Power through photos

LUNENBURG — Powerful photos line G. Ryan Ansin's studio walls — a pensive face peering from behind a hospital wall, a prosthetic leg showing a Cambodian child's visualization of fear side-by-side with sneakers in a star formation, an American child's visual depiction of fun.

The photos were taken by his students from Cambodia and Massachusetts; the students from Cambodia were patients at an amputee rehabilitation center and a sex trafficking rescue center.

The 23-year-old founder of EPHAS (Every Person Has A Story) Productions is on a plane to Rwanda today to start up an educational media arts program at Karambi High School and at a local hospital in Gitwe.

Mr. Ansin and his team will teach between 80 and 100 students the basics of digital photography in advance of the installation of a clean water system that will service more than 250,000 people in the Gitwe area.

The students will document the immediate and long-term health and cultural impacts clean water will bring to Gitwe's residents.

“They now have to walk 11.6 kilometers to a source of relatively clean water, a river, and then back again,” Mr. Ansin said.

After the workshop program is completed, Mr. Ansin and his students will be going on that 11.6 km walk, photographing and talking with people on the way.

Why photography?

Mr. Ansin, an internationally experienced photographer who has made videos for nonprofits, including Veterans International, Epic Arts, Rural Black Women's Rights and others, began making films as a 7-year-old at Fitchburg's Applewild School and then learned about photography at Lawrence Academy.

At 15, he was invited to join a trip to view the rehabilitation centers that the Vietnam Veterans of America Foundations started in Cambodia and Vietnam and found the work to which he has dedicated himself ever since.

He was asked to make a film of the trip, a film that was shown at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

“I took a year and a half off after high school and traveled the U.S., Cambodia and the Cayman Islands doing promotional videos for nonprofits, which were successful in raising money,” Mr. Ansin said.

After graduating from Emerson College, he went back to his roots in photography and started developing an educational media arts program with his past experiences in mind.

“I needed to make changes in the way I was helping. Here are these people being faced with a white male, another guy holding a big mike in their faces, telling them to move this way and asking questions through a translator; I didn't think it was an honest depiction of life in those villages,” he said.

So he decided to teach people to document their own experiences, to empower them to record their feelings with digital photography.

During his three weeks in Rwanda, students will first learn the basics of taking a photograph with a point-and-shoot digital camera.

“Then what I think of as the best part of the workshop, the students will be paired up and then sent out to find another person who has never taken a picture who they will teach. Afterward we go over the pictures together and usually find a few that are very good and they will proudly say ‘my student took that picture.' It helps them to gain confidence,” he said.

During the instruction period, a local artist/assistant is also learning how to run workshops. That assistant oversees the program, downloads pictures and sends them back to Mr. Ansin, who selects photos that best represent the location and puts them online for the public to view.

The pictures will eventually be sold at galleries in the United States for fundraising purposes. All of the proceeds will directly benefit the workshop location programs and the hosting organization.

In the Rwanda program, 75 percent of the funds will benefit the educational program to purchase additional equipment and continue instruction. The remaining 25 percent will be sent to Medical Missions for Children co-founder Andrew Kurban's 1For3 organization for a piping and purification water system for the area.

The Rwandan students can continue to access the program and use the equipment by donating their time to help new students.

Meanwhile, back in the United States, Mr. Ansin will begin to expand his school program with the help of author Loung Ung. Her two books, “First They Killed My Father” and “Lucky Child” are on the curriculum of 250 schools nationwide.

“When she is invited to speak at these and other schools she will be talking about our program. It's important to connect the hosting organizations like Veterans International and 1For3 back here.

“We hear about suicide bombings and atrocities on a daily basis, but it's not the only things that are happening in the developing world. I was lucky to be invited to Cambodia at a young age, and if I can give students here the same eye-opening experience without having to travel, well, it would help the hosting organizations become sustainable, and perhaps bring philanthropy to our kids at a young age,” Mr. Ansin said.

Mr. Ansin is planning a return trip to Cambodia later this year and will begin start-up programs to benefit reconstruction in Haiti, focus on gangs and teen violence in the Dominican Republic, schools/orphanages/soccer in Vietnam and rape in the Congo and Brazil, and a return trip to Rwanda scheduled for 2011.

“It's all about giving people a voice in their community,” Mr. Ansin said. Read more!

Abhisit: No help needed

BANGKOK - THAILAND'S Prime Minister said on Tuesday he would strive to peacefully resolve a bitter border dispute with Cambodia, and outside mediation, as Cambodia has sought, was not needed.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said Cambodia's recent appeal to the United Nations to help negotiate is unnecessary because a 2000 agreement between the countries provides the framework for a solution.

He accused Cambodia of causing the problem by moving people onto 1.8 square miles (4.6 square kilometres) of disputed land around the Preah Vihear temple. Both countries have a heavy troop presence in the area, and have had several small but sometimes deadly clashes in the past few years.

The International Court of Justice in 1962 ruled that the 11th century temple belongs to Phnom Penh.

UNESCO named it a World Heritage site in 2008 after Cambodia applied for the status. The country submitted a management plan for the temple recently to UNESCO's World Heritage Commission, which deferred a decision until next year.

Mr Abhisit is under pressure to move aggressively because Thai right-wing nationalists have protested that Cambodian actions there threaten Thailand's sovereignty. They also want Thailand to revoke the 2000 Memorandum of Understanding as jeopardising Thai territorial claims, which Mr Abhisit denies. -- AP

Read more!

Iran, Cambodia Agree to Boost Mutual Cooperation

TEHRAN (FNA)- Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki announced on Tuesday that Iran and Cambodia plan to further boost their political, economic and diplomatic cooperation.

Speaking at a press conference after his meeting with Cambodian Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Hor Namhong here in Tehran today, Mottaki lauded the close political ties and constructive cooperation between the two countries within the international bodies.

"Mutual support (by Iran and Cambodia) has paved the way for the start of a new era of economic cooperation between the two countries," Mottaki told reporters.

Referring to the agenda of his talks with the Cambodian minister, Mottaki said that he and Namhong had conferred on different issues such as trade, implementation of projects and investment.

"As regards trade, we agreed to bring Tehran-Phnom Penn relations into a new era through holding national fairs in each other's countries, active participation in the two countries' international fairs, and reciprocal meetings between the two counties' chambers of commerce and ministries of commerce," he added.

Mottaki said that he and his Cambodian counterpart had also agreed to work on tourism as a main part of their agenda for the expansion of ties.

The minister further noted that they had also agreed to put on their agenda principal agreements on boosting economic cooperation in areas of tariffs, avoidance on double taxation and joint ventures and investments in both countries.

Read more!

Government Bolsters Policy To Export Labor

Cambodia is hoping to increase the number of workers it sends abroad to absorb the some 300,000 young people entering the job market each year.

In a report made public Tuesday, the government said its labor migration policy will seek to make the export of labor the second-most robust sector, following garment factories.

There are more than 10,000 Cambodians working legally in Thailand, and nearly 20,000 working in Malaysia, Seng Sakada, director general of the Ministry of Labor, told VOA Khmer. South Korea employs nearly 9,000 workers.

“They are employed especially in small and medium factories, in fishery factories and in housework,” he said.

Labor Minister Vorng Soth told reporters Tuesday these numbers were small compared to other countries, which “send millions of their citizens to work abroad.”

The UN estimates that about 300,000 youths enter the work force each year, a number expected to climb to 400,000 in the near future. The construction and garment sectors have not developed quickly enough to employ all the new workers.

Among the countries Cambodia is eying for labor export are Kuwait, Hong Kong and Sinapore, Seng Sakada said.
Read more!

Dengue Outbreak Prompts Government Campaign

Officials from the Ministry of Health met with provincial health authorities on Tuesday to begin a campaign to curb an outbreak of dengue fever.

At least 10 people have died from the disease since June, with another 3,700 infected in what health officials say is a sharp increase from last year.

“We are very concerned about the outbreak of dengue fever over the last few months,” Huy Rekol, deputy director of the Ministry of Health's dengue control department, told the meeting. “So we must have a strong response to this outbreak.”

The outbreak began at the onset of the rainy season, in June, and has spread across provinces of Banteay Meanchey, Kampong Cham, Kampong Chhnang, Kampot, and Kandal, as well as Kep and Phnom Penh.

The virus has become more potent in recent years, Kuy Rekol said.

“We must increase health education in communes and schools, so the people can understand how to prevent dengue fever,” Huy Rekol said.

Dengue is carried by mosquito, so people should kill their larvae by using the chemical known by its brand name Abate in water pots and other still water sources and fill in puddles around their houses, he said.

People should also sleep under mosquito nets at night to prevent the early morning bites of the Aedes mosquito, which carries the dengue virus, he said. The mosquitoes are most active between 5:30 am and 5:30 pm.

