The fund “can provide hope and a path to a new life for thousands of young lives,” he said of his latest donation.
NEW YORK - Viacom and CBS Corp. chairman and controlling shareholder Sumner Redstone on Thursday announced his second donation of $500,000 to the Cambodian Children's Fund via his Sumner M. Redstone Charitable Foundation as he continues to donate some of his money.
The non-profit program, to which Redstone donated the same amount in 2007, provides health and educational services to impoverished and abused children in Cambodia's capital Phnom Penh.
The fund was founded by executive director Scott Neeson, a former Sony executive who knows Redstone, a spokesman said.
Redstone’s initial 2007 commitment established CCF's child rescue center. The latest grant will help fund continued operations.
"The Cambodian Children's Fund is bringing life saving services to innocent children who live in a world of poverty, sickness and ignorance," said Redstone. "With this additional funding, the CCF can grow their programs to serve a wider range of children and to help sustain its operations for the long term. Through the consistency and expansion of its health care and education services, the CCF can provide hope and a path to a new life for thousands of young lives."
Redstone added that "I hope this gift will encourage others to join me in supporting the amazing work of the Cambodian Children's Fund."
Said Neeson “On any given day, our center provides food and health care to over 300 of the country's most vulnerable population. As the demand on our services has increased, so have the costs.”
Last year, Redstone donated $1.5 million to schools he attended and also made a $1 million contribution to advocacy group Autism Speaks. The latter was his largest donation to the group that he has supported in the past.
Read more!
Thursday, April 14, 2011
Sumner Redstone Donates $500,000 to Cambodian Children’s Fund
OZ may pull out of Cambodia gold search
By Berry Fitzgerald
OZ Minerals is reviewing its Cambodian gold exploration program, which has failed to find the 2 million-ounce resource base that could have become a starter project there.
The latest drilling at the Mesam prospect has failed to excite.
Mesam is adjacent to the Okvau deposit, which OZ last year ranked as a 605,000-ounce gold find.
Advertisement: Story continues below It was hoped Mesam would get OZ closer to the 2 million-ounce threshold. But managing director Terry Burgess said yesterday that results to date had ''not been particularly spectacular.
''We have three or four holes to go but I guess like all these exploration endeavours, you're always waiting for the successful hole,'' he said. He confirmed that the gold assets could be sold after the review was completed.
Apart from the lack of a major discovery in Cambodia, gold assets in the country have fallen dramatically in overall importance to OZ.
After the group's drastic restructuring in 2008, its mining portfolio was reduced to ownership of the Prominent Hill copper/gold mine in South Australia and the Cambodian gold play.
Analysts have previously valued the Cambodian assets at between $40 million and $120 million, with the higher amount dependent on the so-far-elusive additional exploration success. Prominent Hill is now well established as a 100,000 to 110,000-tonne-a-year copper producer.
Cambodia also became less important for OZ after the miner's recent acquisition of the undeveloped Carrapateena copper/gold/uranium deposit in South Australia.
Carrapateena has the potential to be a similar sized copper producer to Prominent Hill. But its development is some way off. A pre-feasibility study could start in 2012 and would take at least a year.
This would lead to full feasibility studies, which take another 18-24 months. After allowing for mine construction time, first production would be in 2017 at the earliest.
Mr Burgess dismissed the suggestion the Carrapateena acquisition meant the group's acquisition hunt to replenish its mining portfolio would be reined in. OZ is holding $750 million cash.
Read more!
Wednesday, April 13, 2011
Communities Want More Information on Mekong Dam
As a decision nears for Mekong River countries over approval of a hydroelectric dam in Laos, Cambodian civic groups say they have been given few chances to have their voice in the matter heard.
Laos is proposing to build a dam along the Mekong in Xayaburi province, but it needs the approval of other Mekong countries, including Cambodia, in a meeting scheduled in Laos next week. Critics of the dam say it will hurt ecosystems in the river that provide a major source of fish for Cambodians.
Sun Mao, executive director of Kratie province’s Cambodian Rural Development Team, told “Hello VOA” last week that many people still do not understand the dam project or the process for its approval.
“No member of the affected communities were present at the [Kratie] consultation,” he said of a meeting held in the province in February. “But local authorities were invited instead the represent these communities.
The Kratie consultation meeting was the first of two held on the dam. The second was held in Preah Sihanouk province later in February.
The Xayaburi dam is a proposed 810 meters long, 32 meters high and expected to produce 1,260 megawatts of power. The Mekong River Commission, which is made up of committees from all Mekong River countries, will decide on the project April 22.
Sun Mao said there is still little understanding of the dam’s likely impact on a variety of factors, including fish migration and safety concerns in a quake-prone region. The impacts have been “understudied,” he said, “and the dissemination of information on the environmental, social, and cultural impacts, etc. has not been adequate to either civil society groups or affected communities.”
At the February consultations, participants were briefed on the designs of the dam and the decision-making process for its construction, but Sun Mao said the environmental impact report was not distributed.
A Mekong River Commission official recently told VOA Khmer that Cambodia could lose as much as 63 percent of the total regional fisheries loss, if six proposed dams went ahead in Laos. The Xayaburi dam would be the first of those.
International Rivers, and environmental group that opposes the dam, said recently that consultations took place in Thailand and Vietnam over the proposed dam, but it is unclear whether any took place in Laos.
In March, 263 non-governmental groups from 51 countries submitted a letter to leaders from Laos and Thailand, which will derive power from the dam, asking that they scrap the Xayaburi project.
Sun Mao said more studies are necessary, especially now that Cambodia’s own civic groups have a better understanding of the issue.
“If there is construction of a mainstream dam, we are certain that we will be affected,” he said. “The scale of this we do not know.”
Read more!
Groups Unite To Push Changes to NGO Law
The groups said in a statement the law threatens civic freedoms and could curtail the activities of NGOs that are critical to the development of the country.
“NGOs and Associations stand ready to use our democratic rights to express our discontent through democratic and peaceful means,” the groups said. “The draft law we now see before us is unacceptable, and we cannot support it in its current form.”
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and other major international groups have called on the government to spike the law entirely, and US officials say they fear it is “unnecessary” and could curb basic freedoms.
Government supporters of the law, which is being drafted by the Ministry of Interior, say it is necessary to regulate a huge sector, where thousands of NGOs operate.
Opponents say the draft opens organizations to legal attack without redress for government dissent and could hurt smaller groups that want to form associations.
“We would like to point out three main areas of concern in the current second draft Law,” the groups said in their joint statement. “Registration is mandatory and complex, rather than voluntary and simple. There is no appeal process for the denial of registration and key terms in the law are left undefined, and many sections are vague.”
“I think that it can affect the freedom in the establishment of associations that is guaranteed by the constitution and the freedom in expression that is guaranteed by the constitution,” said Sok Samoeun, executive director of the Cambodian Defenders Project.
NGOs say their recommendations made during a consultative process were not given credence and that new drafts did not address their concerns.
In their statement, the 300 groups did not call for a scrapping of the law altogether, but urged the government to “reconsider” their key requests and redraft the law.
Nouth Sa An, secretary of state for the Ministry of Interior, said he was accepting recommendations before sending the draft for approval from Interior Minister Sar Kheng. After that, the law will be sent to the Council of Ministers for approval before debate. Read more!
JSM completes sale of Cambodia portfolio
StockMarketWire.com - JSM Indochina has completed the disposal of its Cambodia assets with agreed sale of its Siem Reap leasehold interest to Hongkong Land (Singapore).
Siem Reap is currently held by JSM's subsidiary, JSM Holdings (Cambodia).
The deal follows the conditional sale of Colonial Mansion I&II land and buildings, the Embassy land, and the Ounalom land announced on 7 April.
These, together with Siem Reap, represent all of JSM's assets in Cambodia.
The gross consideration payable to JSM for the disposal of Siem Reap is $2,000,000 in cash.
This includes an amount in respect of certain indirect taxes which may be payable.
If applicable, the indirect taxes are expected not to exceed $200,000.
Read more!
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Costello linked to environmental controversy
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Reporter: Zoe Daniel
A company associated with Peter Costello has been accused of threatening endangered wildlife in Cambodia.
