Bigger Collection (Cambodia Weekly News)

Land grab victims appeal for government intervention

2008-06-10T04:45:00.001-07:00

Written by Cheang Sokha
Tuesday, 10 June 2008
Villagers who lost their farms in one of Cambodia's most violent land grabs have traveled to Phnom Penh to seek government intervention in one of the country's longest-standing disputes over property. Some 459 families in Koh Kong Province's Sre Ambel district say that millionaire Senator Ly Yong Phat has yet to pay them for land lost nearly two years ago when his Koh Kong Sugar Industry and Koh Kong Plantation companies were granted nearly 20,000 hectares in land concessions to cultivate sugarcane. Nearly half the families have failed to receive the full 100,000 to 150,000 riels ($25 to $37.50) per hectare that was promised, while 265 families have been paid nothing, said villager An Haiya. “We are here to get back our land, which the company bulldozed,” Haiya told journalists on June 9, speaking at the office of the Community Legal Education Center in Phnom Penh. “We have protested and filed many complaints, but still there is no solution,” Haiya said. Villager protests following the land deal in August 2006 were quelled with bulldozers and armed security, who villagers say fired bullets into the crowd, wounding several. Guards recruited from local police and military continue to bar villagers from the land, and either shoot or seize livestock that wanders into the company compound, another villager, Teng Kao, said. “Since the company came, we can not do anything,” Kao said. “We are starving and have nothing with which to survive.” He said villagers have scrawled their demands along their fences, stating that the company should return their land or provide proper compensation. Provincial authorities have so far proven unsympathetic to the villagers' complaints. Those charged with trying to mediate the row have accused a small group of agitators of inflaming the situation, and say many of the alleged victims are simply trying to wrestle more compensation from the companies who now own the land. Koh Kong Deputy Governor Bin Sam Ol, who is charged with settling land disputes in his province, said that provincial authorities had brought village and company representatives together eight times, but they had failed to reach a solution. “It is difficult for the authorities because the trouble never ends,” Sam Ol said. “A small group of protesters are behind this problem. Outsiders also come to protest,” he added. Sam Ol said the number of families complaining about land grabbing continues to rise, no matter how much compensation is paid out by the company. “Some families have already been paid, but they return to protest again and again, aiming to get more money,” he said. Koh Kong Sugar Industry Company representative Heng San declined to comment, but he previously told the Post that his company had already resolved the complaints of more than 400 families and only 20 families have not yet been paid. In a similar development, villagers from northwestern Cambodia's Oddar Meanchey province embroiled in a land dispute with another Yong Phat-owned company have also sent a representative to Phnom Penh. In that case, a village representative said that an unnamed enterprise had leveled nearly 7,600 hectares of land outside the boundaries of its sugarcane plantation concession in Samroang district. “We came here asking to get our land back,” said Vey Sarin, adding that he was speaking for 256 families. “Most of the farmers are homeless, and others do not have land for farming,” he said. Am Sam Ath, a human rights monitor with the Cambodian rights group Licadho, said that local authorities fear intervening in Yong Phat's business, dragging out the disputes. “If they were willing to solve the problem, it could be over in about a month,” Sam Ath said. "But the villagers in Samroang will have the same problems as the villagers in Sre Ambel.”

Sam Rainsy Party newspaper editor arrested

2008-06-10T04:44:00.000-07:00

Written by Vong Sokheng
Monday, 09 June 2008
A pro-Sam Rainsy Party newspaper editor has been arrested for defamation over reports tying powerful Cambodian People's Party members, including Foreign Minister Hor Namhong, to Khmer Rouge atrocities. Dam Sith, editor-in-chief of Moneaksekar Khmer, was detained on June 8, but some government officials are questioning his arrest, including Information Minister Khieu Kanharith, who told the Post on June 9 that authorities had "no clear reason to detain him." “I signed a letter asking that Dam Sith be freed as soon as possible," Kanharith said, adding that the government had no role in the arrest. The matter was “a personal lawsuit between Hor Namhong and Dam Sith,” he said. Sith has been charged with "defamation" and "disinformation" over an April 18 article in which he quoted opposition leader Sam Rainsy as linking CPP members to the Khmer Rouge, whose 1975-79 regime resulted in the deaths of 1.7 million people and the devastation of Cambodia. Hor Namhong has denied any ties, and has filed lawsuits against both Rainsy and Sith, who was questioned in Municipal Court earlier this month. Sith's attorney, Kong Sam On, said that the court has yet to reply to Kanharith's request, while Ke Sakhorn, deputy chief of the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, and investigating judge Chhay Kong declined to comment. Human rights monitors and free press advocates say the arrest is a threat to journalism in Cambodia, and question why Sith can be detained for the alleged defamation. In May 2006, the National Assembly decriminalized defamation and mandated that all disputes related to the charge be settled through civil lawsuits, not imprisonment. “The arrest of Dam Sith is a threat to the free press in Cambodia. Dam Sith does not deserve to be arrested because he can publish a correction in his newspaper,” said Chan Saveth of the Cambodian rights organization Adhoc. “This case clearly shows that the politicians have influence over the courts," he said, adding that Sith was seized by about 10 uniformed and plainclothes military policemen in a Phnom Penh car wash and was being detained at Prey Sar prison. The International Federation of Journalists and the Cambodian Association for the Protection of Journalists have also called for the immediate release of their colleague. The IFJ condemned the charges as unlawful and raised concerns over the effect “such harassment of journalists” might have on elections. “Democracy cannot prevail where the media is hampered in its efforts to report on politics and the election campaign. Journalists must be able to report freely without fear of arrest or harassment,” an IFJ statement read. Sith is also an SRP parliamentary candidate standing in the July 27 elections with hopes of representing Phnom Penh.