Beginning next week, the Ministry of Health will send around 5 tons of Abate to the worst hit provinces so that it can be distributed by local authorities.

People are also encouraged to by “seven-colored” fish from markets to put in water pots, which keep down mosquito larvae. Children should wear long sleeves and pants to prevent mosquito bites that can carry the disease, Huy Rekol said.
Read more!

Thailand Asks Cambodia To Leave Encroachment Area

Prime minister Abhisit Vejjajiva seem to forget that Preah Vihea Temple was built by Khmer King. And thais should leave Sesaket Province and returning everything back to Cambodia.

By Jamaluddin Muhammad

BANGKOK, Aug 10 (Bernama) -- The Thailand-Cambodia border dispute took a new twist on Tuesday, when Thailand told Cambodians who encroached on its territory at the border, to leave.

Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said the government had asked its foreign and defence ministries to discuss ensuring their withdrawal from the occupied territory.

However, Abhisit refused to provide details of the tasks given to the two ministries, as well as the deadline for the withdrawal.

"All the problems arose because Cambodians encroached into our areas. It is our right to protect our sovereignty," he said.

He reiterated the country's stand to use peaceful means in solving the border issue, in line with the United Nations resolution and the Thailand-Cambodia border memorandum of understanding inked in 2000.

It is not clear on the number of Cambodians alleged to have encroached in the area, as well as the size of the occupied territory as alleged by Thailand.

The two countries are at loggerheads over a 4.6 sq km area surrounding the Preah Vihear Temple, with Thailand claiming the disputed area is part of its Si Sa Kets Karntharalak district while Cambodia says it is in its Preah Vihear province.

The 11th century Hindu temple is located in the Cambodian territory as ruled by the International Court of Justice in 1962, and Unesco listed it as a world heritage site in 2008, which led to strained relationship as both countries claimed the disputed area.

Except for the border issue, Abhisit stressed that both countries enjoyed good relationship in other areas, including trade, adding that border trading was not affected by the conflict.

He also said Thailand would explain to the United Nations and Security Council based on four points in countering his Cambodian counterpart Hun Sen's allegation that Thailand threatened to use military force in solving the issue.

The points are that Hun Sen had misquoted him; the two neighbours enjoyed good relationship in other areas; Thailand would adhere to peaceful resolution and, the country respected the International Court of Justice's decision on the ownership of the temple even though it may not agree with it.

The letters to the two world bodies were in response to the letters sent by Hun Sen to the same bodies on Sunday.

Last week, the border issue heated up again when Cambodia submitted the management plan for the temple at the Unesco World Heritage Committee meeting in Brazil.

Thailand had protested as the plan included part of the disputed territory and the meeting postponed its decision on the management plan to next year's meeting in Bahrain.

Thailand Patriot Network led by People's Alliance for Democracy yellow shirts leaders held a protest in this capital last Saturday, demanding the government revoke the 2000 border memorandum of understanding.

The next day, Abhisit led the government team for a three-hour live telecast debate with the group.

It was during the debate that Abhisit stated that Thailand would use diplomacy to solve the border issue and the use of military force as the last resort, in protecting the country's sovereignty.

-- BERNAMA
Read more!

Cambodian PM warns of 'bloodshed' over Thai border

PHNOM PENH — Cambodia's premier warned Monday that a border dispute with Thailand was "very hot" and could result in violence, reiterating his call for international assistance to end the row.

"Cambodia would like to ask for intervention to have an international conference on the issue of the Cambodian-Thai border dispute," Prime Minister Hun Sen said during a ceremony attended by foreign diplomats.

"The issue is very hot. It may cause bloodshed," he added.

He said bilateral efforts to resolve the conflict with Thailand would not work and called on the United Nations, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations and other countries to help resolve the spat.

Tensions between the two nations over the disputed border have flared up following protests in Bangkok by the royalist "Yellow Shirt" movement over the issue.

Thai media quoted Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva as saying over the weekend that he was ready to use both diplomatic and military means to settle the dispute.

Thailand's opposition has accused the government of using the spat to fuel patriotism and boost its domestic political support.

Hun Sen wrote to the United Nations on Sunday accusing Thailand of violating UN rules by threatening to use military force against Cambodia.

Cambodia reserves its "legitimate rights to defend its sovereignty and territorial integrity in case of deliberate acts of aggression," Hun Sen wrote in the letter, which was distributed to the media.

Abhisit said Monday that the letter was based on incorrect information.

"Cambodia wants to give an image of Thailand as an intruder or using force, which is not true," he told reporters.

"We are Thais, whatever the problem we should talk."

Cambodia and Thailand have been locked in a troop standoff at their disputed border since July 2008, when the ancient Preah Vihear temple was granted UNESCO World Heritage status.

Troops from both countries exchanged fire briefly on their border in June, the latest in a series of clashes between the neighbours.

Read more!

Torture Center Marks First Year as ‘Memory of the World’

Tuol Sleng museum, the former Khmer Rouge torture center, marked its first anniversary as a Memory of the World Monday, as officials set a giant stone on the southern side of Building A.

More than 12,000 people were sent to their deaths at Tuol Sleng under Kaing Kek Iev, the Khmer Rouge prison chief who was sentenced to a commuted 19 years by a UN-backed tribunal last month.

Known as S-21 to the Khmer Rouge, the former high school now goes by the official title of the National Museum of Tuol Sleng, following its Unesco Memory of the World listing on July 31, 2009.

The museum holds an archive of 4,186 prisoner confessions, 6,226 prisoner biographies and 6,147 photographs.

“Its significant and outstanding value were a part of the Memory of the World, stemming from its testament to man’s inhumanity to man, women and children, and from the documentation of one of the most extreme examples of crimes against humanity of the 20th Century,” Unesco’s representative to Cambodia, Teruo Jinnal, said during a ceremony Monday morning.

The anniversary comes just two weeks after the sentencing of Kaing Kek Iev, better known as Duch.

Chuch Phoeun, a secretary of stat the the Ministry of Culture, said the archives will be protected but that will require some technical assisance.

Van Nath, who survived the torture center under Duch, said he was satisfied that his former prison was now a Memory of the World.
Read more!

Hun Sen Issues Missives to UN After Thai Border Threats

Letters over the weekend from Prime Minister Hun Sen to key UN officials may be an attempt to prevent Thailand from resorting to violence over the border issue near Preah Vihear temple, a local analyst said Monday.

On Sunday, Hun Sen wrote the heads of the UN Security Council and its General Assembly, claiming Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva had threatened to use military force to resolve the longstanding border issue.

Hun Sen was responding to Thai media reports that quoted Abhisit telling a pro-government rally that Thailand could walk away from a border agreement signed in 2000 and “use both democratic and military means” to settle a standoff.

“I think this is a sign of alarm to the United Nations Security Council to prevent the border dispute not going toward war and bloodshed,” Chheang Vannarith, the president of the Cambodian Institute for Cooperation and Peace, told VOA Khmer Monday.

“Cambodia is a small country” that needs multilateral support, “particularly the UN,” he said. “So these letters are diplomatic politics from Cambodia to put pressure on Thailand to not use illegal military force.”

Cambodia and Thailand remain at odds over a 4.6-kilometer stretch of land west of Preah Vihear temple, which was made a Unesco World Heritage site under Cambodian protection in 2008. Thousands of troops on each side are amassed on the border, where skirmishes since 2008 have left at least eight soldiers dead.

Both sides severed diplomatic ties last year after Cambodia hired ouster Thai premier Thaksin Shinawatra as an economic adviser to Hun Sen.

“I think the letters to the UN are a step toward peaceful resolution with UN intervention,” Cheang Sokha, director of the Working Group for Peace, said Monday. “The letters are a call for the help from the international community on the Cambodia-Thailand border problem and provide information to UN about the possibility of Thailand using military force to invade Cambodia.”

Hun Sen discussed the letters in a public speech on Monday, saying Cambodia would “fight against a warlike Thai invasion inside Cambodia” and “call an urgent [UN] meeting on the Cambodia-Thai border situation” if Thailand were to resort to military violence over the border.

The Bangkok Post reported Monday that Thai Foreign Ministry officials are preparing a response to the UN that claims, “Thailand had never changed its position, of wanting to cooperate with its neighbor and share common interests.”
Read more!

Thailand Will Not Revoke Border MoU With Cambodia

By Jamaluddin Muhammad

Thailand has no intention of revoking the border Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Cambodia inked in 2000 as it is beneficial to Thailand, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva said on Sunday.

He said under the MoU, Cambodia and Thailand need to consult each other if they want to carry out any activities in the disputed 4.6 sq km territory claimed by both countries near the Preah Vihear Temple.

"The MoU will not accept the map for the temple management plan submitted by Cambodia to the Unesco World Heritage Committee because it included part of the disputed territory," he said.