Transcript
ALI MOORE: A $600 million agribusiness proposal by a company associated with former treasurer Peter Costello is facing opposition from environmental activists in Cambodia who claim it will disrupt a significant wildlife corridor and put endangered animals at risk.
The company behind the banana plantation and reforestation project in Cambodia's Cardamom Mountains says it will be sustainable while providing jobs and generating much needed export income.
But there's concern about the location of the project, on one of the last unbroken forest corridors in the region.
South East Asia correspondent Zoe Daniel reports.
ZOE DANIEL: It's about an hour by chopper from the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh to the Cardamom Mountains.
Factories and then rice paddies stretch from the city to the foothills. But the mountains are barely accessible by road and apart from illegal timber cutting, these forests have been regenerating since they were last logged more than a decade ago.
Why is this area so important?
SUWANNA GAUNTLETT, CEO, WILDLIFE ALLIANCE: It's very important. It's the last left between these two bodies of the forest.
ZOE DANIEL: With its own rangers and government backing, NGO Wildlife Alliance has been protecting the area from poachers, illegal settling and logging. Now the NGO’s founder, Suwanna Guantlett, is opposing the Australian proposal for a 5,000-hectare banana plantation and 20,000-hectare reforestation project.
The issue is the location.
SUWANNA GAUNTLETT: This is the continuous forest cover.
ZOE DANIEL: The company planning the developments says there's no forest of value on the site. But the unbroken tree link between the two mountain ridges is clearly visible from the air.
The southern Cardamom Mountains have been selectively logged in the past, but this area is said to be one of only seven unbroken elephant corridors in Asia and the planned plantation is right on it.
According to environmental groups, the increasing number of land concessions granted for farming nearby mean Asian elephants, unique turtles and crocodiles are all struggling for habitat. Despite obvious signs of prior clearing, activists see this as a sensitive area that's slowly recovering.
SUWANNA GAUNTLETT: As you can see, it is a forest with grass land and bushland. It was indeed a former logging concession.
ZOE DANIEL: Plans for a high-tech drip-irrigated plantation to export bananas as well as a replanting project to give migrating elephants a new pathway have so far failed to win support from critics.
SUWANNA GAUNTLETT: That reforestation they're talking about doing alongside the banana plantation is also where the company says the elephant corridor will be moved to. My first answer is no because that is a populated area and elephants will not migrate and move through a populated area. They won't.
ZOE DANIEL: Would it be fair to say that it is the location that you have a problem with, so no matter what safeguards the company put in place, you still won't be happy with the location that they've picked?
SUWANNA GAUNTLETT: I think you've summarised it exactly.
ZOE DANIEL: Elephants are already increasingly in conflict with humans in Cambodia. A few like this female, Lucky, are in the care of rescuer Nick Marx. She was being attacked by village people for roaming through their small scale banana plots.
NICK MARX, WILDLIFE ALLIANCE: She had serious battery acid burns on her head because they were trying to get rid of her, throwing car battery acid on her.
ZOE DANIEL: He says plans to divert elephants away from the planned plantation by reforesting land near local villages which villages will not work.
NICK MARX: More and more elephants are going to come into conflict with humans. This is inevitable.
ZOE DANIEL: Australian company BKK partners is a corporate and financial advisory service with expertise in areas such as foreign investment and governance. Former treasurer Peter Costello is listed as managing director and partner. The company has an office in Phnom Penh which is advising Indo-China Gateway Capital on developing the $600 million agribusiness fund planning the plantation.
Our requests for an interview were declined. The company also denied that Mr Costello is involved in the project, although he was in Cambodia promoting it last year.
PETER COSTELLO, FORMER TREASURER: One of the things that BKK does is it is managing an investment by Indo-China gateway which is raising funds for a very major agricultural investment here in Cambodia.
ZOE DANIEL: He gave this interview to the Phnom Penh Post which is still on the newspaper's website.
PETER COSTELLO: BKK has established a presence here in Phnom Penh. We have a full time resident director.
ZOE DANIEL: Cambodia desperately needs economic development to increase the standard of living. The company says the banana project will generate up to 7,500 jobs. But when we visited these local villages they were still unsure whether the impact will be positive. They hunt and forage in the forest to survive.
CHAN SAO, VILLAGE CHIEF (translated): Also, we can't raise animals in the forest like cows and Buffalo. If we lose our land this is our big concern.
ZOE DANIEL: This man told us other developers have promised jobs at their sugar cane plantations on the forest edge, but initial wages were soon cut.
VILLAGER (translated): The company provides people with jobs, but they don't last long. At the beginning wages are good, but sooner or later the amount paid goes down.
ZOE DANIEL: Potential Chinese and Korean investors have visited this village, but the people say no one from an Australian company has been to see them.
Departing the area, we fly over clear-felled land being prepared for sugar cane plantations just outside the boundary of the forest reserve.
Indo-China Gateway submitted a formal application to develop the banana plantation in December and is now awaiting a permit.
Zoe Daniel, Lateline.
Read more!
The Eccentricity of Evil: A Khmer Rouge Leader Goes on Trial
Kaing Guek Eav, best known by the revolutionary alias Duch, is also a war criminal and mass killer. He has freely admitted he was responsible for the murder of over 12,000 people as head of the Khmer Rouge secret police and commandant of the S-21 security center, where perceived enemies of the regime were sent to be tortured into submission and "smashed." Over two years and ten months at the helm of the notorious prison, Comrade Duch ordered his captives to be waterboarded, their genitals electrocuted, and their toenails pulled out before sending nearly all of them, blindfolded, to be stabbed in the neck or clubbed to death in a field outside of Phnom Penh.
The case initially looked like a slam dunk -- a simple trial that could be wrapped up fast, initiating a cathartic national discussion in a country that was mired in civil war with the Khmer Rouge until 1998. The evidence against Duch, after all, was overwhelming: when the Khmer Rouge fled Phnom Penh in January 1979, Duch--a compulsive record-keeper -- left behind thousands of forced confessions that he had annotated in red ink: "beat her 40 times with the rattan stick," "medical experiment," "smash them to pieces." In the confessions, known as "autobiographies," Duch's prisoners inevitably admit to being agents of the KGB, CIA or the Vietnamese government and to having undermined the regime's radical plans for agricultural productivity and social harmony. The documents are mesmerizing today for their utter implausibility (one 19-year-old nurse, after being tortured, claimed the CIA had sent her on a mission to defecate in the operating theater of a Phnom Penh military hospital).
It was partly because of this extensive evidence that the UN-backed Khmer Rouge tribunal--established in 2006 to try senior leaders of the Khmer Rouge regime and "those most responsible" for crimes committed under it--decided to prosecute Duch first. The regime's four top living leaders--including "Brother Number 2" Nuon Chea and Foreign Minister Ieng Sary--remain in jail awaiting the beginning of their own trial this summer. They are all older and frailer than Duch, further removed from the killings, and far less contrite, having largely denied the accusations against them.
Duch's trial, which unfolded over the course of nine months in 2009, at first proceeded smoothly. Following a strategy devised by Francois Roux, his French defense lawyer and an experienced practitioner of judicial stagecraft, Duch apologized to his victims dozens of times, sometimes in dramatically self-lacerating fashion.
Under Roux's tutelage, Duch cried in court, made a tearful pilgrimage to the Killing Fields, and even--after an extended and theatrical courtroom dialogue with his lawyer--invited victims to visit him in his jail cell. It was an elaborate defense modeled on the precedent of Albert Speer--the Nazi architect who escaped a death sentence at Nuremberg because of his acceptance of moral responsibility.
Throughout the trial, Duch systematically upstaged everyone with his extraordinarily active participation in his own defense, and his odd zeal for setting the record straight, even at his own expense. Never deviating from a math-teacherish uniform of slacks and button-down shirts, he offered the court extensive commentary and analysis on his own life and character, and at times made helpful corrections -- serving variously as historian, analyst, mathematician, expert witness, character witness and trial monitor.