Climate change threatens food security, warns UNDP

2008-06-10T04:43:00.000-07:00

Written by Brendan Brady
Monday, 09 June 2008
Increasingly unpredictable weather caused by global warming poses a major threat to the Cambodia's already imperiled food supplies, says the UN Development Program. The kingdom also needed to invest in environmentally-friendly energy sources like solar or wind power to help stave off the impacts of global warming, the agency said. Agriculture-dependent Cambodia was especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change which have already triggered a damaging cycle of flooding and drought, said UNDP country director Jo Scheuer at a June 5 conference marking the UN's World Environment Day. “When droughts, floods or storms strike, vulnerable people are forced to sell off productive assets, withdraw children from school and cut back on spending for nutrition and health,” added UN resident coordinator Douglas Broderick. The conference, entitled “Kick the habit! Towards a low-carbon economy,” aimed at outlining ways for Cambodia to fight or adapt to climate change. As Cambodia’s energy consumption increases, eventually making the country a net carbon emitter, it was becoming necessary to explore energy efficient technologies used in developed countries which have legal obligations to offset their carbon emissions, Scheuer said. Solar and wind power projects in particular could be recipients of international funding, he said, adding that the UNDP and the Ministry of Environment had signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly attract such projects. Prach Sun, secretary of state with the Ministry of Environment, said the government would also seek funds to plant trees to absorb greenhouse gases and would call on local businesses to reduce carbon emissions. Tim Ponlock, national project coordinator for climate change at the Ministry of Environment, said Cambodia should also prioritize developing its bio-diesel technology to utilize the country’s substantial supply of discarded rice stalks and corn husks for fuel production. Nop Polin, coordinator of the Climate Change Unit of the NGO Geres Cambodia, pointed to his agency’s energy-efficient stoves, which purportedly use just 25 percent of the wood or charcoal consumed by a traditional stove, to show that cleaner energy doesn’t have to be high-tech or expensive.

US provides nearly $1 million for Bakheng temple restoration

2008-06-10T04:42:00.000-07:00

Written by Peter Olszewski
Sunday, 08 June 2008
Photo courtesy of WMF/Glenn Boornazian Thousands of tourists descend on Phnom Bakheng each afternoon to enjoy the sunset over nearby Angkor Wat temple. The United States will provide almost a million dollars for continued preservation and conservation work on the Phnom Bakheng temple at the Angkor Archaeological Zone in Siem Reap, the US embassy said in a statement. The $978,705, provided through the US Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation to the World Monuments Fund, will allow work to be done on the 9th century Hindu temple's most visible, but heavily-damaged portion. “The historic city of Angkor is one of the world’s cultural and architectural wonders. Conserving its monuments, which are a crucial part of Cambodian history, is one way to promote peace and prosperity in the country," said US Embassy Charge d'Affaires Piper Campbell. "This grant is therefore a significant diplomatic gesture, and it is important to note that it was made possible by strong Congressional interest," she added, speaking in Siem Reap on June 4. Phase One of World Monuments Fund’s work at the temple was conducted between 2004 and 2007 with a separate $550,000 grant from the US State Department. This work included archaeological research, conservation assessments, the creation of a plan for the management of tourism at the site and emergency conservation measures. Phase Two will address some of the most urgent challenges at Phnom Bakheng –- protecting the temple structure from further deterioration through stabilization, waterproofing, repairs and partial reconstruction. Located on a hilltop, Bakheng is a popular tourist spot to see sunset views of the nearby Angkor Wat temple, the most famous of the monuments in the Angkor complex. But the large numbers of visitors who scramble each day up Bakheng's worn stairways makes it one of the most threatened temples in the park.

