour issue officer, told the Post Wednesday that the Kingdom had lost out because producers were unable to compete with neighbouring countries on quality, transportation and pricing.
"We really regret we failed to grab such a big market, but we will keep trying in the hope that we can enter Japan in future," he said.
He said exporting to Japan would add at least US$100 million annually in garment revenues.
The president of GMAC, Van Sou Ieng, led a delegation to Japan in November in a bid to persuade buyers to consider Cambodian garments.
The delegation included manufacturers, government officials and union representatives, and concluded with Japan agreeing to a trial purchase of 10,000 suits and 100,000 pairs of shoes. That deal has not happened.
One of the delegates on that trip, Chea Vuthy from the Council for the Development of Cambodia, told the Post he was not aware of the reasons for failure.
He added that responsibility lay with the Ministry of Commerce.
However, Mean Sophea, who is director of the department of trade preferences at the ministry, was unable to comment on Wednesday as he was in a meeting.
Ath Thun, the president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Unions, an umbrella organisation that has more than 50 garment unions as members, said the failure was a great loss.
Japan is a large market, he said, and its consumers can afford to pay higher prices than people in other markets.
"To my mind loss of confidence by workers in their job security and their low salaries are the main factors which contributed to low quality," Ath Thun said. "But I don't think these are the main reasons for the failure to enter Japan."
Ath Thun said that, more importantly, the government needs to make the bureaucratic process more transparent and improve infrastructure used by the industry.
"Then I am sure we can make a new deal which will allow us to export garment products to Japan," he said.
Cambodia has long wanted to export garments to Japan, the world's third-largest market for such exports after the US and the European Union.
The industry earns revenues of $3 billion annually.
Read more!
leading maker of fish sauce in Cambodia aims for US
Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN, A worker manages the production line at the Kampot Fish Sauce factory in Kampot. The company is hoping to make its first overseas sales to the United States.
THE Kingdom's most popular fish sauce brand has told the Post it is looking to target the US market in a bid to boost sales. Toung Sopheap, the owner of Ngov Heng Kampot Fish Sauce processing factory, which makes Kampot Fish Sauce, said her husband is currently in the United States seeking marketing and distribution partners.
"We need to grow our sales and look at new markets overseas because we have run into some problems with the local market - there are many illegal fish sauce companies making a cheap, low-quality product," she said.
Toung Sopheap said her company is inspected every six months by the Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy, and supplies 60,000 litres of fish sauce, soybean sauce and chilli sauce a month to wholesalers across the country.
"Despite the economic crisis damaging other sectors, we haven't been affected. Production and demand haven't dropped," she said. "I certainly hope we'll export to the US this year, because our sauce is very popular among Cambodian-American visitors to Cambodia."
Meng Saktheara, the director general in charge of the ministry's small and medium enterprise department, said 800 fish and soy sauce manufacturers were operating in Cambodia.
Some - such as Toung Sopheap's factory - are recognised by the ministry as producing a quality product.
The director general of the Institute of Cambodian Standards, Ping Sivlay, said just 30 makers of fish sauce currently hold the Standard Certificate and follow ministry guidelines.
Higher quality required
He said most producers wanting to export would have to adopt better standards in order to meet stringent international food-quality guidelines.
"If the industry wants to improve its quality and meet the standards required to compete with imported and local producers, they should first apply for Cambodia's Standard Certificate," he said.
"That way we can recommend their product and ensure they manufacture according to a proper standard."
The Ngov Heng Kampot Fish Sauce processing factory was established in Kampot in 1995 with a capital investment of US$100,000.
It employs 32 staff, and has 40 storage tanks that refine 2,000 litres of sauce a day.
How rice wine ferments the Cambodian spirit
Rice wine is a popular tipple all over East and Southeast Asia, and, as one soon discovers, it comes in a wide variety of styles and possesses an assortment of medicinal qualities.
Dos Lun fills an order for srah sohl in Takeo (Left) Dos Lun stokes the fire to heat the rice wine.
AN old English proverb says, "Good wine needs no bush", meaning that something of good quality does not need to be advertised. This is especially true of Cambodia's traditional alcoholic beverage srah sohl, or rice wine.
As rice is the primary staple of most Cambodian diets, it comes as no surprise that the cheapest and most popular alcoholic beverage for most Cambodians is a potent brew made from the plentiful grain.
Similar to sake from Japan or cheongju from Korea, rice wine in Cambodia is produced by fermenting grains of rice until the starches in the rice convert into sugars, resulting in a mildly alcoholic liquid. Unlike wine made from grapes, the fermentation period can take as little as 24 hours.
"Once you have the equipment, the process is quite simply really," said Dos Lun of Tang Russey village in Takeo province.
