German charge with aggravated beating of Cambodian wife

Phnom Penh - A German man was facing 10 to 20 years in a Cambodian jail after police allegedly rescued his wife in what they claimed Wednesday was one of the worst cases of domestic violence they had seen. Alvin Gossnol, 37, was arrested after police received complaints from his 38-year-old wife's family that she was being held against her will in their home and had been badly beaten.

Cheung Prey district police chief in the eastern province of Kampong Cham, Heing Vuthy, said the woman had managed to escape a room she had been locked in for two weeks but had been unable to scale the locked gate because her hands were broken.

"She managed to attract the attention of a boy who was passing and he ran to tell her relatives, who called the police," Vuthy said by telephone.

"After we pulled her over the wall, she told us when they married in 2001, her husband had made a special stick to beat her with. If she got the stick for him herself, he didn't beat her as badly, but if he had to get the stick, he beat her very seriously."

Police said Gossnol was at the home when they arrived but refused to open the gate. He only left the woman alone long enough for her to escape when their 8-month-old baby began crying.

"When we came back with a warrant, we found the stick, exactly as she had told us and it was still covered in her blood," Vuthy said.

The baby was rescued and returned to the mother, police said.

Gossnol, a pig farmer whose exact place of birth in Germany was not available, was jailed pending trial. Under Cambodian law he can be held up to six months pretrial.

"It is safe to say this man seems to have treated his pigs much better than his wife," Vuthy said.

Earlier this month Cambodia temporarily banned marriages of its nationals to foreigners, saying they feared often poor and under-educated women were especially vulnerable to abuse.

Divorce is still frowned upon in Cambodia, and the women also frequently feel a financial obligation to their families to stay with their foreign husbands no matter how bad it gets.
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Asia limits rice exports as prices and uncertainty rise

By David Montero

sia, home to many of the world's top rice suppliers, accounts for 76 percent of the 30 million tons of the staple food exported each year. Prices are shooting up worldwide, in part because many of those countries have cut back on exports due to fears of shortage. The food-price crisis has underscored that, as a region, Asia is divided into "rice haves" - where domestic production is enough to feed the population - and "rice have-nots," which consistently rely on imports. Correspondent David Montero provides a snapshot of rice supplies around the region:

HAVES

Thailand

Thailand is the world's largest exporter of rice, with 31 percent of the global market. In 2007, it exported 9.4 million tons of rice, out of a total 20 million tons produced. Unlike many Asian countries, it has not imposed any export restrictions, and this year it expects to export between 8.75 million and 9 million tons.

Yet prices of rice have doubled in the country since the beginning of the year, fueling fears of inflation and hoarding. But the government has stockpiled 2.1 million tons of rice, and no shortages are expected.

Vietnam

Vietnam is the second largest exporter of rice in the world, with about 20 percent of the global market. It has said it will limit exports of rice to 3.5 million tons, down from 4.5 tons last year. The announcement contributed to global prices of rice doubling since January. Consumer prices in Vietnam, meanwhile, increased by 20 percent in March, a 12-year record.

India

India exports about 4 million tons of rice a year, making it the world's third-largest exporter. But because food prices have risen by 8.3 percent in the past year, it has also imposed restrictions on exports of rice. That is putting a considerable strain on world prices and supplies, experts say.

Pakistan

Pakistan exported 3.3 million tons of rice last year, making it the fifth-largest exporter just behind the United States. But exports this year are expected to fall by 15 percent to 2.8 million, mainly due to power shortages, according to Pakistani officials.

Since rice is not a staple food in Pakistan - wheat is - the government has not placed the same kind of restrictions as other Asia countries. With rice in tight supply, many countries are pinning their hopes on Pakistan's exports.

China

China is the world's largest producer and consumer of rice, with annual supplies large enough to feed its population. It exported 1.4 million tons of rice last year. But food prices jumped 21 percent in March alone, and consumer prices reached an 11-year high in February of 8.7 percent. To dampen price increases, China imposed strict export restrictions on rice, which is expected to result in a drop of 300,000 tons to the global market. This week it also imposed a six-month tariff on fertilizer exports, to help shore up domestic supply.

Cambodia

Cambodia produced 3.6 million tons of rice last year, according to official estimates. Two million are needed for domestic consumption, leaving Cambodia with about 1.6 million tons in surplus. Last year it exported 450,000 tons of rice, according to the US Department of Agriculture. But this year it may not: In late March, Prime Minister Hun Sen imposed a two-month ban on all exports, hoping to curb the spiraling domestic price of rice. The rate of food inflation reached 24 percent in March, the highest level in a decade.

Indonesia

Indonesia, one of the world's leading consumers of rice, usually imports large quantities of the grain to feed its 233 million people - making it particularly vulnerable to the rice crisis. But this year it expects to harvest 32.6 million tons, about 1.2 million more than it needs for domestic consumption. The surplus comes thanks to an expansion in the harvested farmland area and improved yields. Accordingly, rice prices have only increased by 7 percent this year, much less than in the rest of Asia, which has seen a rise of about 50 percent.

Japan

Unlike the rest of Asia, there is actually a rice glut in Japan, and rice prices are falling, according to the Wall Street Journal. Last year, Japanese farmers produced 8.71 million tons of rice, against a demand of 8.33 million tons. Japanese consumers pay two to three times more for rice than other Asian consumers do, as part of a program to generously subsidize rice production.

South Korea

South Korea looks prepared to weather the current crisis. Last year it produced 4.68 million tons of rice, more than enough to meet the 4.16 million tons of demand. Still, rice prices have shot up 75 percent in the past two months.