The MoU did not allow Cambodians to occupy the area, he said when leading the four-member government team in a live telecast three-hour debate with four members of the Thailand Patriot Network.

The debate was held after the network's peaceful demonstration in the capital yesterday demanding the Thai government to cancel the MoU as they feared it would cause Thailand to lose the disputed area.

The group claimed that Thailand was at a disadvantage because the MoU was the source of the problem as it gave Cambodians a chance to trespass and settle in the disputed area.

Abhisit said the MoU did not put Thailand at a disadvantage, instead it was beneficial to the country.

The 11th century Hindu temple is located in the Cambodian territory as ruled by the International Court of Justice in 1962 and Unesco listed it as a world heritage site in 2008.

This led to a strained relationship as both countries claimed the disputed area.

The issue heated up again last week when Cambodia submitted the management plan for the temple at the Unesco World Heritage Committee meeting in Brazil.

Thailand protested as the plan included part of the disputed territory and the meeting postponed its decision on the management plan to next year's meeting in Bahrain.

The group yesterday rallied at the Government House where the Prime Minister's Office is located before moving to the Army Region 1 headquarters and later to the Thai-Japanese Stadium.

The group is led by leaders of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) also known as yellow shirts -- the group that seized the Government House in August 2008 and two airports in the city three months later.

Veera Somkwamkid led the group's debate team while the government side included Natural Resource and Environment Minister Suwit Khunkitti. The group distanced itself from the yellow shirts although it was led by yellow shirts' leaders.

Its rival, the United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), known as the red shirts, blamed the government for practicing double-standard for allowing such demonstrations to take place while Bangkok was still under state of Emergency which prohibits the assembly of more than five people.

Red shirts leaders also claimed that government was practicing double standards as the yellow shirts' leaders had yet to be charged for terrorism for the offences they committed two years ago following the seizure of the Government House and two airports.

Most of the red shirts leaders are in detention now facing possible terrorism charges following the unrest in the capital which ended May 19 and left 91 people dead and 1,800 injured.

-- BERNAMA Read more!

Cambodia says Thai demands for joint listing of temple is "out of date"

Cambodian government said Friday that Thailand's demand for joint listing of Preah Vihear Temple is "out of date".

Hor Namhong, deputy prime minister and minister of foreign affairs and international cooperation, told reporters at a news conference on Friday that a demand suggested by Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva on a joint listing of Preah Vihear Temple as World Heritage Site was "out of date" and that was only "Abhisit's dream".

Hor Namhong's remarks were in response to media report that quoted Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva as saying a joint World Heritage listing of Preah Vihear and its adjacent compound - claimed by both Thailand and Cambodia - was the "best and smoothest path to take" to end conflict over Cambodia's controversial management plan for the ancient Khmer temple.

Hor Namhong said Thailand had "no real intention" to end the conflict at which during the past meetings, Thailand still even claimed a simple name of the temple as Preah Viharn, instead of original name as Preah Vihear that was built by Cambodians in 11th century, the name that was officially spelled out in convention 1904 and treaty in 1907 and the name that was called at the international court's ruling in 1962.

However, Hor reiterated that Cambodia hopes to solve the issue peacefully with Thailand through negotiation and dialogue.

The border conflict came just one week after Cambodia's Preah Vihear Temple was registered as World Heritage Site in July 2008.

And over the past days, Cambodia and Thailand have exchanged war of words concerning who won at the recent UNESCO's meeting in Brazil on the conservation and management plan submitted by Cambodian side over the world cultural heritage site.

Cambodia was due to present its progress report on the conservation and management plan of the Preah Vihear Temple to UNESCO's committee for World Heritage, but that was opposed by the Thai side, saying that to be done only after the border issues between the two nations have been finalized.

However, UNESCO accepted the report but suggested it to be examined next year in Bahrain.

Source: Xinhua Read more!

Vietnam, Cambodia share similar growth issues

Vietnam and Cambodia in general, Ho Chi Minh City and Cambodian cities in particular have to face the same difficulties regarding infrastructure, traffic systems, environmental pollution and water resources during the economic development phase.

So said Pham Phuong Thao, chairwoman of Ho Chi Minh City People’s Council on August 6 while meeting with Try Chheang Hout, head of the Cambodian National Assembly’s Commission of Planning, Investment, Agriculture, Rural Development, Environment and Water Resources (Commission 3), who is visiting Ho Chi Minh City from August 6-8.

With the similarities the two sides have shared during the process of national construction and development, Vietnam and Cambodia need to bolster co-operation and the exchange of experiences, she said.

For his part, the Cambodian leader praised Ho Chi Minh City’s rapid development and its potential to be exploited in the future. He said Cambodia wishes to exchange with and learn from Vietnam’s experience in terms of economic development, especially in the agricultural sector and settling environmental issues.

The Cambodian officials are scheduled to have talks with several departments and agencies in Ho Chi Minh City and visit a number of economic models in the city and Binh Duong province. (VNA)
Read more!

Angelina Jolie: 'I miss anonymity'

Actress Angelina Jolie has revealed that she misses anonymity.

The Salt star, who is married to fellow actor Brad Pitt, admitted that she misses walking through New York without being recognised.

According to Virgin Media, she said: "I do miss anonymity. I lived in New York in my early twenties and I used to just walk block after block. I loved it.

"In Cambodia we live very locally and ride elephants and hang out in the streams and be with local people who are our friends."

Speaking of her children, she said: "They have more freedoms when we're not around. They do have an understanding of fame, it bothers them sometimes and it scares them sometimes." Read more!

Lowell immigrant soccer tourney set to crown champ

LOWELL, Mass.—An annual World Cup-style soccer tournament in Lowell created for Massachusetts immigrant groups will crown a champion this weekend.

The 20 team competition is scheduled to continue Saturday at Lowell's Cawley Stadium with knockout stages. The final is slated for Sunday.

The tournament has attracted immigrant players from countries including Somalia, Mexico, Brazil and Cambodia.

Under the rules of the tournament, 17 of a team's 22 players must be from the country of the team, or be children or grandchildren of a person from that country. The winner gets $600 and a replica of the World Cup trophy.

ONE Lowell, an immigrant advocacy group, started the annual competition four years ago as a way to bring the area's diverse immigrant groups together. Read more!

Cambodia, Iran Plan Energy Cooperation Deal

Cambodia's foreign minister is expected in Iran next week seeking investment and technical know-how to help develop his country's offshore oil fields.

A spokesman told VOA Khmer Service that Hor Namhong and other senior officials expect to sign an agreement on petroleum cooperation. They hope the visit will also boost diplomatic relations, trade and tourism.

Oil exploration is under way off Cambodia's coast and production could begin by 2012.

However the visit, scheduled for August 10 and 11, comes at a time when the United States is trying to rally support for international sanctions on Iran's oil and gas industry.

New U.N. sanctions approved in June target Iran's military and its ability to procure equipment for its nuclear program. The U.S. and EU have imposed additional sanctions aimed at deterring investment in Iran's energy sector.

U.S. diplomats have been traveling in Asia this month seeking additional support for the sanctions.

But a senior Cambodian official, Foreign Ministry Undersecretary of State Koy Kuong, told Reuters news agency that Cambodia is a "non-partisan" country and that it is "friends with everyone in the world." Read more!

Thai 'Yellow Shirts' plan Bangkok rally

BANGKOK — Thailand's royalist "Yellow Shirts" said Friday they would rally in Bangkok this weekend to pressure the government over a territorial row with Cambodia, in a show of strength by the movement.

At least 2,000 people are expected to attend the protest on Saturday, organisers said.

But the Yellows agreed to change the venue to a stadium in the city to avoid confrontation with the authorities, who earlier warned they would not be allowed to protest outside Government House as planned.

The compromise came after two hours of talks between Yellow representatives and Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, a spokesman for the movement said.

Under a state of emergency imposed in Bangkok in April during mass anti-government protests, political gatherings of more than five people are currently banned.

The Yellows, formally called the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD), have previously allied themselves with the current Thai political leadership but the spat is the latest sign that relations have soured.

Key PAD figure Sondhi Limthongkul accused Abhisit on Friday of "lying to the entire Thai nation" about the territorial issue.

The PAD has criticised the governing Democrat party of signing up to a deal with Thailand's neighbour in 2000 that the Yellows believe paved the way for recognition of a Cambodian land claim.

The group has demanded that Thailand tear up the memorandum of understanding, eject Cambodian citizens from the disputed 4.6 square kilometre (1.8 square mile) area, and try to regain control of the Preah Vihear temple.

Relations between the neighbouring countries, already strained by Cambodia's refusal to deport fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra, have been further tested by the dispute.

Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong on Friday dismissed a Thai compromise proposal for the temple as "a dream".

The Yellow Shirts, who are backed by the Bangkok-based elite, are a force to be reckoned with in Thailand's colour-coded political landscape.