Every second day Dos Lun boils 25 kilos of rice, lays it to dry in the sun, and then transfers it to plastic buckets, where it is mixed with a natural fermenting agent called dom bai in Khmer. The mixture is then left to bubble and ferment overnight. Once the rice has fermented, it is dumped into a large metal vat along with pure rainwater and covered with a purpose-built lid, sealed with a rice husk paste.
Leftover rice husks and scrap wood are used to start a small fire under the vat, heating the rice mixture so that the watery, alcoholic mixture evaporates, travelling up two metal pipes protruding from the lid and down through a concrete container full of water. The water in the container cools the liquid in the pipes, and a small spigot at the bottom of the container releases the clear, pure, mildly grainy-flavoured rice wine.
Three stages
"There are three stages of wine," said Dos Lun. "The first batch is extremely strong, and is not suitable for drinking. The second stage is the best, at about 30-percent alcohol content, and the third stage is very weak. I often mix the first and third batches to create an evenly balanced blend."
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
If you don't drink, how will the rice wine merchant make his living?
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dos Lun sells his natural rice wine from his stilted wooden house in the midst of rice fields and cow paddocks for 2,000 riels a litre, and can sell as many as 20 litres a day. "People like to buy rice wine from me because they know it's natural and not bad for you," he said. "You have to be careful because some producers of rice wine that sell in bulk from stores or roadside stalls put chemicals and pesticides in the wine to make it taste stronger, but really it just makes you sick."
Takeo native Khem Sokkhieng said, "I like to drink rice wine during special festivals or holidays and sometimes when I'm relaxing with friends or family, but some people drink it every day. Farmers who work in the rice fields will often drink one glass of srah sohl in the morning before they go to the fields in order to warm their body, and then again at night to relax."
Srah sohl can also be used as a base for traditional Khmer medicinal remedies, which many claim can cure everything from muscle aches, fatigue and stomach disorders to menstrual cramps and labour pains.
Medicinal
Medicinal rice wine in Cambodia goes by the name srah tinum, and can be produced by infusing pure rice wine with items such as herbs, roots, tree bark, and even insects.
Chen Veasna, owner of Restaurant No 66, a family-run restaurant on Street 360, has been selling srah tinum at the two-level restaurant for fifteen years, and believes wholeheartedly in its healing powers.
"All of the wine we sell here is good for aches and pains in the body," she said. "Some of the varieties are particularly good for women, although anybody can drink any of the varieties. And the greatest advantage of our wine is that it doesn't burn your stomach when you drink it because it contains no harsh mixtures or harmful ingredients."
Varieties of medicinal rice wine at the restaurant include srah gondia, a dark, rum-coloured brew that is made by infusing red termites in rice wine and then straining the bodies out. The resulting drink tastes a bit sweet and earthy, with flavours of almonds and nutmeg. It is said to help with blood circulation and menstrual cramps.
Srah bondul pich is made from the woody stems of a small plant native to Cambodia and possesses a vibrant yellow colour, with an extremely strong, bitter taste that coats the tongue long after it is swallowed. It is said to be most beneficial for elderly people and cure arthritis, rheumatism and body pains.
Srah tinum chen sei is the most common type of medicinal rice wine in Cambodia and is often taken to alleviate stomach disorders and fatigue. The best tasting wine by far at Restaurant No 66 is srah dom narp k'mull, a strongly alcoholic, sweet and slightly spicy blend, made from black sticky rice. The busy restaurant also sells regular srah sohl.
Hangover-free
All rice wine at Restaurant No 66 is sold by the litre and varies in price depending on the variety. "I can't even count the number of people that come here every day to purchase rice wine," said Chen Veasna. "People love it because it is healthy and it won't give you a headache or hangover the next morning, provided, of course, you don't go overboard on it."
Whether imbibed as a social lubricant, for pleasure, or for curative purposes, srah sohl is a long-established element of traditional Khmer culture, and to quote a common Khmer colloquialism, "If you don't drink, how will the rice wine merchant make his living?"
Read more!
Wednesday, July 01, 2009
UNESCO meet raises the stakes on Preah Vihear
Written by Thet Sambath
The favourable outcome for Cambodia in Spain could translate to more confrontation on the border, according to senior military officers.
THE meeting of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee in Seville, Spain, ended Tuesday without discussing Thailand's challenge to the committee's July 2008 decision to list the disputed Preah Vihear temple as a World Heritage site.
But Cambodian military officials at the border say the committee's decision not to review the case could further heighten tensions and prompt another armed clash, following armed confrontations in October 2008 and in April of this year.