Australia

Australia used to produce 700,000 tons of rice and export around 600,000 annually,

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Kep is Cambodia or the whole country is Vietnam

Crabs...we watched them go straight from the trap to the grill to our plates....YUM! (seafood is Kep's only industry)

Kep was once a seaside resort. Then the Khmer Rouge came to town (see the pattern developing?). Kep and Kampot were one of their last holdouts, so the town is just starting to see tourists rolling through. We spoke to some locals who said there weren't even guest houses in Kep 5 years ago. For that matter, there weren't any Cambodians. The locals were too scared (smart) to live there and moved out. In 1994, there was actually a very well documented account of foreigners getting kidnapped by the KR on the road between Kep and Kampot. None of them survived. (Don't worry, Mom, that's why we're avoiding Burma (and now Tibet) this trip).

We took an 18km bike ride around the mountain range that looms over the town and the effect of their recent history was tough to miss. As we tend to do, we rode off the beaten path of the main road and biked around a little further inland. There were seaside mansions, one right after another. Back in the day, Kep was THE beach-side resort town and only the wealthiest of Cambodians (i.e. government officials) could afford to live there. These places were massive. As we rode past them, however, they were no longer inhabited by Cambodia's elite. Life is nothing, if not ironic and the mansions are now inhabited by Cambodia's impoverished. During the KR years, most of the mansions were shelled by mortars, riddled with bullets and bulldozed with tanks. What were seaside mansions are now seaside ruins. So Kep's poor put up a tin wall here, threw up a plastic sheet there and are now squatting in some of the nicest homes in the country.

Having caught the Indiana Jones bug, I desperately wanted to park our bikes and explore some of the homes that were still vacant. Unfortunately, I saw one too many one-legged and no-legged Cambodians begging in the streets. Putting on my Indy fedora wasn't worth the risk of stepping on an undetonated land mine.

Sadly, Kep was our last stop in Cambodia.

Now we're waking up and screaming GOOD MORNING, VIETNAM!

Cambodian Cultural Difference - HALLO! : Okay, so this is more of a traveling phenomenon than a Cambodian phenomenon, but the kids are so cute there, I had to throw it under Cambodia. No matter where we've traveled, we are always bombarded with waves and greetings from the local children. Particularly during our 18km bike marathon, we would here a high-pitched "HALLO!!!!" coming from out of nowhere, only to see a naked 4 year old running out of his house chasing after us, arm frantically waving in there air. Tracy...err I mean Miss America... likes her Southeast Asian celebrity status so much that if somehow a child DOESN'T see us, SHE will scream out to them. She will do anything for her HALLO! fix.

Funnily enough, as we rode on the back of the tuk tuk to the Vietnamese border, the HALLOS! changed to BYE BYE!!!'s.
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Soccer-Cambodia to beef-up national team to stem goals tide

By Ek Madra

PHNOM PENH, April 22 (Reuters) - Cambodia is on a drive to recruit bigger players for its struggling soccer side after years of being hammered by more physical teams, the country's soccer chief said on Tuesday.

Soccer federation president Sao Sokha said the impoverished country's diminutive players had little chance against bigger, stronger opponents so it was time for a complete overhaul.

"We need to have bigger and taller players to play against tough foreign players," he told Reuters.

"The new recruits must meet the requirement of (being) at least 1.7 metres tall, young, strong and able to run fast."

Cambodia's team of labourers, security guards and policemen have conceded 21 goals in their last four matches. The team has never qualified for a tournament outside of Southeast Asia.

Introduced to soccer in the 1960s by French colonialists, Cambodia were fast improvers before a brutal civil war, which included genocide under the Khmer Rouge regime, curtailed their progress and led to a 23-year absence from the game.

Sao Sokha said 30 players had so far been recruited and would be paid up to $250 a month -- eight times the salary of a civil servant.

"Lots of people like to watch the game, but it is difficult to find qualified people to play it," he said.

"I urge all parents to let their children play soccer so that it will help us to find good players -- players who can attract spectators like rock bands do." (Editing by Martin Petty and Greg Stutchbury)


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US gives Cambodia $2 mln for genocide museum

Cambodia is to build a Khmer Rouge genocide museum and library, funded by the United States, as a permanent reminder of the "Killing Fields" atrocities of Pol Pot's guerrilla movement, its director-to-be said today.

Documentation Centre of Cambodia head Youk Chhang, who has been cataloguing the ultra-Maoist regime's crimes for more than a decade, said the museum would be on the site of an old re-education camp in the capital.

"Genocide does not discriminate. It kept happening in the last century and one way is to use education as a tool help to prevent genocide," he told reporters.

Prime Minister Hun Sen, himself a former Khmer Rouge soldier who defected to Vietnam in the late 1970s, handed over the land on April 17, the 33rd anniversary of the 1975 downfall of Phnom Penh to Pol Pot's peasant army.

A $56 million United Nations-backed court has charged five top cadres with war crimes and crimes against humanity. Cambodia has appealed to its donors for another $114 million in funding to see the trials through to a conclusion. - Reuters
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Thai broker Seamico eyes Vietnam, Cambodia in Q3

BANGKOK, April 21 (Reuters) - Thailand's Seamico Securities ZMIC.BK aimed to finalise plans later this year to expand into Vietnam and Cambodia, two of Asia's fastest-growing economies, the brokerage firm said on Monday.

The company also planned to sell up to 1 billion baht ($32 million) worth of debentures during June and July, Seamico Vice Chairman and Managing Director Pinit Puapan told reporters.

"We should have a clear picture of our overseas expansion in the third quarter," Pinit said without giving further details.

Seamico, ranked 7th among Thailand's 38 listed brokers, is focused on underwriting share and debt issues as well as advising companies on initial public offerings.

The Thai firm said last year it wanted to buy stakes in Vietnamese brokerage firms, but did not name any targets.