Nearly every day he would rise, clutching a binder full of the court documents and mimeographed S-21 confessions he had been poring over, to highlight inaccuracies in witness testimony, correct the courtroom translators, or admonish lawyers for repetitive questioning. He frequently recited eight-digit documentation ID numbers from memory, while some lawyers struggled to produce the numbers at all.
Inexact figures seemed to irk him in particular. When a prosecutor referred to a length of time as "26 or 27 years," Duch retorted, "Could you please make a proper mathematical calculation?" Earlier, he told judges that had selected his revolutionary name from a children's book about a very obedient child called Duch. "I liked the name Duch because I wanted to be a well-disciplined boy who respected the teachers, who wanted to do good deeds," he said. He was in his mid-20s at the time.
Duch explained to the court that he was chosen to be a prison chief because of his ability "to pay attention to whatever I was assigned to do meticulously." "In my entire life, if I do something I'll do it properly," he said.
The Open Society Justice Initiative wrote in a report on the trial, "Duch's behavior at trial again displayed a desire to be seen as exceedingly cooperative with the court, as if he were attempting to exchange his old role with that of the perfect defendant." A particularly telling moment, the report continued, "occurred when Duch thanked expert David Chandler for praising his professionalism in running S-21, seemingly still believing that professionalism in the running of a torture and execution camp was a high compliment."
Out of hundreds of hours of testimony from prison survivors, experts, and Duch himself, a clear and unnerving portrait of him emerged: this killer of thousands was, above all else, a good student. It seems to have been this quality, rather than greed or blood lust or even pure revolutionary fervor, that drove him to manage operations at S-21 so carefully, so meticulously, that only a handful of prisoners survived.
That's why everyone was stunned when, on the 77th and last day of his trial, Duch took on the most unlikely role of all: the bad student.
When called upon to give a final statement, he abruptly abandoned Roux's strategy of remorse and, and instead demanded that the court release and acquit him. Duch's behavior and public statements up to this point had been as good as a guilty plea, and his trial had seemed to be headed toward a predictable ending: a commuted sentence in exchange for cooperation, contrition and conversation.
But instead of apologizing once again to his victims, he launched into a dry, technical discourse on the history of the Communist Party in Cambodia and its leaders--which did not include him. He said that as he was not a senior leader he could not have been "most responsible" for crimes committed at S-21. He asked to be acquitted in the name of national reconciliation--the favored buzzword here for the process of integrating former Khmer Rouge cadres into Cambodian society.
Stunned judges asked him to clarify his statement. He obeyed: "I would like the chamber to release me."
Duch subsequently fired Roux and tried to replace him with a Chinese lawyer who understood Communism (Defendants at the tribunal, which is jointly administered by the Cambodian government and the UN, have the right to one local and one international lawyer). When a Chinese defender could not be procured, he engaged a second Cambodian. Together, the new defense team has pursued a one-note legal strategy: insisting over and over again that Duch was a mid-level cadre and therefore should not be prosecuted.
In July 2010, the tribunal found Duch guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity, sentencing him to 35 years in prison. (Due to mitigating circumstances and time served, he will spend less than 19 years in jail; prosecutors have called this figure "manifestly inadequate.")
Late last month, appeal hearings were held, bringing Duch before the court once again. Reading from copious handwritten notes and once again deftly reciting long strings of document ID numbers, he argued on his behalf better than his own bumbling lawyers, urging judges to release him "for the sake of national reconciliation among my people."
"You must...seek justice and truth for the Cambodian people as well as for the former Khmer Rouge soldiers and cadres, especially the middle class who do not fall within the jurisdiction of this tribunal," he concluded.
It was a poor legal argument, but one that was cleverly phrased to echo the government's stance on the tribunal: that, in the name of national reconciliation, no further prosecutions will be allowed to take place, period. Hun Sen, Cambodia's strongman prime minister, who was himself a Khmer Rouge cadre before internal purges prompted him to flee to Vietnam in 1977, announced in 2009 that more trials could revive the civil war and kill "200,000 to 300,000 people."
Although United Nations prosecutors have identified five additional suspects they would like to see tried for genocide and war crimes, those cases have been stalled in the tribunal's investigation chamber, hindered by the fact that Cambodian staff refuse to participate in them. Court observers say the cases are likely to be dismissed soon.
Out of paranoia or pride, the government has also refused to allow several top officials who are former mid-ranking members of the Khmer Rouge to give evidence before the tribunal, although none of them has been implicated in crimes. Hun Sen flatly told visiting UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon in October that no new trials would be permitted. Neither Mr Ban nor the international community, which funds the court's multi-million dollar budget, seemed to particularly care.
Because of all this behind-the-scenes political wrangling, Duch's dramatic change of stance has raised persistent whispers that he may now be taking orders from someone else--especially since his lead Cambodian counsel, Kar Savuth, also happens to be Hun Sen's family lawyer. But a large part of his turnabout can likely be attributed to his idiosyncratic personality. With his penchant for calculation, astonishing head for detail, and incapacity to process human emotion, he often comes across as mildly autistic. Decades after he committed his crimes, Duch is still unable to understand how the behaviors he values most--dedication to a higher cause, unfailing obedience to superiors, and pride in a job well done--can be entirely wrong.
Given his defiant new stance, his victims are unlikely to get the contrition they seek. But thanks to Duch¹s loquacity throughout the trial, and his obsession with getting the facts right, Cambodia and the world have gleaned not just a fuller understanding of the machinery of death he headed, but also a portrait of one brutal regime's slavishly obedient, ferociously meticulous executioner.
Read more!
Monday, April 11, 2011
Good News for Cambodian Gibbons!
Pleased that the prime minister has taken the environmental impact into account, Suwanna Gauntlett, of the conservation NGO Wildlife Alliance, says: "We applaud the courageous decision of the prime minister to see the greater value of the forest as it currently stands."
The move has been welcomed by locals and environmentalists who were concerned for both the biodiversity of this forested area and also the continued well-being of nearby communities who depend on it. The proposed project had planned to locate the mine in the way of a migration trail used traditionally by Cambodia's largest population of Asian elephants.
The local communities have spent years avoiding deforestation and poaching to develop alternatives such as viable eco-tourism packages. These forests are famously rich in wildlife and, according to the IUCN Red List , there are several endangered species found in the Cardamom Mountains. These include: the Asian elephant (Elephas maximums), Indochinese tiger (Panthera tigris corbetti), Malayan sun bear (Helarctos malayanus) and Pileated gibbon (Hylobates pileatus). Also in this forest, the Siamese crocodile (Crocodylus siamensis), classified as "critically endangered", has one of its last refuges.
Wildlife Alliance and a Cambodian newspaper had questioned a claim by the mining company that its project would generate US$1.3 billion dollars a year.
Read more!
NGOs in Cambodia set to struggle for survival
Excessive regulation of NGOs is threatening to undermine the efforts of aid agencies in Cambodia, warns the new head of a leading German development foundation in Phnom Penh.
Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and other NGOs say Cambodia's draft law regulating associations and non-governmental organizations should be abandoned on the grounds that it will undermine rather than promote civil society in the country. Dozens of international organizations working in Cambodia have called on international donors to make strong public and private statements opposing the law. Deutsche Welle spoke to the new head of the Heinrich Böll Foundation in Phnom Penh, Manfred Hornung, about the implications of the legislation.
Deutsche Welle: You've been living in Cambodia for several years now. Some rights groups say that there's been a pattern of repression in the country over the last decade. What do you feel is the current situation in the country as far as democracy, human rights and civil society are concerned?
Manfred Hornung: There has been a very obvious trend in several sectors to restrict political and societal freedom on a large scale. A number of laws have been passed, among them the laws on NGOs and the passage of the criminal procedure law which was supposed to regulate certain sectors but turned out to be very restrictive in many ways.
A new law that Cambodia is set to put in practice this month will make it even harder for NGOs and foreign organizations to get registered. What does it mean for civil society in Cambodia if unregistered NGOs are prohibited from operating?
Informal groups are taking over roles and services that are really vital for Cambodian society. These groups are now being forced to register under very stringent conditions. Many individuals forming these groups are illiterate and have no connection to government structures, which will put a huge burden on civil life in Cambodia. The main problem is that no civil society life will be possible without registration, which is unconstitutional and in practical terms will curtail a lot of freedom in Cambodian society.