Thailand's Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said last month that a joint listing of Preah Vihear temple would better promote peace and tourism around the 11th-century temple complex, according to Thai media.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
More Thai troops, tanks and artillery have been sent to confront our troops.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He pledged that Thailand would use the 33rd session of the World Heritage Committee to challenge the inscription of the temple.
"I would like to see peace in the area and people from both sides benefit from a joint listing of this site," Abhisit was quoted as saying.
But Phay Siphan, spokesman for the Council of Ministers, said that Thailand's inability to get its objections onto the committee's agenda was a "diplomatic failure".
Yim Phim, the commander of Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) Brigade 8 stationed in Preah Vihear province, said that although he welcomed the committee's decision, he worries that Thai soldiers may be angry and start another border clash.
"We are on alert after the Thai failure to get it reviewed," he said. "I am told that more Thai troops, tanks and artillery have been sent to confront our troops."
Raising the stakes
Phorng Eung, a Cambodian soldier, said that Thailand has been evacuating villages near the Preah Vihear border, a sign Thailand could be planning something.
"Thai solders have asked their people to leave villages near the temple, but our villagers at Ko Muoy are doing business as usual," he said.
"Because the Thais did not get their way, they are not happy and might do something at the border. We are on alert 24 hours a day."
But Ros Heng, deputy governor of Chom Ksan district near the Preah Vihear temple, said that villagers in his district are preparing for the possibility of more conflict.
"Some of our people are digging trenches after we informed them in Ko Muoy and Sam Em villages near the front line to protect themselves from Thai shells," Ros Heng said.
"We alerted out people to prevent an accident from happening. It is better to take action first," he said.
The World Court ruled in 1962 that the temple belonged to Cambodia, although the most accessible entrance to temple is in Thailand.
Read more!
Hun Sen warns Thais against air incursions near disputed temple
Written by vong Sokheng and Thet Sambath
PM also says that in the event of war, Thailand will need up to 50,000 troops to subdue 10,000 of the Kingdom's own battle-hardened soldiers.
PRIME Minister Hun Sen sounded a belligerent note during informal talks with Thai Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban and Defence Minister Prawit Wongsuwon on Saturday, warning that if Thailand violates Cambodian airspace along the border Cambodia has the right to shoot down Thai aircraft, the premier said Tuesday.
"I told the Thai deputy prime minister and minister of defence frankly to be careful about not flying across the border into Cambodian territory," Hun Sen told an audience of new graduates at the National Institute of Education in Phnom Penh on Tuesday.
"I am afraid that I won't be able to control the shooting if the ground soldiers lose patience."
Hun Sen said he also told Suthep and Prawit that, if full-blown hostilities break out between the two countries, Bangkok would need to mobilise between 30,000 and 50,000 soldiers to match 10,000 of the battle-hardened troops stationed at the disputed Preah Vihear temple. He said that Cambodia did not want confrontation, but that Thailand must not violate the the country's territorial sovereignty.
"We are waiting to shoot because we are not invading [Thailand]. Cambodia is not showing muscle, but to defend the nation we will play it until the end," Hun Sen said.
Meanwhile, the situation on the border remains tense, with officers of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) saying they are ready to counter any Thai incursions.
"The situation at the front line is increasingly tense since I learned that Thai soldiers are scheduled for military exercises along the Thai-Cambodia border near Koh Kong province to Anses of Preah Vihear Temple on July 3," said Seoun San, an RCAF captain based at Veal Sambokhmum.
"If the rockets launched from the military exercises fall into Cambodian territory, we will open the fight without discussions."
Officials at the Thai embassy could not be reached for comment Tuesday.
Read more!
Photographer Hei Han Khiang, ‘Right Place, Right Time’
By VOA Khmer, Sothearith Im
After Hei Han Khiang survived a forced labor camp for children under the Khmer Rouge, he wanted little more than to live a life of peace. But innate talent and dogged pursuit enabled him to become an accomplished photographer.
Now living in the New York, Hei Han Khiang was born in 1968 to a family of six near Phnom Penh’s Damkor Market. His father was a teacher and noodle shop owner.
The Khmer Rouge pushed the family to Battambang province as the regime enacted Year Zero, and Hei Han Khiang lost an older brother and older sister. After the regime’s overthrow, the family sought refuge in the US, by way of Vietnam, Thailand, Singapore and Indonesia. Finally, in 1981, they arrived in New York.
“When I first came here I had no clue what the city was going to be like,” Hei Han Khiang told VOA Khmer in a phone interview. “I came here with a pair of sandles, and it was cold, but I was so amazed to see the streets, big buildings, and we lived near the bridge here. It was just amazing, George Washington Bridge, how long it is. And there was just so much to buy, so much selling in the stores, so many kinds of food here, different kinds of people. You know, when we first came here, we ate a lot of meat.”