Vietnam's main stock index .VNI rose 23 percent last year after jumping 145 percent in 2006, powered by surge in foreign funds. The index has fallen 42.3 percent so far this year.

Seamico expected to receive a licence to enter Cambodia later this year, he said.

On Monday, Seamico shares closed down 1.8 percent to 3.22 baht while the overall index was 0.4 percent lower. ($1=31.50 Baht) (Reporting by Saranya Suksomkij; Writing by Ploy Chitsomboon; Editing by Darren Schuettler)

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Cambodia opposes Dalai Lama's attempts to sabotage Beijing Olympics

PHNOM PENH, April 21 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia opposes attempts by the Dalai clique to sabotage the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing by making use of the Tibet issue, Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister Hor Namhong said on Monday.

Cambodia also opposes any foreign interference in China's internal affairs, said Hor, who is also minister of foreign affairs and international cooperation, during a meeting with a visiting Chinese delegation.

The Olympic Games have nothing to do with politics and Cambodia fully supports China's hosting of the 2008 Olympics, Hor told the delegation headed by Zhang Xuan, deputy party chief of China's Chongqing city.

King Norodom Sihamoni will attend the games' opening ceremony in Beijing, he added.

The Cambodian government has consistently adhered to the one-China policy and opposed Taiwan independence, he said.

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French lawyer in Cambodia to represent ex-Khmer Rouge leader

By KER MUNTHIT

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — A French lawyer who defended terrorists and a former Nazi officer arrived in Cambodia on Monday to represent a former Khmer Rouge leader.

Jacques Verges declined to comment and only said "go to the court" before being whisked away in a car after his arrival at Phnom Penh International Airport.

Verges will join a Cambodian attorney to argue former Khmer Rouge leader Khieu Samphan's appeal against his pretrial detention.

The U.N.-assisted tribunal has held Khieu Samphan since Nov. 19 on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity stemming from atrocities committed under Khmer Rouge rule in 1975-79.

The communist group's radical policies led to the deaths of some 1.7 million people from starvation, disease, overwork and execution.

Khieu Samphan is one of five former leaders of the group held for their alleged roles in the atrocities. He has repeatedly denied any involvement.

Verges has won international notoriety for his past efforts in defending criminals such as Venezuelan terrorist Carlos the Jackal and Nazi Gestapo officer Klaus Barbie.

Khieu Samphan has said he has known Verges since he attended university in France in the 1950s, when both were active in student movements against French colonialism.

Khieu Samphan's defense team also includes Say Bory, a Cambodian lawyer who used to serve on the constitutional council, the country's highest legal body.

Say Bory said the defense is challenging both the tribunal's grounds for detaining Khieu Samphan and its arguments implicating him in the Khmer Rouge's atrocities.

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Cambodian Campaigner Get World's Children's Prize In Stockholm

By Bjarne Wildau

Somaly Mam of Cambodia, who has campaigned against trafficking and child prostitution was Wednesday named winner of the World's Children's Prize. Queen Silvia of Sweden, one of the patrons of the prize, was to present the award, worth 150,000 dollars, at a ceremony on Friday.

Somaly Mam was sold to a brothel as a young girl, and has campaigned against trafficking for the past 12 years. She has set up three safe houses for girls rescued from brothels and offers them food, health care, schooling and job training, organizers said.

Her organization, that is known under its French acronym, AFISEP, has helped some 3,000 former sex workers.

However, Somaly Mam's campaign against the sex trade in Cambodia has "earned her many enemies and death threats. Her own 14 year-old daughter was kidnapped, raped and sold to a brothel" two years ago, organizers said.

Somaly Mam was selected by a jury of former child soldiers, street children, bonded workers and refugees from 17 countries.

Somaly Mam was also winner of the Global Friends' Award in a worldwide vote among some 6.6 million children.

The World's Children's Prize award, was established in 2000 by the Swedish non-governmental organization, Children's World. Read more!

Far Reaching Impact of the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia

Deep in the former opium-growing region of the Golden Triangle in Southeast Asia, a new road has opened that is bound to change the social, economic and environmental fabric of the region forever. But unlike so many changes in Asia that have been studied only after their impact has occurred, researchers were on the ground for this one from the very beginning.

Using a combination of high-tech satellite technology and traditional boot-pounding research, they are working to understand the impact of change on a region that has largely existed in steady isolation for generations.

The road, inaugurated with great fanfare in early April by the prime ministers of Cambodia, China, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam, will link the city of Kunming in southern China through northern Laos to Chiang Mai in Thailand and then on to Bangkok, nearly 1,100 miles away. This new “Route 3,” the first modern ground link between China and Thailand, cuts directly through the formerly isolated high mountain areas of the region - the famed “Golden Triangle.”

Among those researching the impact of the road through Montane Southeast Asia is East-West Center researcher Jefferson Fox. Under grants from the National Science Foundation and NASA worth about $1.5 million, Fox and his colleagues are studying how the road will affect the environment, land use practices and daily life in the regions it penetrates.

But in larger ways, their study will contribute to the understanding of how projects such as this have impacts far beyond the direct economic or physical changes that drive them in the first place.

Working with economists, geographers, sociologists and others, Fox put together a high-tech database, which in turn has led to a greater understanding of dynamics of change.

“We’re looking at the road as a metaphor for change,” Fox said.

A half-century ago, this was a remote mountainous region populated by indigenous people who survived on traditional shifting cultivation and subsistence hunting. From far northern Thailand through Laos and into China, “you wouldn’t even know you were in three different countries,” Fox said.