Will it also impact on foreign NGOs such as the Böll foundation and the work they do?
It's not a major problem for us as such, what I'm worried about is the future of our counterparts and partners. We work very closely with informal groups, students, rural communities in the north east that are now being forced to register. It will be very interesting for us to see if these groups become illegal because they don't have the capacity or might be frightened to register.
What are the biggest challenges in the areas that the Böll foundation wants to tackle in Cambodia?
We focus on gender democracy; we want to encourage women to become more pro-active and active in the political process of the country, and we are also working on resource governance issues with a focus on the north east. We try to combine these two issues, to give women the opportunity to become active in the resource governance sector in political institutions of the country. This is a very controversial area, as there is a lot of land grabbing happening at the moment.
You mention land-grabbing, how difficult or dangerous is it to work under these kinds of conditions?
Again I'd like to focus on our partners, on the people in the countryside. The allocation of land, the granting of land concessions is very opaque and it goes to the core of the livelihoods of the people. And this is why it is so important that these people who work on these issues and topics for the benefit of their communities are allowed to remain active and stay in the process. This [NGO] law will kill a lot of the initiatives to protect the communities in these areas.
Half of the national budget of Cambodia comes from development assistance. Do you think donors could influence the government not to implement this law?
I think we are talking here about responsibilities. Clearly the international community has funded a lot of projects targeted towards building up civil society after the tragic period in Cambodia's history. A lot of effort and money has been poured in. And with that, I think the international donor community should take this responsibility to try its upmost to find a law that serves the people in the countryside and helps them to remain active in this societal area. Influencing the government is outside the control of the donor community.
So they shouldn't pull out of Cambodia and stop financing?
You shouldn't pull out, but staying also means taking responsibilities, it means you work in specific sectors, if you see a negative trend or one that is not in line with your vision and mission, you need to intervene, you need to work in the political sphere. I think political dialogue needs to continue, real dialogue, where you get to the core of these issues.
How hopeful are you that the conditions for democracy, human rights, and an active civil society in Cambodia are going to improve?
There are many variables in that question. It is about political development, future of the government in general. At the moment I have the feeling that many of these organisations try to anticipate things and then take action accordingly, and these actions are not in line with their visions or missions or mandates. And this should not happen. I see it as a process, you work and if you stay true to yourself and your partners, they will realise and cherish that.
Interview: Sarah Steffen/tkw
Editor: Guy Degen
Read more!
Thai-Cambodian conflict sets precedent for ASEAN, chairman says
Bangkok - The Thai-Cambodian border dispute has set a precedent for regional problem solving by the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Indonesian foreign minister said Monday.
Indonesia, which now holds the rotating chairmanship of ASEAN, has been active over the past two months in promoting a ceasefire and facilitating talks between Thailand and Cambodia over their joint claims to a plot of land adjacent to an 11th-century Hindu temple on their border and hosted talks Thursday and Friday between them in Bogor.
'I think we have the potential for this episode to have a silver lining, a positive long-term impact in the sense that we are setting a precedent,' Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa said in Bangkok.
ASEAN has in the past maintained a stance of non-interference in it 10 member states' internal or bilateral affairs, raising questions about the group's effectiveness as a regional problem solver.
'I think it has had a potentially positive impact, for it shows ASEAN for the first time addressing an issue of this type directly and not simply producing documents,' Natalegawa said.
Both Cambodian and Thailand are members of ASEAN, which also includes Brunei, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam.
Preah Vihear temple has been a bone of contention between Thailand and Cambodia for the past five decades, leading to a cessation of diplomatic ties in 1958.
The two countries agreed to have the sovereignty spat settled at the International Court, which in 1962 ruled that the temple belonged to Cambodia.
Fighting broke out between Thai and Cambodian troops near the temple February 4-7, killing three Thais and five Cambodians and leaving dozens wounded on both sides.
The conflict raised questioned about solidarity within ASEAN, which is striving to be an economic community similar to the European Union by 2015.
Although Indonesia has played a role in bringing both sides to the negotiating table, Thailand and Cambodia remained at loggerheads over joint claims to a 4.6-square-kilometre plot of land adjacent to Preah Vihear that was not including in The Hague's 1962 ruling.
Nalalegawa was in Bangkok to lead an ASEAN foreign ministers meeting on the upcoming East Asia Summit, one of Asia's pivotal security forums, which Indonesia is to host in October or November.
Read more!
CAMBODIA: Rural poor most at risk from rabies
KAMPOT, 1 April 2011 (IRIN) - Yinn Siet, 65, recalls in horror when a snarling dog bit her husband four years ago. Before he died, the farmer hallucinated and convulsed. “He barked like a dog,” she said. “We put a chain on him and locked him up.”
He had contracted rabies, a virus that kills nearly all victims who develop symptoms.
Yinn could not afford to bring her husband to the capital Phnom Penh, the only city in Cambodia that has a centre offering free treatment.
Even if she had, it would have been too late.
He left behind his family of seven, who are struggling to make ends meet through farming.
Cambodians in the countryside have little access to treatment for rabies, a preventable disease that disproportionately affects the rural young and poor.
If dog-bite victims do not seek immediate treatment, they are likely to die. The virus is untreatable after symptoms appear, which can be anything from 10 days to a year after being bitten.
“The loss of a family member to rabies has a profound psychological impact on the family,” said Deborah Briggs, head of the Global Alliance for Rabies Control, a US-based NGO. “The disease is frightening and it is devastating to watch a loved one die.” In 2007, the most recent year data are available, 810 human rabies deaths may have occurred in Cambodia, says a study in Neglected Tropical Diseases, a science journal.
The number is only an estimate. Hundreds of cases in the countryside go unreported, because patients are rarely hospitalized and tend to die at home.
The estimated rabies mortality for 2007 exceeded that of malaria (240 deaths) and dengue fever (400 deaths), the study said.
The report concluded that free post-exposure prophylaxis, an injection after a bite that prevents infection, is really only relevant for residents of Phnom Penh. Injections must be administered promptly, usually within 10 days of an infection.
The Pasteur Institute, a non-profit medical research and treatment centre in Phnom Penh, is the only institution in Cambodia offering free post-exposure treatments.
The rural poor often cannot afford lengthy and expensive visits to the capital and therefore miss out on the free treatment.
“We see maybe five patients per year who arrive with symptoms,” says Philippe Buchy, head of the virology unit at the Pasteur Institute, “and the only thing we can do is to send them to Calmette Hospital where they will die after few days.”
The fact that poor people are most susceptible to rabies means campaigns against the virus tend to be given lower priority, said François-Xavier Meslin, the Geneva-based team leader for neglected zoonotic diseases at the World Health Organization (WHO).
Epidemiology
Warm-blooded mammals, mostly dogs, spread the virus through bites, scratches, and licks on open wounds.
Typically between 10 days and a year after exposure, patients experience insomnia, headaches, a fever, and twitching around their wound.
Two to 10 days after those first signs appear, they hallucinate, have seizures, become fearful at the sight of water and experience paralysis. Most rabies patients die from respiratory failure.
Each year, about 55,000 people around the world die from rabies. More than 80 percent of cases are in Asia, according to WHO, which says half of all human rabies deaths occur in children under 15.
“Every one of those deaths could have been prevented as we have the vaccines… available to save their lives before clinical signs begin,” Briggs told IRIN.
In Bali, Indonesia, authorities culled 100,000 dogs to prevent the spread of rabies by shooting poison blow darts at them, but the authorities halted this policy last September in favour of a mass inoculation programme of 400,000 dogs (70 percent of the island’s dog population).
WHO’s Meslin does not advocate killing dogs because it is “inhumane,” he told IRIN.
In Cambodia, the Pasteur Institute recommends setting up a national rabies control programme to improve disease surveillance and access to treatment. It also recommends starting vaccination campaigns for dogs.
Read more!
Sunday, April 10, 2011
RPT-Cambodia probes mass fainting of workers at Puma suppliers
By Prak Chan Thul
PHNOM PENH, April 10 (Reuters) - Cambodian authorities began an investigation on Sunday into the mass fainting of about 800 workers at two factories that produce footwear for German sporting goods group Puma .