The group's rallies in 2006 helped trigger the coup that unseated Thaksin, the hero of the mostly poor, working class "Red Shirts", whose mass protests in Bangkok in April and May culminated in deadly clashes with troops.

The Yellows also mounted a siege of Bangkok's two main airports in 2008, which stranded hundreds of thousands of foreign tourists and helped to topple a government allied to Thaksin.

Many Red Shirt leaders are in jail for their roles in this year's protests, and the movement has complained that the lack of charges against Yellows showed a double standard of justice.

This week prosecutors again postponed a decision over whether to indict individual Yellow Shirts over the airport siege.

Red supporters plan a small demonstration of their own in Bangkok on Sunday to protest at the May crackdown on their rally, during which about 90 people died and nearly 1,900 were injured.
Read more!

British man wanted over murder arrested in Thailand

A British man wanted in the UK over the 2008 murder of his south London landlord has been arrested in Thailand, police said.

Stuart Scott Crawford, 44, was picked up on Tuesday after an extradition warrant for the fugitive was issued.

Thai authorities also announced the arrest of a second Briton, David Fletcher, on charges of sexually assaulting children in Cambodia.

Crawford is wanted in connection with the murder of Michael Ryan at the pair's home in Sutton, Surrey.

The 67-year-old's body was found at the address on September 10, 2008, but it is thought he had been dead for a number of days. The corpse had been rolled in carpet and pinned under a bookcase to conceal it.

A post-mortem examination found that Mr Ryan died as the result of a heavy blow to the head from a blunt instrument.

Crawford, who lived with the victim, fled the UK after the murder. Before leaving, it is alleged that he withdrew £6,500 from Mr Ryan's bank account.

Police in Thailand said the suspect had been living in the country for almost two years. He was arrested at an apartment in the resort of Pattaya. Crawford is now set to be extradited. A spokesman for the Metropolitan Police said: "Proceedings continue to return him to the UK."

Meanwhile, Fletcher could be extradited to Cambodia, where he is wanted over child sex offences. He had been awaiting deportation from Thailand after being arrested on June 27 on immigration charges. The sex offender had failed to inform the Thai authorities of a conviction in the UK for raping a 16-year-old girl, a crime he served 18 months in prison for.

Whilst awaiting deportation, Interpol in Cambodia notified the Thai authorities that he was wanted in connection to child sex offences.
Read more!

Minority Opposition Leader Claims Intimidation by Ruling Party

Kem Sokha, director of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, stands outside his office in the capital Phnom Penh

One of Cambodia's opposition parties continues to face political repression and discrimination that need international attention, the leader of the minority party says.

Kem Sokha, president of the Human Rights Party, said in an interview with VOA last week that his party faces repression both on the parliamentary floor, where time is limited for his three parliamentarians, and in the field, where his meetings with grassroots supporters find it hard to get permission to gather and participants are intimidated.

“In some places the local authorities don't allow us to have a meeting, even though I use my name as a member of parliament visiting my constituency,” Kem Sokha said, as he continued a two-month tour of the US and Canada.

“In some places the ruling Cambodian People's Party officials disturbed our meeting by verbally attacking our supporters during the session and threatening them with chair fighting,” he said.

Kem Sokha said the US should look into critical issues like land grabbing, elections and freedom of expression.

“The ruling party has classified Cambodian people into three different categories: black, grey and white," he continued, referring to lists the ruling party initiated earlier this year.

Those who support the Human Rights Party are labeled “black,” while those who support the CPP are labeled “white,” he said.

Kem Sokha is scheduled to meet US officials before attending his party congress on Aug. 28 and Aug. 29, when party officials will review their strategy for the 2012 and 2013 elections. He is due to return to Cambodia at the end of September.

Read more!

Farmers Watch as Tonle Sap Authority Crushes Reservoirs

The machines had come to tear down more than 10 reservoirs local farmers had built to capture the receding waters of the swollen Tonel Sap lake.

One morning in early July, about a dozen bulldozers and excavators came to Msa Krong commune where Kong Heuv lives, about 50 kilometers outside Kampong Thom provincial town.

The machines had come to tear down more than 10 reservoirs local farmers had built to capture the receding waters of the swollen Tonel Sap lake.

“I was very disappointed with the destruction of my reservoir,” said the 67-year-old farmer, as he walked along the flattened dam one recent day.

“If I were rich, this would not be a problem,” he told VOA Khmer. “But I am still in debt due to the construction of the reservoir.”

The government has been tearing down these kinds of reservoirs since late June, under the new Tonle Sap Authority, which has a mandate to protect the flooded forests around the great lake.

There are about 1 million hectares of these forests around the lake; nearly 400,000 hectares have been destroyed already. Since 2002, villagers have been expanding their farmlands, while business owners have looked for other means to catch fish as the water recedes each year.

Kong Heuv said he spent about $5,500 two years ago to keep water for his rice paddies during the dry season.

“I don’t know how to deal with my debt now that I can’t work on the paddies I depend on,” he said.

Chan Yuttha, secretary general of the Tonle Sap Authority, said 35 of 239 reservoirs have now been destroyed across six provinces.

“And there will be no compensation for any loss of the reservoirs, because they were all built illegally,” he said.

Tri Horn, chief of Msa Krong commune, said the destruction of the reservoirs is good for the sustainability of the flooded forests. But, he acknowledged that the dismantling some of the small ones owned by poor farmers in his commune has caused problems for them.

“They borrowed the money from banks to build those reservoirs, so they are now in debt,” he said in an interview at this house. “Some almost want to commit suicide due to the debt.”

Most of the 9,000 people in his commune depend on farming, while a smaller number need the reservoirs for dry-season fishing, he said.

“In addition to keeping water for farming, the building of reservoirs is also meant to catch fish,” said Lim Kean Hor, Minister of Water Resources and head of the Tonle Sap Authority.

The reservoirs are especially problematic in Kampong Thom province, where they are built consecutively and impede the flow of the river, he said.

“So, all of the remaining reservoirs around the great lake will be dismantled to preserve the lake,” he said.

Read more!

Hun Sen Praises Tribunal Verdict in Duch Case

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Wednesday praised the Khmer Rouge tribunal’s sentencing of torture chief Duch, in the premier’s first public statement since the decision last week.

Victims have said they are unsatisfied with the commuted sentence of the prison chief, under whose supervision more than 12,000 people were tortured and executed.

Hun Sen said the courts had made an independent decision free of political influence.

“The Royal Government of Cambodia respects the Khmer Rouge tribunal’s decision because the court is independent,” he said in public remarks. “We respect the independence of the court. The court sentenced Duch to 35 years in jail. It is up to the court, which the Royal Government of Cambodia must respect.”

In fact, Duch was handed a commuted sentence of only 19 years, following leniency and time served.

And tribunal observers say the court risks being tainted by political influence, with a number of senior officials refusing to cooperate with the international investigating judge and public statements by the premier against further indictments at the UN-backed court.

“The tribunal is facing problems of independence…relating to summonses of witnesses and progress on Case Nos. 003 and 004,” said Long Panhavuth, a tribunal monitor for the Cambodian Justice Initiative. “The government has not allowed the arrest of more suspects.”

Bu Meng, a former prisoner in Duch’s S-21, was not convinced of the court’s independence.

“The tribunal verdict seems to have had pressure from some circle or someone,” he said. “But [Prime Minister] Hun Sen said the court has independence and non-interference. That’s his right. The rights of the victims are different.”

Tribunal spokesman Reach Sambath said the verdict had the support of donor countries in a decision that was jointly arrived upon by international and national judges.
Read more!

Author Undertakes Battambang School Rehabilitation

The author of a Khmer Rouge memoir who now lives in the US is raising funds to help education in Cambodia.

Ung Kilong, the 50-year-old author of “The Golden Leaf,” said he hopes better education will promote free thinking and a break from the kind of political ideology that led to the disaster of the Khmer Rouge.

“Young people joined the Khmer Rouge because they lacked understanding,” he said. “With the schooling in place they will have more knowledge.”

Ung Kilong is working with a group of associates to build a primary school in Thmor Kol district, Battambang province, where students are taught by underpaid teachers in a dilapidated school and without proper uniforms.

Ung Kilong is himself originally from Battambang, but he fled to the US with his sister following the Khmer Rouge and the loss of their parents and other siblings.

“I was lucky to come here, so I want to help Cambodia, so that in the future, Cambodian children can raise up the face of the country,” Ung Kilong told VOA Khmer from Portland, Oregon, where he was fundraising for the school project.

Cambodia’s ambassador to the US, Hem Heng, who attended the fundraising ceremony, urged other Cambodians to do more to help education, health and social issues.

“As Cambodians, no matter where we go and no matter what citizenship we hold, our blood is still Khmer,” he said. “Therefore, we always think of our country.
Read more!