But change inevitably came. Opium production became an export crop, and, later, cash crops such as rubber began to take over. The Chinese, Fox notes, were particularly successful in establishing rubber in the semi-tropical areas of southern China with a system that became a combination of state-run enterprises and private small landholders.

In Thailand, an interest in land preservation led to the creation of land set-asides and national parks that left traditional indigenous people marginalized or dispossessed, he said. In Laos, the indigenous people are increasingly becoming sharecroppers for outsiders who are eager to plant more and more rubber.

The introduction of year-round “monocrops” has had an immediate and measurable impact on the environment, Fox says. This is particularly true with an introduced crop such as rubber, with its high demands for land and water resources.

The only thing holding back even further expansion of rubber and further loss of the existing environment and traditional cultures in the area was lack of an adequate means of getting that product to market.

Hence, the road.

Traditionally, such development projects happen, and then scientists come in to study their impact after the fact, Fox said. In this case, the study began before the road was completed and led to a solid baseline of information that can be used to accurately paint a before-and-after picture.

Whether that change is good or bad can be a matter of perspective, Fox said. But what is without question is that transformation is coming to the region on a scale that could not have been imagined previously.

“We’re really on the verge of a major change in land use in the uplands of Southeast Asia,” he said. “It was going to find a way to happen anyway, but not at this speed.”

What is important to scientists such as Fox is that, this time, the change - beginning with the physical and environmental transformations and moving on to all the associated impacts - is being watched and measured. It makes sense, he said, to monitor land-use change as the baseline for understanding these massive changes taking place.

“These cultures were built around their land use,” he said. “If you change land use policies, you’re going to have an impact on your culture.”

Along with that change of land use come new environmental problems, such as demand for water and loss of biodiversity; the shift from a subsistence to an export economy; social change as people move toward cash jobs and urban centers; and the influx of new people and ideas carried easily along the smooth new Route 3 road.

One concern is the spread of disease, particularly HIV/AIDS, which is known to “flow along roads,” Fox said. The fact that Kunming and the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai are known for high incidence of AIDS makes this unhappy change inevitable.

Another concern, he said, is the potential for an uptick in smuggling. While opium production has been largely curtailed, there is still a lucrative black market for tropical hardwoods and lumber. Illegal forestry could expand with easy access to the new road, he said.

Over time, Fox said, the story of a place transitioning from subsistence to a commercial economy “is not a new story.”

“But a major road that opens up an area that has been totally isolated is not that common,” he said. “Here we have three countries, three (land use) policies. It’s a great opportunity for understanding.”

Jefferson Fox is a senior researcher at the East-West Center in Honolulu, specializing in land-use and land-cover change in Asia, and is coordinator of the Center’s Environmental Change, Vulnerability and Governance research group. Read more!

Careless drivers blamed for high holiday road toll

Written by Khouth Sophak Chakrya

Eight killed, 21 injured in Phnom Penh

Substantially more people were killed on Phnom Penh roads this New Year than during the 2007 holiday break despite the efforts of road safety organizations and the Cambodian government, who campaigned hard to lower the holiday road toll.

Eight people were killed and 21 injured in the capital over the April 12-15 holiday period, said the deputy chief of Phnom Penh’s traffic police, Pen Khun, who blamed poor driving for most crashes.

Last Khmer New Year in Phnom Penh, only one person was killed and 20 injured during the five days from April 12-16, he said.

“Ninety-seven percent of all accidents are caused by human error, primarily drunk driving and speeding,” Khun said.

Meanwhile, the Department of Road Transportation said the number of accidents nationwide from January to March 2008 had more than doubled from the same period last year.

In Siem Reap province this New Year, there were nine traffic accidents that injured 16 people, although no fatalities were reported, Siem Reap police chief Sot Nady told the Post on April 16.

“We had eight fewer accidents this year than in 2007 because many people didn’t drive their cars during the festivities as we had bad storms at the time,” he said.

Keo Savin, director of the Department of Road Transportation, said roads were becoming more crowded and this was contributing to a higher rate of crashes in general.

From January until the end of March, 421 people were killed on Cambodian roads and a further 3,003 injured, compared with 206 fatalities and 2,122 injured in the first three months of 2007, according to the department’s figures.

“The sheer volume of vehicles causes accidents now,” Savin said.

From January 1 to March 31, “in the whole of Cambodia, 11,414 people received driving licenses but the number of registered vehicles went up even faster – 34,810 vehicles were registered, of which 29,049 were motorbikes,” he said.

Several NGOs and government departments issued warnings and held high-profile public ceremonies in the build-up to the Khmer New Year break in the hope of saving lives on the Kingdom’s notoriously chaotic roads.

The National Road Safety Committee on April 7 warned people to drive carefully as there is often a spike in the number of traffic accident during national festivals, particularly during Khmer New Year when thousands of families flood out of the cities in overloaded vehicles to celebrate the holiday in their home provinces.

Still, festivities got off to a bad start in Phnom Penh with five people killed in three crashes on April 13.

Pop star Sok Pisey was injured on April 14 when the car she was driving blew a tire and ran off a road in Koh Kong province, killing four passengers, including her 10-year-old sister, and injuring five others.

The 19-year-old, who had been traveling from Phnom Penh to Sihanoukville for a concert, was taken to Calmette hospital and is expected to make a full recovery.

According to the Road Traffic Accident Victim Information System (RTRAVIS), from April 12-18 last year there were 1,340 minor casualties, 74 fatalities, and 341 severe injuries nationwide.

While an accurate national tally of crashes is yet to be compiled for the holiday this year, the deputy head of the department of judicial police, Him Yan, said on 16 April he was optimistic that “traffic accidents during the Khmer New Year period for this year will be fewer than last year.”