When he first arrived in the United States, he had few ambitions, having survived his ordeal in Cambodia.
“It was still fresh in my memory, war, evacuation, and escaping from one place to another in refugee camps,” Hei Han Khiang said. “We didn’t have much of anything, so we didn’t really see very far. I think maybe it was just culturally shocking to me to see, you know, a new world.”
As time passed, his interests grew: he wanted to be a teacher, or doctor; his parents wanted him to go into business. In the end, he realized his interest was in the arts. He began snapping pictures of his family, who had never had photographs before. His love of the art form grew from there.
He began taking classes at the Cooper Union School, on Saturdays.
Marina Gutierrez, director of Cooper Union’s Saturday Arts Program, said still remembers him.
“Khiang mentioned us as helping open his eyes to art, but he also helped us open our eyes to a larger world,” Gutierrez said. “When he was a student with us, I can’t say he showed much promise in drawing or painting, but he has an incredible spirit, and I think that’s something that you cannot teach somebody. That’s what really makes the artist.”
Hei Han Khiang’s art, temperament and spirit are interchangeable, she said, contributing to a successful career.
“When he was my student I thought that he was a wonderful person,” Gutierrez said. “I didn’t have any idea that he would become a wonderful photographer and artist, because the work he did was OK. It was not notable. As a teacher, you can never imagine a limit on somebody. Only they can define their own limit.”
Hei Han Khiang went to State University of New York, in Buffalo, in 1988. He was sent by the university to study Chinese language, culture, history, political science and paintings in Beijing, from September 1988 through June 1989. Just then, the Tiananmen Square demonstrations broke out.
Hei Han Khiang photographed the unrest, proving his mettle as a photographer.
Dee Wedemeyer, a former employer, recalled Hei Han Khiang as a courageous, dedicated, and talented photographer.
“He makes sacrifices to make this trip abroad to take photographs, and he is a documentarian,” Wedemeyer said. “He documents anything that other people have not found. You know, walking the Ho Chi Minh Trail is not something that everyone has done.”
Thirty of his Tiananmen photographs were displayed at Christonpher Henry Gallery, New York, from May 29 through June 28, to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the crackdown.
The gallery’s owner, Christopher Henry, told VOA Khmer he selected the photographs from thousands of applicants.
Henry said sometimes photojournalists can be too good at taking pictures: their images can look unreal. Hei Han Khiang’s photos were honest and real, and the exhibition was a success.
The images were visually striking and iconic, he said, and, coming from a student, came from a different perspective.
“It really has a much more honest impression,” Henry said. “Any images therefore were much more [like] somebody just happened to be at the right place at the right time, rather than somebody that was sent there to chronicle or document an event.”
Read more!
UN rights expert concerned at restriction of lawyers’ freedom in Cambodia
A United Nations independent human rights expert today voiced concern at attempts to curtail lawyers’ freedom to effectively represent their clients in Cambodia, with criminal charges being leveled recently against attorneys in the South-East Asian nation.
“To be able to represent their clients effectively, lawyers should not be subject to threats or intimidation, nor should they be targeted for prosecution or disciplinary action merely for having acted in the interests of their clients,” said Leandro Despouy, the Special Rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers.
“Lawyers play an important role as defenders of human rights and must be free to represent their clients as they see fit in accordance with professional standards and the rule of law.”
Last week, he said, a lawyer, working for an opposition member of the National Assembly who alleged that she has been defamed by the country’s Prime Minister, was himself charged with criminal defamation and could be expelled from the Cambodian Bar Association.
This January, he added, defense lawyers representing defendants at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) – the UN-backed tribunal trying Khmer Rouge leaders accused of mass killings and other crimes three decades ago – were threatened with legal action by Cambodian judges for having called for corruption allegations at the tribunal to be properly investigated.
Further, Mr. Despouy noted, in June 2007, attorneys representing indigenous communities in Ratanakiri Province, involved in a land dispute with a businesswoman with ties to the Government, were threatened with criminal charges and disciplinary action for having allegedly “incited” communities to file a suit to reclaim their land.
The expert cautioned that these recent moves against lawyers seem to indicate a worrying new trend which could have a chilling effect on the legal profession, expressing his support and encouragement for the Bar Council and its President “in their efforts to strengthen the legal profession in Cambodia and to defend lawyers against attempts to undermine their independence.”
In a press release, Mr. Despouy, who reports to the Geneva-based Human Rights Council in an independent and unpaid capacity, underscored that Cambodia’s obligations under international law, as laid out in the UN Basic Principles on the Role of Lawyers, say that “lawyers should not be identified with their clients or their clients’ causes as a result of discharging their functions.”
Read more!