Cambodia to celebrate day for indigenous people near Angkor Wat

About 1,000 people will get together next week in Cambodia's northern province of Siem Reap, home of Angkor Wat Temple complex to celebrate international day for indigenous people.

In a joint statement released Tuesday, Oxfam America in cooperation with 17 other local and international organizations said about 1,000 people representing the Cambodian government, civil society, the United Nations and indigenous communities from across Cambodia will come together for the first time to celebrate the 16th International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples in Siem Reap on August 9, 2010.

The celebration is to recognize the aspiration of Cambodian indigenous peoples to exercise control over their ancestral lands, forest and other natural resources vital to their ways of life and economic development, and to maintain and develop their identities, languages and cultures.
Indigenous peoples, making up 5 percent (about 340 million) of the world's population, are among the poorest of the poor, according to the statement.

The statement, however, did not say how many percent that the indigenous people in Cambodia represent the country's total populations of more than 14 millions.

But it did say Cambodia has about 30 indigenous groups, and on the day some 300 indigenous peoples from across the county will join a parade to call for respect for their own rights.

They will present their ways of life in an exhibition and a cultural performance, the statement said.

Source: Xinhua Read more!

Mystery Pig Deaths Spread Through Three Provinces

Animal health authorities are trying to learn what has killed nearly 200 pigs in three separate provinces.

An unknown number of pigs have died in the provinces of Battambang and Kampong Cham, while nearly 150 have perished in the southern province of Kampot.

Health officials said the disease appears to be bacterial, making an outbreak of H1N1, sometimes called swine flu, unlikely.

On Monday, officials began blood tests of pigs in Kampot, where the latest and most severe outbreak has occurred.

“On Saturday, we started the blood tests on seven pigs,” Kao Phal, director of the animal health department of the Ministry of Agriculture, said Monday. “But unitl now we do not know exactly the disease that happened to the pigs is.”

The animal health department is also appealing to farmers not to transport any pigs from their farms to market for the rest of the month of August, he said. Read more!

No Cluster Munition Ban for Cambodia

Cambodia has not yet signed a cluster munition ban that went into effect Sunday. Thirty-seven countries have ratified the 2008 Convention on Cluster Munitions.

“As a heavily cluster-bombed country, we are willing to become a party to the convention,” Prak Sokun, a secretary of state for the Council of Minister, told VOA Khmer last week. “But we have to consider thoroughly any impact to our national security.”

The cluster munition convention bans the production, use, transport or stockpiling of cluster munitions.

It was opened to states for signatures in 2008 in Oslo, Norway.

“Countries like Thailand and Vietnam have not signed it either,” said Prak Sokun, who is an adviser to Prime Minister Hun Sen on landmine issues. Read more!

A small measure of justice in Cambodia

The punishment given the ex-chief of the Khmer Rouge's most notorious prison appears to be too lenient. And culpability for the reign of terror extends far beyond him.

By James Pringle

Last week in a Cambodian courtroom, I watched as the former commandant of the Khmer Rouge's notorious Tuol Sleng prison and torture center was sentenced to 35 years in prison for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

During Monday's 70-minute session, the former executioner, now a born-again Christian, listened attentively from the dock, holding what appeared to be a small Bible. "If you want to stone me to death, as they did when Christ was with us, the Cambodian people can do so and I will accept it," he told the tribunal during his trial. But he also asked for mercy.

Kang Kek Ieu — known in tribunal filings as Kaing Guek Eav but best known by his revolutionary name, Comrade Duch — fled Phnom Penh when the Vietnamese invaded and deposed the Khmer Rouge in 1979. He remained at large for more than 20 years until he was found, working for a Christian aid agency, by Irish photographer Nic Dunlop

To many survivors of the Khmer Rouge era, last week's sentence seemed far too light for a man who was "addicted to the sight of blood," as one of them described Duch in trial testimony. After taking into account the time he's already served and other considerations, he is likely to serve 19 more years, which leaves the distinct possibility that the 67-year-old will live to see freedom again.

Is that too lenient a sentence? Probably. But it's hard not to also think about how the culpability for Cambodia's horror extends far beyond one prison commander.

The first time I saw Cambodia was during the American "incursion" in the spring of 1970. Flying over the country in a rickety Vietnamese helicopter, I beheld a landscape pocked with craters, the result of the secret bombing that had been ordered by President Nixon and his national security advisor, Henry Kissinger, in 1969.

Some commentators have wondered since just how much the American bombings, which killed tens of thousands of Cambodians before being stopped by Congress in 1973, had to do with the ferocity of the Khmer Rouge, under whose rule an estimated 1.7 million people were put to death or died of hunger or overwork.

In 1979, I went to Phnom Penh as part of a press tour for half a dozen Western journalists who had been brought to see the "new" Cambodia. But everywhere we looked were signs of the despot Pol Pot and his Khmer Rouge.

In the countryside, skinny oxen pulled wooden carts along mine-laden and bomb-blasted roads. In the city, mountains of wrecked automobiles stood alongside hillocks of rusting refrigerators, unacceptable bourgeois toys in Pol Pot's "glorious" Democratic Kampuchea.

At one point, having evaded our minders, we came across a handful of ordinary Cambodians who had crept past government barriers into Phnom Penh. They were kneeling in tattered clothes on the ground picking up individual grains of rice. The pathetic cavalcade of skeletons smiled shyly at a couple of foreigners before hauling themselves to their feet and tottering off, as if they felt their suffering was an eyesore to us.

Among the places we visited on that trip was Tuol Sleng, also known as the S-21 prison, where Duch had ordered the killing of thousands of Cambodians. Blood was still congealed on the prison floor when we visited, and it felt as if the last desperate scream still hung in the air. The whole awful place stank of death, fear and neglect.

Today, of course, Phnom Penh is a very different place, a busy city full of bars and restaurants. For decades, Cambodians have wanted to forget the past and move on with life, and it remains to be seen whether the government will muster the will to aggressively prosecute other war criminals. Only recently have young people even been taught much about the Khmer Rouge regime.

But as I watched Duch's sentencing last week, I found the past hard to forget. I remembered speaking to a mother and her 11-year-old son in 1979, soon after Pol Pot's ouster. The boy had lost both his legs in a mine blast while watching their cow. And he wasn't alone.

"The children of Cambodia have no legs," his mother, half-demented with grief, told me.

James Pringle covered the war in Vietnam and Cambodia as a correspondent for Reuters and Newsweek. Read more!

Poll: Respondents fear temple row will impact Thai-Cambodian relations

BANGKOK, August 1- The Thai public is concerned about the impact of the current diplomatic wrangling and four out of 10 respondents in a new poll -- 40 per cent -- expressed concern that the current dispute over Preah Vihear temple could negatively affect relations between Thailand and Cambodia, according to a survey conducted by Dusit Poll.

The survey conducted among 1,148 people from July 30 through August 1 showed that one in four -- some 25 per cent of respondents worry that Thailand might eventually lose the area adjoining Preah Vihear temple.

Almost 21 per cent of the respondents fear that more clashes between soldiers of the two countries would take place, causing unsafe conditions for residents living near the border, while 14 per cent said the dispute would affect the livelihood of people living near the border and those in the tourism business.

The survey was conducted after UNESCO's World Heritage Commission on Thursday deferred its decision on Cambodia’s request to review its management plan for the temple for one more year. It will be reviewed during next year's WHC meeting in Bahrain.

Thailand and Cambodia recognise different border demarcations, having resulted in clashes along the disputed border between the two countries. The clashes have occurred periodically since the temple was awarded to Cambodia by the International Court of Justice in 1962.

The situation has worsened after the UNESCO named the temple a World Heritage site in 2008 after Cambodia applied for much-valued status.

The Dusit Poll said one third of the respondents -- 33 per cent -- believed the government should present facts on the temple to Thais and foreigners, 26.5 per cent said Thailand must prepare information and maps marking the boundary between the two countries in details and that it must work on an proactive basis.

Twenty-one per cent said Thailand must monitor Cambodia's movements and provide security to residents the border and 19 per cent suggested the Thai government to be patient and resolve the problem through negotiations. (MCOT online news) Read more!

Sarandon urges U.S. law on child sex traffic victims

By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters Life!) - Oscar-winning actress Susan Sarandon launched a campaign on Friday to urge U.S. lawmakers to protect, instead of prosecute, children who become victims of sex trafficking.

She wants Americans to sign a petition lobbying lawmakers to stop the prosecution of child sex trafficking victims as prostitutes. According to the "Stop Sex Trafficking of Children and Young People" campaign only New York, Connecticut and Washington state have laws to protect child trafficking victims.

"It can be changed," Sarandon said. "It's really important that the public be educated."

The petition is part of a broader campaign by the U.S. branch of End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT), The Body Shop and the Somaly Mam Foundation, run by former Cambodian child sex slave Mam, to end child trafficking.