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Govt shrugs off Thai border complaints over Preah Vihear

Written by Cat Barton and Vong Sokheng

The government on April 11 denied Thai allegations it was overstepping its boundaries at the long-disputed Preah Vihear temple that straddles the Thai-Cambodian border, in the latest bout of political jostling that has for years has prevented Cambodia from listing the ancient Hindu temple as a UNESCO world heritage site.

Although the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled in 1962 that the temple belongs to Cambodia, the actual boundary line in the district remains unclear and the 4.6-square-kilometer area surrounding the temple is claimed by both countries.

Thailand sparked off the latest series of exchanges on April 11 when it summoned the Cambodian Ambassador to Thailand, Ung Sean, and claimed Cambodia had dispatched troops to the contested area over a month ago. This would violate a memorandum of understanding signed in 2000 by both parties which bars them from making any changes in the area before the border can be demarcated.

Ouch Borith, Secretary of State at the Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told reporters the only armed forces deployed in the area were there to maintain the temple and provide security for visiting tourists.

“There is no confusion about the border and no overlapping area with Thailand’s territory in Preah Vihear,” Borith said. “The border was clearly mapped out in the Hague’s decision which was recognized by the international community.”

Thailand has lodged complaints before; in 2004 over the building of a road, in 2005 over the setting up of official outposts and a community, and in 2007 over the issuing of a decree to claim the area so it can be registered as a World Heritage Site.

This time, they requested Phnom Penh withdraw its armed forces and leave the area vacant until the completion of demarcation – expected in about 10 years.

Cambodia is trying to demarcate the border area itself, which requires finding 73 old markers that once signaled the border line. Since 2006, they have found 20.
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Witness to history, telegraph service set to shut down

During a recent visit to the Central Post Office on Bangrak Road, officials there proudly told me about the history of the post office building, which has been deemed to be part of the nation's cultural heritage.

Jeerawat Na Thalang

The Nation

"There's a bomb underneath the car parking lot," an official said, pointing to the parking space in front of the building. The bomb was dropped during World War II but it did not explode. Officials didn't know how to retrieve the bomb without setting it off, so they left it there after the war ended.

The monolith building was designed according to old European architectural styles and its floor is decorated with tiles from Italy. The tiles may have darkened over the years but they give a vintage look to the interior of what is known as both the Bangrak Post Office and the Central Post Office, Bangkok South.

The building has witnessed the fast-changing pace of communications technology, from the old days when postmen wore neatly ironed shirts with shining stripes and rode bicycles to deliver mail to more modern times when people on different continents can communicate via email within seconds.

From next month, this old building will witness another historical event in the evolution of technology. The telegraph service will cease to exist, with a new generation turning to new methods of communication like e-mail.

Telegraph was once one of the most popular ways to send quick messages. People used the telegraph wire to deliver hot news, such as the results of a job interview, news of a recent death or claims for debt payment. At its peak, from 1987 to 1992, more than 500,000 messages were sent by telegraph each month. But that number has declined to some 8,000 this month. CAT decided to close down the service because the cost of maintaining it was not worthwhile.

The telegraph service came to Thailand in 1875. At that time, both the French and the British offered to construct telegraph lines in Thailand. The French offered to connect the line to Saigon, while the British wanted to run a line from Bangkok to Tavoy, Burma. King Rama V eventually turned down the offers from both countries and decided that Thailand would construct its own line. Thailand launched its first line in the East, connecting Bangkok and Samut Prakan. The service was later expanded to Prachin Buri to connect with the Indochinese line in Battambang in Cambodia and Saigon in Vietnam. Later on, the service was expanded throughout Thailand.

The telegraph was in fact part of several historical events. On January 17, 1928, the Post and Telegraph Department launched the international radiotelegraphy line for the first time by using a short-wave transmission machine to send a signal to Berlin. King Rama VII sent a telegraph to the Thai ambassador in Berlin saying:

SIAMESE MINISTER BERLIN

GREETING AM GLAD TO BE ABLE TO SEND FIRST MESSAGE DIRECT BANGKOK BERLIN RADIO

PRAJADHIPOK R

During World War II, the international telegraph service - which came through Manila - was halted in December 1941. Later on, the Thai government tried to negotiate the re-launching of the service via a neutral country. On April 6, 1942, the international telegraph service was reopened as the service was connected via Geneva, Switzerland.

Postal staff said that when they were students at the Post and Telegraph School, Morse Code class was their toughest because they had to memorise how to send the code accurately. An urban legend at the school had it that some telegraph experts could receive and memorise four messages at the same time before delivering them all later.

Officials said they received incomprehensible messages frequently, which they suspected were sent by lovers. Unfortunately, quite a number of the messages sent were death notices.

"It combined the art of finger-tapping and the accuracy of the code," said Saneth Pangsapha, the 59-year-old head of the Bangkok South Post Office in Bangrak. He demonstrated how to tap the code with his flexible wrist. "Telegraph is very classic. It requires both technical skill and a human touch," he said while complaining that his wrist has turned "dusty" because he cannot move his fingers to tap the code as fast as he used to.

These days, the telegraph service section consists of 25 staff members, a reduction from some 300 when the service was more popular. The telegraph section is located on the upper floor of the Bangrak Post Office. Morse Code is no longer applied. Officials use a computerised system to send telegraphs.

Consumers can, however, fill out the telegraph forms, which they can collect from the ground floor of the post office. Pieces of the brown paper form available in a box obviously shows that the form has not been reprinted in years.

Many years ago, the telegraph office wanted to change the image of the telegraph service. "People were frightened when they received a telegraph. They thought chances were good they were about to receive death news," said Kanissorn Tongsap, another post office official. The post office introduced the idea of telegraphs sent for "friendship and goodwill". However, the campaign was not quite successful as people turned to other types of technology to send messages, such as SMS.