Workers suddenly fell sick on Saturday night and again on Sunday morning at Universal Apparel (Cambodia) Co Ltd and Huey Chuen (Cambodia) Corp Ltd, which labour officials and workers identified as suppliers to Puma.
"I was just feeling exhausted and dizzy," Keopich Panha, a hospitalised 19-year-old shoe stitcher at Huey Chuen.
Phnom Penh Police Chief Touch Naruth told Reuters his officers and the Labour Ministry were investigating the factories, where workers such as Keopich Panha typically earn about $61 a month.
"It could have been the workers were too tired. We will also look at work environment issues and whether there was enough air or oxygen," he added. "We don't know the conclusion yet."
Worker Soeum Ny, 24, said the smell from materials used in the manufacturing of sport shoes may have made workers sick.
"We are used to it now. This affects our health but there is nothing we can do," she said.
Moeun Tola, head of the labour unit at the nonprofit Community Legal Education Center, said mass fainting is a problem in Cambodia's textile industry because rules requiring factories to be monitored are not enforced.
"The government has to strictly monitor these factories," Moeun Tola said.
Garment manufacturing is Cambodia's third-biggest currency earner after agriculture and tourism. More than 210,000 textile workers went on strike last year over the government's attempt to regulate trade unions.
Cambodian factories produce clothes for many Western brands, including Gap Inc , Nike Inc and Inditex Group , the world's biggest clothing retailer and owner of Zara.
Officials at Puma were not immediately available to comment. (Editing by Jason Szep and Miral Fahmy)
Read more!
Saturday, April 09, 2011
Turtle Known Only From Asian Markets Finally Found in Wild
By Brandon Keim
Stuart and other researchers weren’t starting from scratch, however. From the location of markets where C. picturata was sold, they figured the turtles were captured in southern Vietnam or across the border in Cambodia. The turtle also resembled two other known box turtle species, Cuora galbinifrons and Cuora bourretti. Genetic comparisons proved their relation.Those other turtles live in wet forests with closed canopies. The place best fitting that description in southern Vietnam was the Langbian plateau, at the southern tip of the Truong Son mountains — and C. bourreti lived in the central part of the mountains, with C. galbinifrons to the north.
The puzzle pieces were coming together, and there was one more clue. Where C. galbinifrons lived, so did Hylobates leucogenys, a species of gibbon, and Pygathrix nemaeus, a species of douc langur. Likewise, where C. bourretti lived, so did a Hylobates species closely related to the northern gibbons, and a Pygathrix species closely related to the northern doucs. Such so-called “co-occurences” result from historic events — a new river, a climate change — that split ancestral populations into separate groups. The Langbian plateau also had its own unique gibbon and douc langur; if the pattern held, C. picturata should be its box turtle.
But though Stuart could guess where C. picturata might be, he still needed help finding it. Enter Tri Ly, a biologist at the University of Science in Ho Chi Minh City, who had just finished his undergraduate studies and approached Stuart in search of a project.
Ly traveled to the Langbian plateau, where he interviewed villagers and met with hunters. In July of 2010, the first expedition set off. Hunting dogs were used to find turtles in the dense jungle foliage, but their barks were often false alarms: the group found king cobras, mouse deer, squirrels, monkeys — but no turtles.
Finally, on July 5, 2010, hiding from the dogs under a pile of dry leaves at the base of a rattan bush on the slope of a hill, was a single female C. picturata, seen for the first time in the wild. “I was totally amazed and elated,” said Tri Ly.
Three separate expeditions recovered a total of eight turtles, firmly establishing the Langbian plateau as their home. Unfortunately, the turtles’ habitat is being lost to agriculture and coffee plantations, but the findings are an essential first step toward conservation.
Beyond knowing what places need protection, conservationists now know where turtles bred in captivity can be released. Without this knowledge, C. picturata could end up in the conservation equivalent of life support, bred in captivity in perpetuity.
Stuart and Ly hope their efforts will inspire other biologists in southeast Asia, which is currently experiencing what’s known as the “Asian turtle crisis“: Millions of turtles are sent each year to China, threatening many species with extinction. At least three other box turtle species — C. zhoui, C. mccordi and C. yunnanensis — are known only from markets.
“It is hoped that focused field efforts such as ours will soon identify the mysterious origins of these other rare species that are known to scientists only by turtles bearing price tags,” wrote Stuart and Ly.
Images: 1) Female Vietnamese box turtle (Biological Conservation). 2) A map of southeast Asia and the box turtles’ ranges (Biological Conservation).
Monkeys main reservoir of human malaria in Southeast Asia
A study led by an Indian-origin scientist has warned that monkeys infected with an emerging malaria strain are providing a reservoir for human disease in Southeast Asia.
It confirmed that the species has not yet adapted to humans and that monkeys are the main source of infection.
Previously thought to only infect monkeys, the researchers have shown that human P knowlesi infections are widely distributed in Southeast Asia and that it is a significant cause of malaria in Malaysian Borneo.
Until now, it was not clear whether the infection is transmitted from person to person, or is passed over from infected monkeys.
Researchers led by Prof Balbir Singh at the Malaria Research Centre, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, collaborating with Sarawak State Health Department, St George's University of London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, examined blood samples from 108 wild macaques from different locations around the Sarawak division in Malaysian Borneo.
Their results revealed that 78% were infected with the P knowlesi species of malaria parasite, and many were infected with one or more of four other species of monkey malaria parasites that have not yet been found in humans.
By comparing the molecular identity of the parasites from monkeys and those isolated from patients with knowlesi malaria, the team were able to build a picture of the evolutionary history of the parasite and its preferred host.
Their analysis reveals that transmission of the knowlesi species is more common amongst wild monkeys, than from monkeys to humans, and that monkeys remain the dominant host.
"Our findings strongly indicate that P knowlesi is a zoonosis in this area, that is to say it is passed by mosquitoes from infected monkeys to humans, with monkeys acting as a reservoir host," said Singh.
"However, with deforestation threatening the monkeys' habitat and increases in the human population, it's easy to see how this species of malaria could switch to humans as the preferred host. This would also hamper current efforts aimed at eliminating malaria," he added.
Based on the molecular data, the researchers estimate that the knowlesi malaria species evolved from its ancestral species between 98 000 and 478 000 years ago.
This predates human settlement in the area, meaning that monkeys are mostly likely to have been the initial host for the parasite when the species first emerged.
This estimate also indicates that the species is as old as, or older than, the two most common human malaria parasites, P falciparum and P vivax.
The study is published in the journal PLoS Pathogens.
Read more!
Cambodia 'disappointed' by Thai stance on observers
JAKARTA : Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong yesterday expressed disappointment over Thailand's refusal to accept Indonesian military observers into the disputed area on the Thai-Cambodian border.
''If Thailand really wishes to have a ceasefire at the border, why should they hesitate to receive Indonesian observers?'' he asked reporters in Jakarta ahead of an Asean meeting on the relief response to tsunami-ravaged Japan.
''Every time there's an armed clash, they always accuse Cambodia of starting the fighting. If this is the case, why don't they accept Indonesia as a mediator?'' he said.
At an informal Asean Foreign Ministers' meeting on Feb 22, Thailand and Cambodia agreed to accept Indonesian observers into a flashpoint section of the border where heavy fighting erupted the same month.
But Thailand's military last month said the observers were not welcome in the 4.6-square-kilometre disputed area near 11th-century Preah Vihear temple because it was too dangerous and their presence would only complicate matters.
Hor Namhong said Thailand should respect Indonesia's role in the negotiations as Jakarta had received the UN Security Council's support.
''We have to respect the Asean chair's role in the negotiations. Indonesia as a chair has received the mandate from the UN Security Council,'' he said.
''I never can be optimistic with Thailand; it's very difficult to deal with them. I always trust Indonesia,'' he added.
A two-day Joint Boundary Commission (JBC) meeting of senior officials from the two countries held in Bogor, Indonesia, this week ended without
dhresolution.
''The border issue is very complex. The discussion process cannot possibly be solved in just one meeting,'' said Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa.