"We have a lot of minds to change, we have a lot of work to do here in the United States to make sure these kids are offered assistance and protection -- not a jail cell when some pimp recruits them at 12-years-old," said Carol Smolenski, ECPAT-USA executive director.

The U.N. children's agency UNICEF says that about 1.2 million children a year are trafficked for cheap labour and sexual exploitation. ECPAT-USA says 300,000 U.S. children are at risk of being forced into the sex trade and U.S. citizens account for 25 percent of child sex tourists globally.

"Not that many people know that this is not just an issue that affects children in other countries. There are hundreds of thousands of American children who are sexually exploited and trafficked right here in the United States," Smolenski said.

The Body Shop has raised more than $1.5 million in the past year through sales of a special hand cream and tote bags for ECPAT-USA and the Somaly Mam Foundation, which run shelters in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.

"It's easy to go to the brothel and save the girl. Five minutes you can save them, no problem. but make your five minutes 10 years to (help them) recover," said Mam, who last year rescued a four-year-old girl from a brothel in Cambodia.

Sarandon became involved in the Somaly Mam Foundation after meeting Mam at the Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy in 2006 when the pair participated in the opening ceremony. Sarandon then helped Mam set up her foundation in the United States.

"It's not just an emotional thing, she understands what these girls need and I know that the money is being well spent," Sarandon said. "It speaks to me so personally as a mother."

Read more!

Vietnam, Thailand, & Cambodia Niche Luxury Travel Operator to Exhibit at 2010 ITB Asia

Hanoi, Vietnam, July 31, 2010 --(PR.com)-- Asia’s largest dedicated leisure and MICE supplier, Luxury Travel (www.luxurytravelvietnam.com) will exhibit at the 2010 ITB Asia from Oct 20-22, 2010 in Singapore.

In addition to meeting with key partners and golf agents from around the world, Luxury Travel will launch several golf tours at the show as well as unveil new strategic hotel and golf course partnerships.

Information on these new tours, courses, and properties will be made available to ITB Asia show attendees.

This is the time third time, Luxury Travel shows at ITB Asia.

Hung Nguyen, Huong Pham and Ha Pham will be in attendance along with a company representative who exemplifies the traditional Vietnam smile and luxury service mind-set found through the region.

They would like to have the chance to meet all outbound golf tour operators with interest in opening up or expanding their Thailand, Vietnam, and Cambodia golf tour offerings.

Please make an appointment or visit the Luxury Travel booth at ITB Asia to learn more about these exciting new destinations and opportunities.

Contact Luxury Travel at itbasia10@LuxuryTravelVietnam.com if you need any additional information.
Read more!

Cambodia claims win in UNESCO tussle over temple

By SOPHENG CHEANG (AP)


PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — Cambodia declared victory Friday in a diplomatic standoff with Thailand after the U.N. cultural agency agreed to consider its plan for managing a temple that is on land claimed by both countries.

Deputy Prime Minister Sok An said that Cambodia had achieved its goal when UNESCO's World Heritage Commission agreed on Thursday to consider its plan for the Preah Vihear temple on the border with Thailand.

However, UNESCO's decision to defer the matter to its meeting next year takes pressure off both countries.

Thailand, which claims the plan jeopardizes its claim to disputed territory, had threatened to quit UNESCO if the plan was endorsed at Thursday's meeting in Brazil. Thai officials said they viewed the postponement of the plan's consideration as progress.

In 1962, the International Court of Justice ruled the 10th-century border temple belongs to Cambodia, rejecting Thai claims. UNESCO — over Thai objections — named Preah Vihear a World Heritage site in 2008, after Cambodia applied for the status. Cambodia's World Heritage bid reignited Thai resentment over the earlier ruling, and there have been small and sometimes deadly armed clashes in the area during the past few years.

Leaders of both countries have used the issue to stir up nationalist sentiment and shore up domestic political support. In Thailand, nationalist pressure groups demonstrated this week for Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva to take a hard line against Cambodia and UNESCO. The two sides' military leaders spoke about strengthening their respective forces at the border in preparation for any incursions from the other side.

Sok An led the Cambodian delegation at the UNESCO meeting, and spoke by satellite from Brazil live on television.

"UNESCO has officially accepted our management plan documents, so there is no need to have a further discussion or voting," Sok An said. "The result of the meeting is a big victory for Cambodia, a result we have been waiting for."

Thai officials insist that demarcation of the disputed land must come before UNESCO endorses any management plan.

"How we're going to move forward is a matter to be discussed by both sides," said Thailand's Deputy Prime Minister Suthep Thaugsuban.

UNESCO Director-General Irina Bokova released a statement earlier this week calling for dialogue between the two countries. "It is our common responsibility to make these sites emblems of peace, dialogue and reconciliation," she said.

Read more!

CNN Heroes: Aki Ra Disarmed Land Mines in Cambodia He Placed Decades Earlier

Aki Ra, leader of the nonprofit Cambodian Self Help Demining team, works to make his country more safe by clearing land mines on a daily basis. He estimates that he and his team have cleared more than 50,000 land mines -- some of which he planted himself.

At around age ten, Aki Ra was selected by the Khmer Rouge to lay land mines in and around his village. Over the next three years Aki Ra must have planted some 4,000 to 5,000 land mines in a single month.

"I had [bad] feelings, because sometimes we were fighting against our friends and relatives," Aki Ra said. "I felt sad when I saw a lot of people were killed. A lot of people were suffering from landmines. [But] I did not know what to do, [because] we were under orders."

The CNN Hero nominee formed the Cambodian Demining Self Help team in 2008 and continues to work with local Cambodians, former soldiers and war crime victims.

CNN's "Heroes" series honors individuals who make extraordinary contributions to helping others. In November, one CNN Hero will be chosen to receive a large sum of money to continue his/her work. Last year's winner was Efren Pe<&>#241aflorida.

Read more!

From Cambodia's Killing Fields to New York, a new film confronts Khmer Rouge

By Jared Ferrie, Correspondent

Phnom Penh, Cambodia
In the new film "Enemies of the People," the highest-ranking Khmer Rouge leader still living promises to disclose at his war crimes trial details of the mysterious inner workings of the regime.

"I will talk about it at the court to open their eyes," says the notoriously secretive Nuon Chea, pledging to explain the 1970s mass killings that still confound Cambodians.

The documentary won the 2010 Special Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival and began a series of US screenings July 30 in New York (see trailer below).

Mr. Nuon is expected to go on trial next year, following up on the court's initial July 26 verdict against a Khmer Rouge chief jailer, Kaing Guek Eav, or "Duch," who ran a torture facility. Duch was sentence to 19 years for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

Unlike Duch, who was not a member of the ruling clique, Nuon was second in command only to Brother No. 1 Pol Pot, who died in 1998.

Observers say Nuon's case will be more revealing and satisfying for Cambodians who seek to understand better why the Khmer Rouge killed 2 million countrymen in the 1970s, including the brother of Thet Sambath.

Mr. Thet, for one, didn't wait for a court to tell him what he wants to know. Over the past two decades, while the international community negotiated with the government to establish the United Nations-backed tribunal here, Thet was venturing into the jungles of western Cambodia to pose his own questions to Nuon and other Khmer Rouge.

"I want to know what went on inside the Khmer Rouge – why the starvation, why the killing," says the journalist, who teamed up with British coproducer Rob Lemkin for "Enemies of the People." In the film, slated to air on PBS next year, Nuon and other former Khmer Rouge reveal a previously unheard history that contradicts the government narrative.

In the national myth of the liberation, the Khmer Rouge was a monolithic organization that massacred those it imagined to be enemies until regime defectors and their Vietnamese benefactors charged to the rescue. Nuon suggests that the enemies were, to some extent, real. According to Nuon, the Communist Party was engaged in an internal struggle – his group against a powerful pro-Vietnamese faction. Both factions killed enemies, real and perceived.

If Nuon is to be believed, then his court testimony could implicate Khmer Rouge defectors who remain in the highest seats of government today. This may be why the government has been stonewalling the court, say observers. They point to, for example, the refusal of six top politicians to testify despite legally binding orders. Prime Minister Hun Sen, himself a regime defector, has said he'd rather see the court fail than prosecute more people.

Even if this version of history brings the viewer closer to the truth, Thet is careful to point out that none of this absolves Nuon of killing innocents. In the film, Nuon admits publicly, for the first time, that he ordered the killing of thousands of political opponents, which is probably evidence enough to convict him for war crimes – if he ever makes it to trial. Read more!

In Brasil: Thailand objects again to Preah Vihea plans

Thailand has re-raised objections to the World Heritage status of Preah Vihear temple on the northern border.

At a meeting of Unesco in Brazil, Thai officials said they do not agree with a Cambodian management plan for the 11th-Century temple, which is now at the heart of an ongoing military standoff on the border.