Thailand is not alone in closing the service, as other countries have also ended the service recently. "The other factor forcing us to close the service is that spare parts needed for telegraph equipment are no longer available," said Kanissorn. Some countries such as France, however, used telegraph services during the Iraq War because the services were deemed safer. Who knows, the abandoned telegraph poles along several main roads may be dusted off and used again.

Members of the public are invited to join the telegraph exhibition in the final week of April at the Central Post Office in Bangrak.

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ADRA Provides Food and Shelter for Fire Survivors in Cambodia

Source: Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) International
Ann Marie Stickle
Website: http://www.alertnet.org/redir/mem_out_219487/http://www.adra.org
Reuters and AlertNet are not responsible for the content of this article or for any external internet sites. The views expressed are the author's alone.

Phnom Penh, Cambodia—After a fire completely destroyed 450 homes in an impoverished section of Phnom Penh, Cambodia, on April 11, 2008, the Adventist Development and Relief Agency (ADRA) provided emergency food and shelter for 2,400 residents displaced by the disaster.

Coordinating with the mayor's office, ADRA Cambodia distributed rice, noodles, fish, salt, sugar, and vegetable oil to 520 families, or approximately 2,000 identified fire survivors, on April 12.

On April 15, ADRA expanded its response, distributing shelter and noodles for an additional 80 identified families that were also displaced by the fire, and are currently living in a make-shift internally displaced camp near the site of the tragedy.

According to authorities, the fire began at around 5 a.m. and burned for approximately 5 hours.

Due to the close proximity of the poorly constructed wooden homes, and the crowds of people escaping with their possessions, fire engines were unable to enter the area to extinguish the fire, which caused the complete destruction of all 450 homes located there, leaving behind only concrete poles.

More than 50 families were immediately moved to an open field nearby. However, more survivor families are joining the displaced persons camp each day, swelling the camp's population to more than 250 families. ADRA International, the ADRA Asia Regional Office in Bangkok, Thailand, and ADRA Cambodia are funding this response. ADRA has worked jointly with the Cambodia Adventist Mission, the Cambodia Adventist School, and Adventist Frontier Missions in packaging and distribution, and is coordinating with the mayor's office, village leaders, and other NGO partners in the relief efforts.

To assist in ADRA's response to the fire in Cambodia, please contact ADRA International at 1.800.424.ADRA (2372) or donate online to the Emergency Response Fund at www.adra.org. ADRA is present in 125 countries, providing community development and emergency management without regard to political or religious association, age, gender, race, or ethnicity. Additional information about ADRA can be found at www.adra.org. -END- Author: Ann Stickle, Associate Director for ADRA Cambodia Media Contact: Hearly Mayr ADRA International 12501 Old Columbia Pike Silver Spring, MD 20904 Phone: 301.680.6357 Mobile: 301.526.2625 E-mail: Media.Inquiries@adra.org

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New Year's blast in Cambodia kills 1, injures 25

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (AP) — An attacker hurled a hand grenade into a crowd of people dancing at a Buddhist temple to celebrate Cambodia's traditional New Year, killing one villager and wounding 25 others, police said Thursday.

The attack, which killed a 21-year-old man, occurred Wednesday evening about 30 miles north of Siem Reap in western Cambodia, said Ou Em, the provincial police chief.

Many villagers had gathered at the temple for dancing to mark the last day of the traditional New Year holiday, police said.

"First, I thought it was a firecracker that exploded until I saw people with blood on them," said Bou Nimol, a 17-year-old girl who witnessed the attack. "I just ran straight home after that."

Police said they were investigating the attack but had no immediate suspects.

Siem Reap, about 140 miles northwest of the capital, Phnom Penh, is the site of the famed Angkor temples.
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Man guilty of Cambodia coup plot

It is so sad and regret to see the Justice in the United State bear from its role to pro the Mafia government of Cambodia. In stead of helping Chhun as political exile; United State is trying to please those criminal Mafia officials.

A US court has convicted a Cambodian-born man of masterminding a failed coup attempt against the Cambodian government eight years ago.

Chhun Yasith, 52, was found guilty of four charges relating to the failed attack in November 2000.

Dozens of armed men attacked government buildings in the Cambodian capital, Phnom Penh, in a bid to overthrow Prime Minister Hun Sen.

Several people were killed but the prime minister escaped unhurt.

The court in Los Angeles found Chhun guilty of three charges of conspiracy and one of planning a military expedition against a US ally.

"The planning and fundraising happened right here in the United States," prosecutor Lamar Baker told the court earlier this month.

"It was like the labels say, 'Made in the USA'."

But a lawyer for Chhun argued that his client's only goal had been "to bring democracy to his homeland".

"It was misguided and naive in its execution but it was not misguided and naive in its intent," lawyer Richard Callahan said.

Armed attack

Chhun left Cambodia in the early 1980s when the country was in disarray following the Vietnamese invasion that swept the Khmer Rouge regime from power.

He became a US citizen and worked as an accountant in Long Beach, California.

But in the late 1990s, prosecutors said, he founded a group called the Cambodian Freedom Fighters.

The group's aim was to unseat the government of Prime Minister Hun Sen, a former Khmer Rouge commander who had defected to Vietnam in the late 1970s.

Prosecutors said that the group - controlled by Chhun from a base in Thailand - carried out a series of smaller attacks in the lead-up to the coup attempt.

Then on 24 November 2000, dozens of rebels armed with rockets and grenades attacked government buildings in Phnom Penh.

Several people were killed and more injured.

In the wake of the attack, dozens of people were arrested and jailed. Chhun was tried and convicted in absentia by a Phnom Penh court.