However, Thailand continued to urge Cambodia to resolve the border conflict through existing bilateral mechanisms.
Chavanond Intarakomalyasut, secretary to the foreign minister, said: ''We want Cambodia to use this mechanism to tackle future problems and prevent severe conflicts along the border.''
He said that the Bogor meeting was held on a bilateral basis and Indonesia did not interfere.
Mr Marty was at the venue but did not attend the talks, co-chaired by Thai delegation head Asda Jayanama and Cambodian Senior Official on Border Affairs Var Kimhong.
There was no mention of which country would host the next JBC meeting.
Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Kasit Piromya last night discussed with Mr Marty the details of the terms of reference for sending Indonesian observers to the Thai-Cambodian border.
The talk was held after Mr Kasit sent a letter to Mr Marty on Friday last week discussing how Thailand would take care of Indonesian observers.
Both Thailand and Cambodia have now agreed not to have any Indonesian observers stationed in the disputed area, said Mr Kasit, adding that the deal was reached after talking with Cambodia through Indonesia.
He said the details of the Terms of Reference would be announced to the cabinet shortly.
Read more!
Activists fight to stop dam across Mekong
By Dennis D Gray
BANGKOK
A plan for the first dam across the Mekong River anywhere in its meandering path through Myanmar, Laos, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam has set off a major environmental battle in Southeast Asia.
The $3.5 billion Xayaburi dam is slated for the wilds of northern Laos and would generate power mostly for sale to Thailand. The project pits villagers, activists and the Vietnamese media against Thai interests and the Laotian government in its hopes of earning foreign exchange in one of the world's poorest countries.
A decision on whether the dam gets the green light, is axed or deferred for further studies is expected April 19 during a meeting in the Laotian capital among Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and Cambodia.
Opponents warn it could open the way for 10 more dams being considered along the lower Mekong.
"Our lives and livelihoods depend on the health of the Mekong River," said Kamol Konpin, mayor of the Thai riverside town of Chiang Khan.
"As local people have already suffered from dams built upstream in China and watched the ecosystem change, we are afraid that the Xayaburi dam will bring more suffering."
China has placed three dams across the upper reaches of the Mekong, but otherwise its 3,000-mile (4,900-kilometer) mainstream flows free.
The Xayaburi would cut across a stretch of the river flanked by forested hills, cliffs and hamlets where ethnic minority groups reside, forcing the resettlement of up 2,100 villagers and impacting tens of thousands of others.
Environmentalists say such a dam would disrupt fish migrations, block nutrients for downstream farming and even foul Vietnam's rice bowl by slowing the river's speed and allowing saltwater to creep into the Mekong River Delta.
A Thai firm would build the 1,260 megawatt hydroelectric project. However, Thai villagers along the river are staging protests and planning to deliver letters to Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva and the Lao Embassy in Bangkok, where the Thai government has maintained an official silence on the issue.
Pianporn Deetes, of the U.S.-based International Rivers, said environmentalists are ready to take their case to court if Abhisit doesn't deliver a positive response.
Last month, 263 non-governmental organizations from 51 countries sent letters to the governments of Laos and Thailand urging that the project be shelved.
Laos said in February that the Xayaburi would be the "first environmentally friendly hydroelectric project on the Mekong" and that will "not have any significant impact on the Mekong mainstream."
"We are excited about this project," the statement said.
Vietnam's official media, in a rare disagreement with its communist neighbor, has blasted the dam, while scientists and environmental groups have called for its construction to be delayed for 10 years until more research is conducted.
"It seems that countries of the lower Mekong still haven't learned lessons from the impact of the Chinese dams," Pianporn said. "Xayaburi is so important because it could set off the destruction of the lower Mekong."
Since 2007, there have been proposals to put up 11 mainstream dams in Cambodia and Laos.
The Mekong River Commission, set up by the four Southeast Asian neighbors in 1995 to manage the river, has expressed serious reservations about Xayaburi. A study by the group recommended a 10-year moratorium on all mainstream dams, a stand supported by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton during a Southeast Asian trip earlier this year.
The commission cited feared damage to migrations of between 23 and 100 fish species, among a host of other environmental problems.
Another MRC document showed nobody spoke in favor of the dam during public consultations this year in Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand, while many officials, academics and residents cited problems or lack of information about the project. No consultation was held in Laos.
"If this project goes ahead it would be unimaginably irresponsible," said Ame Trandem of Rivers International.
Somkiat Khuengchiangsa, who has spent his life along the river and heads The Mekong-Lanna Natural Resources and Culture Conservation Network, said governments are more interested in the economics of the project than its effect on residents.
"Rivers are not the property of nations or groups of people. They belong to all mankind," he said.
Read more!
Friday, April 08, 2011
Cambodia PM nixes controversial mine project
PHNOM PENH (AFP) – Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has cancelled a controversial titanium mine project in the country's southwest because of environmental concerns, the government said Friday.
 |
| Cambodia priminister Hun Sen, seen here on April 1, cancelled a controversial a titanium mine project |
"Due to concerns about the impact on the environment and biodiversity as well as the living standards of the people... Hun Sen has banned the exploitation of a titanium mine in Koh Kong province," it said.
Wildlife Alliance, a conservation group that campaigned for months against the proposed mine, said it was "thrilled" with the decision.
"We were under the impression the battle was lost," communications officer John Maloy told AFP.
"We are very pleased that the prime minister has weighed the environmental impact."
He said the mine would have been located "directly in the middle of an elephant corridor" and a nearby eco-tourism village "stood to be ruined by the project".
Read more!
Thursday, April 07, 2011
Thai Military Not Participating In Thai-Cambodia Peace Talks
Members of the Thai-Cambodian Joint Boundary Commission are meeting Thursday in Indonesia to again address a dispute over land surrounding a Hindu temple built 900 years ago.
Indonesia, in its role as head of the Association of South East Asia Nations, negotiated a cease-fire after clashes in February that killed killed 10 people and displaced thousands. But now the Thai military is rejecting a key element of the agreement calling for Indonesian observers to be placed along the border. Missing in the peace talks between Thailand and Cambodia, in Indonesia, is the Thai military. Pavin Chachavalpongpun, with the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore, says that is because of a disagreement between the foreign ministry and military leaders in Thailand about how to deal with the border dispute.
"I think there is a clash between the two state agencies about the control over foreign policy,” Chachavalpongpun said. “And I think the military has disapproved of the foreign ministry policy towards Cambodia, which I think the military claim that it is a little bit too soft."
He says the dissension has prevented any further implementation of the cease-fire deal negotiated by Indonesian Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa in his role as head of ASEAN in February.
The two armies clashed over a disputed area next to a Hindu Khmer temple, a historical landmark that both countries consider part of their heritage. The cease-fire called for Indonesian observers to act as monitors in the disputed region. But the Thai military has resisted allowing foreign military observers into the area, saying the matter should be resolved on a bilateral basis without third party intervention.
Chachavalpongpun says, if an agreement can be reached to send in Indonesian observers, there are still a number of logistical and support issues to be worked out. But he does not see any progress happening without the participation of the Thai military.
"I don't know how this can be compromised, sending in observers with the military continuing to reject the role of Indonesia," he said. "Because, at the end of the day, the officers say we have to work hand in hand, not with the foreign ministry, but with the army and especially those soldiers in the area. I still cannot foresee how that will happen."
Still, he says Indonesia's efforts to facilitate and maintain a cease-fire have kept pressure on both sides to keep the peace.
Read more!
Donors Asked to Withhold Aid Over Proposed Law in Cambodia
By Seth Mydans
BANGKOK — A proposed law to control nongovernmental groups in Cambodia threatens to silence some of the last independent voices in an increasingly repressed nation, a group of leading international human rights agencies said Thursday.
Calling the proposal “the most significant threat to the country’s civil society in many years,” the agencies urged foreign nations and aid groups to oppose the law, which they said would undermine much of the nation-building work the donors have supported at a cost of billions of dollars.
The measure, which is moving toward enactment by Parliament, would for the first time require nongovernmental organizations of all types and sizes to register and to follow complex reporting procedures. The law would give the government new leverage to shut down any group it considers to be opposed to it.