Both Thailand and Cambodia have had troops amassed along the border since the July 2008 inception of the temple as a Heritage site under Cambodian control.

Unesco spokeswoman Sue Williams told VOA Khmer from Brazil that Cambodia had presented a plan for consideration. However, she said the border dispute between the two countries was “strictly bilateral” and declined to comment further on the Thai objections.

Cambodia's management plan, submitted by a delegation led by Cabinet Minister Sok An, has provoked strong disapproval from Thailand, which claims a 4-kilometer strip of land near Preah Vihear temple.

Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva was quoted in the Bangkok Post saying Thailand would reconsider its ties with Unesco if the body approves the plan.

Cambodian government spokesman Phay Siphan said Thailand’s argument was to ultimately co-manage the temple, which sits on a high precipice overlooking the plains of Preah Vihear province.

Unesco Director General Irina Bokova said in a statement that the Brazil meeting, which ends Aug. 3, will examine the state of conservation of the temple.

“Protecting and enhancing our natural and cultural heritage means building the peace, respect and solidarity which lies at the heart of Unesco's mission,” she said. “It is our common responsibility to makes these sites emblems of peace, dialogue and reconciliation.”

At least eight soldiers have died in ensuing skirmishes since the military standoff began, along a border that has yet to be fully demarcated by either side.

Read more!

Fishermen say they are forced into illegal catches

Local fishermen on the Tonle Sap lake in the province of Battambang say they continue to fish illegally during the off-season.

In interviews with VOA Khmer, the fishermen said they have no choice but to continue fishing, sometimes with banned equipment, in order to feed their families, despite a three-month ban instituted by the government that begins each July.

“The ban is like breaking our rice pot,” said 53-year-old fisherman Chhun Leang.

He sat in a wooden house on the great lake, in the floating village of Anlung Ta Our, in Ek Phnom district, and when boats passed their wakes shook his home.

“Unlike the people on land who are farmers, we fishermen have no land for farming,” he said. “We only depend on fishing.”

Commercial fishing for the next three months is forbidden. This is the breeding season. Small nets and handmade gear are allowed, but fishermen like Chhun Leang say that isn't enough.

He earns about $250 a month, working a medium-sized net rig that is banned this time a year. Even if these were permitted, he said, these days he barely catches enough fish to feed his family.

“So despite the ban, myself and other fishermen in the commune still secretly fish with our rigging,” he said. There are crackdowns, he said, but he keeps fishing. “Otherwise, we cannot survive.”

His neighbor five houses down, Yon Phann, agreed.

“If we didn’t do it, we would have nothing to eat,” he said, looking at fishing nets hanging on a nearby wall. “Fishing is our farming here.”

More than 70 percent of the 10,000 people living in this commune, Koh Chi Verng, are fishermen. The rest sell goods or repair boats.

Commune Chief Bun Beng said that every year people face hard times during the three-month ban, so at times he turns a blind eye to some illegal fishing.

“They can catch just a kilo or two of fish a day, and they sell it for rice to eat,” he said in an interview at his own floating house. “This is all they can do here because we have no rice to harvest.”

On the other hand, he said, he advises people not to use heavy rigging during the ban, and he encourages them to breed fish and raise eels to supplement their catches.

Nao Thuok, head of Agriculture Ministry’s fishery administration, said there is no exception for any particular fishing community in the use of banned gear this season.

“Any such act will be cracked down on,” he said. “This is according to the law, which must be implemented to benefit all the people across the country, not just that particular community or a small number of others.”

“All floating communities around the Tonle Sap should only fish for family consumption during this ban season,” he said, “so that more fish can breed for them to catch at the end of the season.”


Read more!

Thailand Threatens to Pull Out of UN World Heritage Committee Over Border Dispute

Preah Vihear temple is seen near Cambodian-Thai border in Preah Vihear province, about 245 kilometers (152 miles) north of Phnom Penh, Cambodia (File photo)

Thailand is threatening to withdraw support from the U.N. Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization if the U.N. World Heritage Committee backs a Cambodian plan to manage a 900-year-old Hindu temple site bordering the two countries.

The Thai government's threat to withdraw from the 21-nation UNESCO World Heritage Committee was made as the panel prepared to vote on a new Cambodian proposed management plan for the 900-year-old Khmer temple.

Source of tensionThe Preah Vihear temple site lies immediately inside the Cambodian border on the top of a 525-meter-high cliff in the Dangrek Mountain range. But access to the temple complex is only readily available from the Thai side.

span class="fullpost">In 1962, the International Court of Justice ruled that that the temple is on the Cambodian side of the border, but failed to determine ownership of an adjacent piece of land. Since then, Thailand has sought to have both countries jointly seek World Heritage listing for the site.

But in 2008, then Thai Foreign Minister Noppadon Pattama was forced to resign after a Thai court found he had breached the constitution by signing a joint communiqué with Cambodia. This opened the way for Cambodia to make a separate application for World Heritage listing.

New friction

Under a proposed development plan for the temple, Thailand fears Cambodia may create a buffer zone around the site, marking what Thailand sees as occupation of its territory.

The Thai government has been lobbying committee member states to postpone the vote until both countries settle the border disputes covering land immediately surrounding the Preah Vihear temple.

Thai government spokesman Panitan Wattanayagorn said Minister for Natural Resources Suvit Khunkitti attended the meeting and had the full backing of the Cabinet for Thailand to withdraw from the World Heritage Committee.

"If the process adopting that plan is approved, not only Khun Suvit is authorized to object to that plan - not to vote for that plan - he is authorized to express his ideas, his concerns and also the wishes of the Thai government to reconsider the membership of the World Heritage Committee," Panitan said.

Thai proposal

Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva is calling for a return to a 2000 agreement centered on the border demarcation. He said Thailand would only accept Cambodia's management plan if the temple is jointly listed between the two countries.

The temple site gained World Heritage listing in 2008, but has remained a source of nationalist tensions since then. Pro-nationalist groups in Thailand protested earlier this week outside the UNESCO offices in Bangkok.

Avoiding clashes

In recent years, rising tensions between Thailand and Cambodia have led to cross-border clashes, with the Thai army accusing Cambodian troops of laying land mines in the region.

UNESCO's director general, Irina Bokova, released a statement calling for dialogue in safeguarding the temple site. She also said the World Heritage Committee's first concern is to protect and promote the region's heritage, and emblems of peace, dialogue and reconciliation.

Read more!

Canadian man gets 11years for sex tourism charges

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — A Canadian man has been sentenced to 11 years in prison for committing sex tourism with children and importing child pornography.

Prosecutors say the sentence is the highest so far for charges under Canada's sex tourism law.

The B.C. Superior Court in Vancouver, British Columbia, sentenced Kenneth Klassen on Wednesday to 10 years for 14 counts of sex tourism and one year for one count of importing pornography.

Klassen had pleaded guilty to having sex with more than a dozen underage girls in Cambodia and Colombia. The prosecution said some girls were as young as eight.

He unsuccessfully challenged Canada's sex tourism law when he argued the incidents happened in other countries where Canadian courts have no jurisdiction.
Read more!

Thai army to reinforce Cambodian border if needed

By KINAN SUCHAOVANICH (AP)

BANGKOK — Thailand's army is prepared to defend its border with Cambodia if a territorial dispute heats up, the prime minister said Wednesday, as the two nations were set to tussle on the diplomatic front at a U.N. meeting in Brazil.

Deadly clashes have flared in the past over the Preah Vihear temple, which the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization named a World Heritage site in 2008, over Thailand's objections.

Two Thai soldiers were killed and 12 wounded in April 2009 after troops exchanged fire with assault rifles and rocket launchers along Cambodia's northern border near the temple, one of several clashes in recent years.

Cambodia will present a management plan in Brazil on the disputed territory at a UNESCO meeting this week.

The International Court of Justice in 1962 ruled the 10th-century border temple belongs to Cambodia, rejecting Thai claims. Cambodia's World Heritage bid reignited Thai resentment over the ruling, and there have been small armed clashes in the area during the past few years.

Thailand claims the management plan would infringe on a small area of undemarcated territory around the temple, of which both sides stake a claim. It has called on UNESCO to reject the plan, and said it will walk out of the meeting if it is accepted. It also said it would consider withdrawing from UNESCO's membership if Cambodia's plan is accepted.

Leaders of both countries have used the issue to stir up nationalist sentiment and shore up domestic political support.

Abhisit met Wednesday with Defense Minister Pravit Wongsuwan, who told him that, pending Cabinet approval, the army is ready to deploy more troops to the already heavily defended border if Cambodian forces intrude into Thai territory.

"The army is now ready to defend our sovereignty if breached," said Abhisit after his weekly Cabinet meeting. He said he was appealing to members of UNESCO's World Heritage Committee "to remember the very purpose this committee was set up for. It should be a purveyor of peace and culture, not of tension and conflicts."