He will be sentenced in Los Angeles on 8 September, where prosecutors say he could face life imprisonment.

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Cambodia’s Urban Renewal Turns Ugly

The government is using the fiction of slum clearance to kick the poor off valuable property

Just a stone’s throw away from Cambodia’s National Assembly in Phnom Penh, a fading billboard trumpets an urban renewal campaign promising to transform 100 poor communities into thriving neighborhoods within a year. Included is the decimated slum that lies behind parliament – Dey Krahorm, or Red Earth village.

The billboard, erected a few months before national elections four years ago, shows Prime Minister Hun Sen leading a band of impassioned officials as they stride toward this much publicized goal.

They never reached it. After the election, urban renewal turned into poverty expulsion. Red Earth now resembles a moonscape of rubble, teetering shacks and evacuated spaces. Fewer than 100 of the nearly 1,000 families who lived there when the billboard was erected remain. The rest have been trucked off to one of the many relocation sites 20 to 30 kilometers outside the city, most of which lack electricity, clean water, toilets, schools, clinics and, importantly, access to jobs.

Excluding Burma, “Cambodia has the most abusive record of forced evictions in the region,” said David Pred, the country director of Bridges Across Borders, an international non-governmental organization formed to combat the root causes of violence.

In an interesting twist, the Cambodian Red Cross, which has been appealing for donations to resettle squatters, is headed by the prime minister’s wife, Bun Rany Hun Sen. Besides widespread allegations of corruption and misuse of funds, the Cambodia Red Cross’s appeal for funds to resettle people evicted as a result of land grabs by people closely tied to the prime minister is, to use the phrase of one diplomat, “more than a little off-putting.”

An official at the International Red Cross agreed: “There’s something not quite kosher about this,” he said.

Although evictions have been a companion to Asia’s “asymmetrical growth”, as Pred calls it, over the past 25 years, the situation in Cambodia is exacerbated by the lack of legal protection for those facing eviction. “At least in a country like the Philippines, affected people can go to court and a have some chance at stopping [evictions] or getting fair compensation. That is not possible in Cambodia today,” Pred said.

Dey Krahorm resident Lee Luleng was blunter: “If I call the police [for help] they will arrest me.” Lee Luleng, 61, is among those who have declined the offer of either relocation outside the city or compensation equivalent to less than 10 percent of the land’s market value of more than US$3,000 per square meter from 7NG, the shadowy company that claims ownership of the land. (7NG describes itself as a publicly listed company in a country that does not have a stock exchange. In a telephone interview, 7NG chairman Srey Sothea said the company is not listed on a foreign bourse and that all its funds are sourced in Cambodia. He declined, however, to identify the exact source of the company’s funds or name its board of directors. He did say, however, that 7NG is “seeking foreign investment.”)

Declining a bad deal from 7NG can come at a heavy price. At least 13 residents of Dev Krathorn, including six community representatives, have been charged with criminal offenses, according to the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights, which has documented a three-year campaign of what it calls “harassment, intimidation and provocation” against the community by private security officers and municipal police.

“They shout, ‘Get out, dogs!’ We shout back, ‘You’re worse than Pol Pot,’” is how Lee Luleng described the frequent standoffs with police and security officers. Along with insults and obscenities, police sometimes toss bags of urine at them, residents say. Police erected a wall along one end of the community to block access to street-side shops (forcing owners to sell or relocate) and tried unsuccessfully to block access to the market that is the community’s main source of income.

Srey Sothea, the 7NG head, said no employees of his company were involved in altercations with residents of Dey Krathorm. “We’re a construction company, not a security firm,” he said. He also denied allegations that 7NG is paying police officers to drive the residents from their homes.

“When Cambodians hear the phrase ‘development plan’, they know it means evictions,” explained Choun Chamrong, a land-rights program officer at the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Organization. “Usually they give up quickly because they know they are up against companies or individuals connected to the government,” she explained. In 2006, Adhoc recorded 16 cases of entire communities being forcibly evicted. Last year, the figure rose to 26.

Brittis Edman, a researcher with Amnesty International, pointed to another disquieting trend. “What we are seeing over the last year is that the courts are increasingly being used as tools to silence housing rights activists,” she said before the February release of AI’s report “Rights Razed: Forced Evictions in Cambodia.” The report warned that “at least 150,000” Cambodians are at risk of forced evictions.

The government’s response was unintentionally amusing. It insisted there were no forced evictions in Cambodia and accused Amnesty International of trying to grab headlines. Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak went further. He told reporters that if the government did not respect human rights, it would have expelled Amnesty’s representatives from Cambodia.

What he failed to mention, however, was that police tried to stop Edman from meeting a group of residents facing eviction near Phnom Penh’s Boeung Kak Lake on February 10. “They told us we didn’t have a permit to hold the meeting, but we explained we were just having a discussion,” Edman said. After a brief face-off, police allowed the discussion to proceed, but they photographed every resident, journalist and activist present, and tape-recorded the meeting.

Villagers say they are crammed together now in a ditch with no access to clean water and no source of income. The impact of forced evictions on public health has yet to be measured – at either the local, provincial or national levels – but NGOs working with communities that have been evicted are scrambling to find funds to expand their medical outreach programs. Illnesses include malnutrition, weakened immune systems, bronchitis and other lung infections, skin rashes, ear and eye infections, diarrhea, fever, intestinal worms, fungal infections, and post-traumatic stress.

Andong, a resettlement site where the evicted have been moved to about 20 kilometers from Phnom Penh, is a public-health disaster. The lack of sanitation, clean water and access to health care leaves the 1,500 families crammed into what has been called a “fetid swamp” highly vulnerable to any outbreak of infectious disease, health workers warn.