Human rights advocates said the law would cap a long process during which Prime Minister Hun Sen has imposed controls over his political opponents, the security forces and the judiciary, leaving the independent groups and civil society the country’s only independent voices.
“Should this law pass as it is currently formulated, the survival of each and every N.G.O. in Cambodia will be at the whim of the government,” said Ou Virak, president of the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, referring to nongovernmental agencies that monitor and act on areas like human rights, legal affairs, the environment, land issues, public health and the role and rights of women.
“Emboldened by the legitimacy that they believe a law gives to abusive behavior, the government is likely to use the N.G.O. law to silence its people and to tighten its control on their daily lives,” he said. “The international community needs to act now, or Cambodia will continue in its march away from democracy and toward autocracy.”
Simon Taylor, director of Global Witness, an independent rights monitoring group, said the proposed law was a test of the commitment of donor nations and international agencies to the future of the civil society they had worked for two decades to foster.
“If the donors stand by while the government adopts this law, they cannot in good conscience claim to be working in the interests of Cambodia’s development objectives,” he said.
Despite Cambodia’s continuing pressures on human rights and its failure to control corruption, illegal logging and an epidemic of sometimes violent land seizures by powerful interests, international financial support for Mr. Hun Sen’s government has continued to increase.
At their most recent annual conference last June, donor nations and international agencies pledged $1.1 billion in aid for this year, a record amount, up from $950 million last year, despite widespread criticism that much of the money was misspent or diverted.
The aid is equal to roughly half the country’s official budget. In principle, it gives the international community leverage to maintain or strengthen basic freedoms and democratic institutions.
The amount has risen even as Cambodia’s economy has steadied itself and begun to grow, and even as China has matched Western donors with its own financial support, which comes unencumbered by the human rights conditions imposed by the West.
In December 2009, China awarded Cambodia $1.2 billion in aid and soft loans. That pledge came immediately after Cambodia deported 20 ethnic Uighur refugees to China over the strong objections of the United States and the United Nations, which called the deportation a violation of human rights.
“It must be remembered that the freedoms of association, expression and assembly in Cambodia are already heavily restricted, particularly at the community level,” said one of Cambodia’s oldest human rights groups, Licadho, in a separate report last week on the proposed law.
In their statement on Thursday, the international human rights agencies said that the strict financial conditions of the proposed law would disproportionately affect small groups with limited resources operating at the local level, “making them vulnerable to prosecution for carrying out legitimate activities without the proper legal status.”
The agencies voiced concern over what they called a lack of safeguards and meaningful judicial review mechanisms and pointed to the vague wording regarding a right of appeal of government sanctions.
Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch, said, “Cambodia’s proposed law could too easily be used to refuse registration or close down organizations that serve the public interest.”
“Over the past 20 years, the development of civil society has been one of Cambodia’s few enduring achievements,” he said. “This law threatens to reverse that progress.”
In the early 1990s, Cambodia emerged from two decades of civil war and mass killings by the Khmer Rouge, which left the country brutalized, without an educated class or civic institutions.
As part of a $2 billion nation-building effort, the United Nations established democratic forms of government and introduced standards of human rights that soon became a part of political discourse.
The concept and practice of human rights and political freedoms grew hand in hand with the introduction of the nongovernmental organizations that are now under threat.
Read more!
Cambodia fishermen save tourists off capsized boat
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — Cambodian police say fishermen rescued 92 foreign tourists whose boat capsized, apparently after drunken passengers started dancing and made the boat unstable.
The tourists hired the boat Thursday afternoon to go to an island near Sihanoukville beach.
Mat Soth, deputy police chief in Preah Sihanouk province, said it overturned soon afterward and four local fishing boats rushed to rescue the passengers and five Cambodian crew members.
He said everyone from the boat was rescued and no one was injured. Most or all of the tourists were Western, but Mat Soth said he had no details on their nationalities.
He said the initial investigation indicated the boat became unstable when a group of drunken passengers started dancing.
Read more!
Hilltown Ten Thousand Villages staffers visit artisans in Laos, Cambodia
By Erin DuBois
Associate Editor
With no electricity or running water, and sometimes even with no hands, villagers in Laos and Cambodia craft objects of beauty from the remnants of war. Deanna Husk, assistant manager at Ten Thousand Villages Souderton store, witnessed the transformation process during a trip Feb. 6 to 20 to visit some of the fair trade retailer’s international artisan partners.
 |
| Hilltown Ten Thousand Villages store assistant manager Deanna Husk at the Potter's wheel with Artisans |
“The smiles on their faces really touched my heart,” Husk said during a presentation at Dock Meadows retirement home in Hatfield March 29.
Check Chan has worked his way up from messenger to production manager despite the loss of both his hands. Many employees are hired with no education or training, and working at Rehab Craft Cambodia allows them to gain valuable skills.
“They are being provided something that no one can take away,” Husk said.
Artisans incorporate renewable resources into their handiwork, carving ornaments from dried coconut shells. They also make the silk ikat purses available in Ten Thousand Villages stores. The Rajana Association employs 40 full-time staff and supports 130 families living in rural villages, selling their products in its Cambodian shops as well as in Ten Thousand Villages stores.
Dove pendant necklaces are made from bomb casings, with the word “peace” in English and Khmer stamped on the wings.
“They are making something beautiful and making money from something that is still tragic in their lives,” Husk said.
The Rajana Association logo is three elephants, a symbol of joint labor and solidarity. In the rural villages, families work together to make soap, do metalwork and weave silk, often in difficult conditions.
One learning tour participant bought 100 small baskets, allowing a family to pay its electric bill. Villager Chin Sovann previously rode her bike an hour to get to work; but with her earnings she was able to buy a motorbike, reducing her commute to 20 minutes.
“Now she can spend more time at home with her family,” Husk said.
Husk learned to weave baskets in one village without the aid of a translator.
“That moment was beautiful because of the common language” of touching and smiling, Husk said.
At Phontong Handicrafts in Laos, silk weaving is no longer a dying art thanks to founder and director Kommaly Chanthavong. Chanthavong was nominated for the 2005 Nobel Peace Prize and was invited to Washington, D.C., to be honored by first lady Michelle Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for winning the 2011 International Woman of Courage Award, Husk said. Chanthavong grew up in one of the most impoverished regions of Cambodia, and her vision is to expand silk production into the poorer areas, engaging silk farmers in the entire production cycle, Husk said.
Her granddaughter, Phoukham, is currently working in the Ten Thousand Villages Souderton store through Mennonite Central Committee’s International Visitor Exchange Program. She arrived August 2010 and will continue until July, serving in all areas of the store’s daily operations, according to Husk.
“It’s a great way for her to see the items they make in Laos sold in the store,” Husk said.
Ten Thousand Villages partners with artisans in over 38 developing countries, creating income and bringing the artisans’ products as well as their stories into its markets, according to Husk. The goal is to develop long-term fair trade relationships, treating both the artisans and the environment with respect.
Artisans receive half of the purchase price in advance and are paid in full before their products are shipped, with Ten Thousand Villages paying shipping costs. Establishing long-term relationships allows artisans to depend on future pay so that they can invest in community development.
Ten Thousand Villages employees collaborate with artisans on product design so that the artisans’ traditions can be preserved and so that the environment will be protected by using renewable resources, Husk said.
Ten Thousand Villages, a nonprofit program of the Mennonite Central Committee, operates over 150 stores across the United States. The Souderton store, which was the third store to open, began in 1975.
For more information, visit Souderton.tenthousandvillages.com Read more!
Group Confirms Cluster Bomb Use by Thailand
The Coalition called on Cambodia and Thailand to prohibit the use of cluster bombs, which are scattered over a wide area and sometimes fail to detonate, leaving behind dangerous remnants.
Neither Cambodia nor Thailand are party to an international ban on such weapons.
“It’s appalling that any country would resort to using cluster munitions after the international community banned them,” Laura Cheeseman, director of the CMC, said in a statement. “Thailand has been a leader in the global ban on antipersonnel mines, and it is unconscionable that it used banned weapons that indiscriminately kill and injure civilians in a similar manner.”