A Thai delegation, led by Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Suwit Khunkitti, is in Brasilia to attend the UNESCO meeting.

"We must make it clear that Thailand cannot and will not accept the proposal," said Abhisit. "And if the committee will not listen to our objection, we will not take part in the voting process." Read more!

PM firm on temple plan

'No Thai cooperation' on Preah Vihear area

Thailand will not cooperate with the World Heritage Committee if it agrees to a management plan for the Preah Vihear temple that infringes upon the disputed border area, Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva says.

The prime minister is sending a message to the WHC meeting which is expected to discuss Cambodia's management plan for the Hindu temple and its surrounding areas before the gathering, which began on Sunday in Brasilia, Brazil's capital, ends next Tuesday .

The Cambodian-sponsored plan is on the WHC agenda for its 21-member committee to discuss.

Phnom Penh is required to submit the management plan for WHC approval after the temple was placed on the world heritage listing of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) in 2008.

Thailand's main concern is that the overlapping territory of 4.6 square kilometres, which has not been demarcated, could be included in the plan and jeopardise negotiations to sort out the area, which has been the main source of border conflicts between the two countries.

Thailand last year successfully blocked the plan at the meeting of the WHC in Seville, Spain.

This time, Mr Abhisit is refusing to cooperate with the WHC on the issue as the conflict over sovereignty of the area remains unsettled.

He reiterated yesterday Thailand's stance on opposing the management plan, which he says should not be brought up for discussion until the two countries resolve their dispute over the territory.

If the WHC's resolution on the management plan affects Thai sovereignty, the government will make it clear that it will not accept it, he said after talks with key leaders of the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) at Ban Phitsanulok.

The prime minister met with the PAD's co-leader Pibhop Dhongchai, the movement's spokesman Panthep Puapongpan, Senator Kamnoon Sitthisamarn and historian ML Walwipha Charoonroj, who leads the Preah Vihear listing monitoring network.

With the Brasilia meeting scheduled to discuss the issue, the PAD, led by Maj Gen Chamlong Srimuang, and 1,000 supporters converged on Unesco's Sukhumvit office yesterday in an effort to derail the Cambodian effort and call for a review of the registration of Preah Vihear as a world heritage site.

The rally broke up after officials from the UN agency agreed to forward the demands to the WHC meeting.

The 21 members of the serving WHC committee are Thailand, Cambodia, Australia, Bahrain, Barbados, Brazil, China, Egypt, Estonia, Ethiopia, France, Iraq, Jordan, Mali, Mexico, Nigeria, Russia, South Africa, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates.

Natural Resources and Environment Minister Suwit Khunkitti is leading the Thai delegation to Brasilia to try to stifle Cambodia's management plan.

Mr Kamnoon said the PAD and the government shared a similar view on protecting the country's sovereignty.

He said he felt "relieved" since the government had prepared measures to be taken against the UN agency if it ignores Thailand's stance.

But Maj Gen Chamlong apparently did not feel that way. He said it would be difficult for the Thai delegation to support its objection to the management plan for the temple and its surrounding area, but warned the PAD would not give up its rallies to block it.

"We need to reaffirm our position because we don't believe that the Thai representatives will be able to oppose Cambodia's plan," he said.

"But we still have time to protest until the decision is made. Another series of protests will be definitely arranged to have our voices heard."

The International Court of Justice ruled in 1962 that Preah Vihear belonged to Cambodia.

The disputed area near the temple is claimed by Thailand as part of Kantharalak district in Si Sa Ket. Read more!

Protests In Bangkok Over UNESCO Temple Listing

(RTTNews) - Hundreds of people staged a rally in Thailand's capital Bangkok on Tuesday to protest the listing of the disputed Preah Vihear border temple in Cambodia as a World Heritage site.

The protesters marched to the UNESCO building on Bangkok's Sukhumvit Road to protest an international court ruling that gave management control over the temple to Cambodia despite a lingering territorial dispute over land adjacent to the Hindu shrine.

The protesters also handed over a petition against the listing of the temple as a heritage site to UNESCO officials, who in turn promised to forward it to the UNESCO World Heritage Committee before it meets in Brazil later this week.

span class="fullpost">The protesters also presented a similar petition to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya later in the day.

Abhisit has already indicated that his government will oppose Cambodia's management plan for the preservation of the 11th century temple at the UNESCO annual meeting on heritage sites in Brazil.

The temple protest was led by the the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD). The rally was held despite a standing emergency decree that bans political gatherings of more than five people and allows authorities to make arrests without filing charges.

The emergency decree was issued in April after a military crackdown ended months of protests by anti-government 'Red Shirt' volunteers in the Thai capital. At least 50 people were killed in the crackdown, bringing the total death toll to 77 since the protests began in mid-March.

Currently, relations between Thailand and Cambodia remain strained over the ancient temple on their border. Both countries claim ownership of the temple, which is located inside Cambodian territory. However, the main approach to the temple is from Thailand.

Cambodian and Thai troops had clashed briefly near the temple in July 2008. Since then, situation along the Thai-Cambodia border had been tense as both countries raised their troop levels at their respective boarders.

Dispute over the temple arose after an international court awarded the place of worship to Cambodia in 1962, and escalated after UNESCO listed it as a World Heritage Site recently. The dispute has led to several clashes between Armies of the two countries near the temple. Read more!

Kent man pleads guilty in Cambodia child exploitation case

Posted by John de Leon


A Kent man pleaded guilty Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Seattle to sexual exploitation of a child in connection with a January trip to Cambodia where he had sex with underage girls, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.

Craig Carr, 59, faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 15 years in prison, and up to 30 years in prison, when he is sentenced in October.

According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, Carr made contact over the Internet with a person in Cambodia who agreed to find girls for Carr to have sex with during a visit to the country. Carr paid the individual approximately $8,000 for sex with the girls during a week-long trip to Cambodia. Carr reportedly told the person arranging the sexual encounters that he wanted the girls to be about 12 years old.

Carr traveled from Seattle to Phnom Penh on Jan. 13. When he was arrested nine days later he admitted that he had sex with three young girls during his stay in Cambodia, the U.S. Attorney's Office said. His camera contained pictures of three young victims. Two of the victims have been located. Read more!

Striking female workers paid just £1 a day at factory which makes clothes for Gap and Adidas are beaten by riot police

By Richard Shears


Riot police used electric shock batons to beat women sweatshop workers when they stopped producing fashion labels for the UK and other Western nations in Cambodia today.

The image of heavily-armed police in protective clothing using their shields and batons to crush a strike by poverty-stricken women workers will do nothing to improve the tarnished image of designer label companies who run Asian sweatshops.

At least nine women were injured when more than 100 police, more than half in riot gear and armed with assault rifles, tried to force 3,000 women workers back into their factory.


Batons out: Nine garment workers were injured today in clashes with riot police in Phnom Penh as officials tried to end a week-long strike over the suspension of a local union official

Some women, who earn less than £1 a day, fell to the ground where they were attacked and stunned by police batons.

Workers in Cambodian sweatshops have risen up in recent protests against low pay and harsh working conditions, but today's walk-out was over the suspension of a local union official.

The factory, on the outskirts of the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, is owned by a Malaysian firm and produces garments for the big names of fashion and sport - Gap, Benetton, Adidas and Puma. The factory contributes to Cambodia's clothing, textiles and shoes exports which were valued at more than £1 billion last year.

Police used shields and electric shock batons as they tried to force workers back into the PCCS Garments factory, which produces items for companies including Gap, Benetton, Adidas and Puma

All four clothing and sporting companies linked to the factory have come under severe criticism from investigators for the harsh conditions endured and low wages given to their Third World employees.

Reports by charities such as Oxfam have found that the apparel industry, whether for designer labels or for garments that carry the names of big sporting companies such as Adidas, Nike and Puma, uses and abuses sweatshops.

Oxfam points out that workers in developing countries are paid minimal wages and are often forced to endure long hours in harsh and often dangerous conditions producing some of the world's most expensive and coveted brands.

The Cambodian garment industry has been plagued by strikes over low pay and working conditions. Most employees make less than $100 a month and many receive a monthly wage of as little as $50

It is the sportswear and garment industry that employs mostly women - and the demonstration at the Cambodian factory yesterday was evidence of that as by the hundred they poured out of the premises in support of their suspended union official.

Riot police rushed to the factory after a court order was given to them to clear the roads and force the women back to work.

The brutality the women suffered brought an end to their strike and they returned to the factory, part of an estimated 300,000 people who work in the garment manufacturing sector.

When they have saved enough of their meagre wages, they send what they can back to their impoverished rural villages, where people struggle on as little as 50 pence a day.

Temporary reprieve? Police managed to bring the demonstration to an end, and union leaders are now talking to the workers about calling off their action
Read more!