Five children died of dengue fever there in March last year alone, resident Kat Vijay recalls. Like most of residents of the site, Kat was evicted from Sambok Chap, a settlement along the banks of the Bassac River in Phnom Penh in June 2006.

Resident Sum Khum says living in Andong is worse than the refugee camp in which she spent 13 years on the Thai border. “Then, we had food and water. We had medicine and schools. Aid workers used to visit us,” said the 74-year-old widow. “Now, we have nothing. Sometimes the Christians come with rice and noodles, but they don’t bring enough.”

After almost two years, the evictees are still waiting for running water, electricity, a sewage system, a clinic, a school, and toilets that work. The 12 that were installed last year, along with 12 bathing stalls, can’t be used because they are not connected to running water.

When he lived in Phnom Penh, Kat Vijay worked in construction, mainly restoring the city’s French colonial mansions, for US$2.50 a day. Since then he has had no work except for a three-month stint building a row of 41 rooms at Andong for the Cambodian Red Cross, he says.

Brittis Edman of Amnesty International noted a new development in forced evictions that many diplomats may find even more off-putting. Some residents at resettlement sites are being threatened with eviction again, possibly to make more room for newcomers, she said.

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Charity dinner to provide cows for Cambodia's poor

An inventive scheme aiming to help impoverished families in rural Cambodia by providing short-term loans of cows is the motive behind a gala charity dinner and auction to be held in Osaka next month.

Hope International Development Agency, a nonprofit organization that helps people overcome poverty by providing human and financial resources, will host the May 10 event at The Ritz-Carlton, Osaka, in the city's Kita Ward.

Funds raised at the event will go toward the Cow Bank project, a part of Hope's microcredit program, which promotes self-help among rural families and sustainable development in Cambodia.

The Cow Bank operates literally as its name implies: Families borrow a cow from Hope and use it to fertilize and plough their fields. Ideally, the cow will give birth during the loan period, and when the calf becomes self-sufficient a few months later, the borrowed cow is "paid back" to Hope.

The family keeps the calf, while the returned cow is then loaned to another poor family. This cycle can be repeated several times, according to Hope.

The May 10 event, to begin at 7 p.m., is the second such event the organization has staged in the Kansai region.

The evening will feature a five-course dinner; a silent auction of items from developing countries, local artists and companies; live entertainment by Japanese musicians; a short video presentation on Hope's activities in Cambodia; and the opportunity to contribute to helping people in the nation.

The organization, based in Naka Ward, Nagoya, and headquartered in Canada, invites organizations, groups and individuals to attend the event. A table for 10 costs 220,000 yen, while individual tickets are 30,000 yen each.

Tickets for the gala event must be reserved by April 21.

The Osaka event, to be hosted in partnership with The Ritz-Carlton, Osaka, is sponsored by Lexus and AstraZeneca K.K.

A similar event hosted by Hope in Nagoya on Feb. 29 saw more than 450 people attend, along with media organizations including NHK and local TV and radio stations.

The Tokyo event is scheduled for May 9 at the Embassy of Canada.

For more information, visit www.hope.or.jp or call (052) 204-0530.

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U.N. chief calls for justice in Cambodia

UNITED NATIONS (CNN) -- On the tenth anniversary of Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot's death, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon appealed Tuesday for the senior leaders of the regime to be brought to justice.

"I would like to remind the international community of the urgent importance of bringing to closure one of history's darkest chapters," Ban said in a statement.

The secretary-general said he hoped that the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia "will soon deliver long-overdue justice for the people of Cambodia."

"The United Nations and the Royal Government of Cambodia remain actively engaged in efforts to hold the Khmer Rouge senior leaders and those most responsible accountable for their horrific crimes," he said.

Five former Khmer Rouge leaders have been detained and will face the ECCC, most of them on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

They are: Kaing Guek Eav, the alleged chief torturer of the regime; former Khmer Rouge Prime Minister Khieu Samphan; Ieng Sary, the regime's former foreign minister, and his wife, Ieng Thirith; and Nuon Chea, the top surviving regime leader.

The ECCC, which was established by both the United Nations and Cambodia, became operational in 2006, but the first formal hearings took place in fall of last year.

More than 2 million people died during the party's efforts to transform Cambodia into an agrarian utopia before troops from neighboring Vietnam overthrew the regime. Remnants of the Khmer Rouge continued to battle Cambodia's government into the 1990s before they fragmented in the middle of the decade.

Pol Pot, known as "Brother Number One" during the group's nearly four years in power, died in a jungle hideout in 1998. Ta Mok, the former Khmer Rouge military chief known as "The Butcher," died in a Cambodian military hospital in 2006 while awaiting trial for crimes against humanity.

The tribunal, which includes three Cambodian and two international jurists, is expected to continue until at least 2010. Read more!

More U.S. soldiers' remains in Vietnam repatriated

HANOI, April 14 (Xinhua) -- The Vietnam Office for Seeking Mission Persons transferred Monday custody of possible remains believed to be those of Americans who died during the conflict in Southeast Asia and recovered from excavation sites in Vietnam's central region.

At the repatriation ceremony at the Da Nang International Airport in central Da Nang city on Monday, U.S. ambassador to Vietnam Michael Michalak and U.S. Army lieutenant colonel James Saenz, representing the U.S. government, received custody of the remains, according to a press release by the American Embassy in Vietnam. The ceremony marks the 106th post-war repatriation of remains from Vietnam.

To date, 883 Americans have been identified since 1975 -- 627 from Vietnam, 224 from Laos, 29 from Cambodia, and three from China. There are 1,763 Americans still unaccounted for from the war in Southeast Asia, including 1,353 in Vietnam, said the release. 　 Read more!