The CMC said Thailand’s ambassador to the UN in Geneva confirmed the use of the cluster munitions in 155-mm artillery shells fired during deadly border fighting in February.
Thani Thongphakdi, a spokesman for the Thai Foreign Ministsry, told VOA Khmer Thursday the Thais had fired in “self defense” after Cambodia attacked with multiple rocket launchers.
“Both sides lost civilian property,” he said. “Cambodia’s BM21 multiple rocket launchers are very danger to Thai civilians. We had aimed at military targets, but not civilian targets.”
However, observers say civilians are now endangered by the munitions.
“There are around 5,000 people living in Sen Chey village that are at risk from these unexploded weapons,” Atle Karlsen of Norwegian People’s Aid said in CMC statement. “Thailand must supply information to help clear affected areas and make them safe for civilians to return home.”
Sao Cheth, who commands 30 Cambodian soldiers at Phnom Trop near the temple and was injured above the eye in February’s clashes, said he supported the group’s stance against the weapons.
“The condemnation is a right and fair thing, because the world has banned the use of cluster munitions,” he said.
Prak Phy, head of Samdech Hun Sen Natural Village, said residents there had suffered damage to their houses, property and rice fields, but no one has so far been injured by ordnance.
“I demand Thailand to be responsible for firing the cluster munitions in Cambodia, and I want Thailand to stop firing cluster munitions in Cambodia,” he said.
Authorities have explained to villagers not to touch unexploded munitions in the area, while the Cambodian Mine Action Center has set up warning signs around the dangerous areas, he said.
Read more!
Wednesday, April 06, 2011
Cambodian ex-king returns from China
PHNOM PENH - CAMBODIA'S ailing former king Norodom Sihanouk returned home on Wednesday from Beijing where he spent nine months receiving medical treatment, officials said. One of Asia's longest-serving monarchs, the revered king abruptly quit the throne in October 2004 in favour of his son, citing old age and health problems.
Prince Sisowath Chivan Monirak, deputy president of the Cambodian senate, told reporters Mr Sihanouk had kept his promise 'to come back for Khmer New Year' and that the ex-monarch's doctors 'had no problem' with his return to Cambodia.
The new year festivities, which start on April 14 and last for three days, are a popular time for families to get together. -- AFP
Read more!
Cambodia PM and ROTA officials inaugurate new school project
There are 15,000 crowd and 200 government officials attend ceremony
Essa Al Mannai: "The new Samdec-ROTA High Schools are built in line with our international commitment to provide quality education in countries which most need ROTA's assistance"
Doha, Qatar, 6 April 2011: The Prime Minister of Cambodia His Excellency Hun Sen joined Reach Out To Asia (ROTA) Director Mr. Essa Al Mannai, Cambodian government officials, 15,000 cheering community members and a team of ROTA representatives at the Inauguration Ceremony of the ROTA-funded new Samdech Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Sen- ROTA General and Technical High School in Vihear Suork, Kandal Province, Cambodia.
Emphasizing the ceremony's significance to the future of education in Cambodia, H.E The Prime Minister was joined by 200 government officials including The minister of Education and Ministry of Education representatives plus teachers, students and families as the local community celebrated the handover of ownership of the new Samdech High Schools.
"I have no doubt the new Samdech Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Se - ROTA General and Technical High School will become a centre of education excellence in the region. The old school - with primary, low secondary and high secondary schools in the same building - was overcrowded and running on a double shift System, the new ROTA school will cover the high secondary section which will reduce the pressure from the old school and all schools will be running on single shifts, accordingly the pressure on the teachers will be reduced and their productivity and teaching quality will be improved. The new schools are built in line with ROTA's international commitment to provide sustainable quality education in countries which most need Qatar's assistance," said Essa Al Mannai.
Located on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, the educational vision for Vihear Suork is to create an educational hub encompassing a secondary school, Vocational Training Institute and, in the long term, a University.?
Starting in July 2007, ROTA and its Cambodian partner the Monithapana Foundation and Monithapana Khasatch Kandal High School agreed plans to expand the old Vihear Suork Schools by building new primary, secondary and vocational schools. Recently renamed the Samdech Akka Moha Sena Padei Techo Hun Sen - ROTA General and Technical High School, the new name acknowledges the affection and respect the people of Cambodia have for H.E. The Prime Minister Hun Sen.
Construction of the new schools - which created temporary employment for 250 laborers and consultants, and long-term careers for 88 teachers and 18 school administration staff - began in 2009. Completed ahead of schedule in mid-November 2010, the new schools provide additional and improved access to primary and secondary education, as well as up-to-date technical skills, for 2,750 Cambodian youth each year.
With the potential to benefit more than 500,000 people in the surrounding community, the new Samdech High Schools campus boasts hi-tech science laboratories, fully equipped and multimedia enabled classrooms and a computer laboratory.
In addition, ROTA's commitment to Cambodia also provides consultancy to empower the school's administration, staff and children as they seek to identity income generation projects to increase the school's long-term financial autonomy and self sufficiency.
"Cambodia's 30-year struggle with civil war and socio-political unrest has left over 35% of the population living in poverty. ROTA's strategy enables children and youth to access primary and secondary education that is focused on local needs, thereby empowering communities with the tools to eradicate poverty by their own hands," said Essa Al Mannai.
The Samdech High Schools inauguration ceremony took place during a 5-day tour of ROTA projects in South East Asia by a team of ROTA representatives. During their stay in Cambodia, the ROTA Team visited a second project, the Kampot Traditional Music and Dance School in Kampot province. Founded in 1994, the school is unique in Cambodia as it provides cultural education focusing on traditional Khmer music, dance and vocational training to approximately 30 orphaned, disabled or vulnerable children, in addition to 170 students from the local community.
In partnership with the Khmer Cultural Development Institute (KCDI), ROTA supports the Kampot School management to integrate Cambodia's Policy on Alternative Care for Children and the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child into school policies.
"ROTA's work in Cambodia tackles two key challenges: providing access to education by funding construction of the Samdech High Schools, and helping the KCDI strengthen and improve its educational, administrative, financial, staff and student capacities," explained Essa Al Mannai.
Cambodia ranks among the poorest countries in the world (136th out of 179) and the country's 30+ year struggle with civil war and socio-political unrest has led to over 35% of the population living below the poverty line.
Barriers facing primary and secondary education in Cambodia include many children enrolled in school older than the recommended age (6 years), high number of primary school dropouts, numerous incomplete primary school buildings, low quality teacher training, lack of a sufficient core curriculum and widespread child labor.
"ROTA's mission in Cambodia is to achieve Qatar's contribution to the UNESCO Millennium Development Goals. It is important we never lose sight of quality and excellence, which is why the school has been constructed and equipped to the best standards, in line with sustainable global educational requirements," added Essa Al Mannai.
-Ends-
About ROTAReach Out To Asia is a non-profit organization launched in December 2005 in Doha, Qatar, by Her Excellency Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, daughter of His Highness the Emir of Qatar. Operating under the auspices of the Qatar Foundation, ROTA is committed to providing high quality and relevant primary and secondary education, encouraging relationships among communities, creating safe learning environments and restoring education in crisis affected areas across Asia and around the world. ROTA envisions a world, where all young people have access to the education they need in order for them to realize their full potential and shape the development of their communities.
Further information on Reach Out To Asia can be found at: www.reachouttoasia.org.
About Qatar FoundationFounded in 1995 by His Highness Sheikh Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Thani, Emir of Qatar, and chaired by Her Highness Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser Al Misned, Qatar Foundation is a private, non-profit organization committed to the principle that a nation's greatest natural resource is its people. The headquarters of Qatar Foundation are located within its flagship project, Education City. A fourteen million square-metre campus, Education City is home to numerous progressive learning institutions and centers of research, including branch campuses of six of the world's leading universities, plus a cutting-edge science and technology park. Qatar Foundation also works to enhance the quality of life in Qatar by investing in 'Education, Science and Technology and Community Health and Development'.
For further information please contact:
Krikor Khatchikian
Senior Account Manager
Cohn&Wolfe Public Relations, Doha, Qatar
Telephone: +974 4428 3177
Email: krikor.khatchikian@cohnwolfeqatar.com
Read more!