Cambodian kickboxers triumph in South Korea

2008-06-10T04:40:00.000-07:00

Written by Vong Sokheng
Saturday, 07 June 2008
Cambodian kickboxers Mey Sopheap, left, and Lao Sinath, right, both returned victorious from matches in South Korea. In a major boon to the homegrown, cash-strapped world of Cambodian kickboxing, fighters Mey Sopheap and Lao Sinath recently triumphed over international competition at South Korea’s One Match Winner’s Cup, an amateur tournament held in the city of Nanchu. Sopheap, 70 kg, outscored his Korean opponent in a three-round bout, while Sinath’s Korean rival conceded midway through a bruising second round in the 60kg weight division. Oum Yourann, president of the Cambodian Amateur Boxing Federation (CABF), said June 4 that top local boxers hope to participate in more invitational tournaments abroad. “Cambodian boxers could earn more money, experience and recognition for their country by competing in the international friendship tournaments,” Yourann said. Sopheap and Sinath’s South Korean victories on May 31 earned them $200 each, rich spoils compared to the 350,000 riels (about $87) they fight for here. Local paydays are also increasingly rare for Cambodia’s best boxers, as they lack viable competition. Yourann said at least 10 fighters in the CABF stable are waiting for international invitations, having vanquished the field of domestic challengers. But the usual obstacle remains. “The CAFB lacks funding to travel to international competitions, therefore we are looking for invitations with sponsors,” Yourann said. Challenges occur inside the ring too, when fighting abroad. Sopheap and Sinath both suffered penalties for employing knees and elbows in clinches, acceptable blows here at home, which the Koreans deem too rough. “There were some problems with rule violations when we hugged up during the fights. I used my elbows and knees, which were not allowed,” Sopheap said. At present, boxers Chey Kosal and Birth Samkhan, 73kg and 65kg, respectively, are in France preparing for a tournament on June 22. If the CAFB’s application to the World Traditional Boxing Federation is approved, Cambodia may host its own international friendship tournament later in 2008. (Vong Sokheng)

Gov't threatens legal action against police who abuse sex workers

2008-06-10T04:38:00.000-07:00

Written by Nguon Sovan
Friday, 06 June 2008
Deputy Prime Minister Sar Kheng has threatened legal action against officials accused of sexually abusing or robbing sex workers taken into custody during an ongoing crackdown on prostitution. The threat comes a day after sex workers gathered in Phnom Penh to protest the implementation of a new anti-trafficking law that critics say gives authorities a license to rape. The law, promulgated in February, is aimed at curbing people smuggling, either for labor or sexual exploitation. It has resulted in mass brothel closures throughout the country. Critics say implementation of the new law has led to rising abuses by police against sex workers. At a June 4 protest against the new law several sex workers alleged being raped, beaten and robbed while in police custody following brothel raids and sweeps through public places where prostitutes ply their trade. “We have heard this information ... the government, especially the Ministry of Interior, will take legal action against the officials who are accused of rapes of sex workers," Sar Kheng said June 5 Sar Kheng added, however, that sex workers have yet to present any evidence of abuse. He was speaking at the release of the US State Department's annual Trafficking in Persons study, which this year upgraded Cambodia to Tier 2, the middle of three tiers which indicates that the country is making efforts to address its trafficking problem. Hundreds of sex workers attended the June 4 rally against the new legislation. In addition to alleged police abuses, they said the new law has hindered HIV/AIDS care and prevention programs among prostitutes.

Economic growth to ease to 7.0 percent in 2008, inflation remains high: IMF

2008-06-10T04:37:00.000-07:00

Written by Meixner, Seth
Friday, 06 June 2008
Cambodia's economic growth is expected to dip into the single digits this year, dropping more than three points to 7.0 percent, the International Monetary Fund said on June 6, citing a slowdown in the Kingdom's key garment sector. But the decrease from 2007's growth of 10.25 percent is not likely to hurt Cambodia's position as one of the region's most robust economies, it said in a statement released at the end of a round of talks between IMF and senior government officials. "Economic activity in Cambodia remains robust, although the pace of growth is expected to ease. ... The moderation mainly reflects slowing garment exports due to weaker external demand and heightened regional competition," the IMF said. The garment sector is impoverished Cambodia's largest industrial employer – giving jobs to more than 330,000 people – and one of the main sources of foreign exchange. But while exports topped $2 billion in 2007, orders plummeted by 46 percent in the last quarter of the year, raising fears that the industry would be badly shaken by increasing competition from China and Vietnam. Inflation, which in January rose to 18.7 percent, will also hold back growth and continue to affect mostly poor Cambodians who have been hit hard by spiraling food and fuel costs. "The mission shared authorities' concern with rising inflation and its adverse effect on the poor," the IMF said. More than a third of Cambodia's 14 million people remain mired in poverty, living on the equivalent of $1 a day. While record-high international oil and food prices have contributed heavily to inflation in Cambodia, domestic commercial bank lending, which increased 100 percent year-on-year in early 2008, has also flooded the economy with cash and added to inflationary pressures, the IMF said. The government has tightened its monetary policies in an attempt to rein in inflation – including raising bank reserve requirements in a bid to curb high credit growth and reduce the demand for loans.

Government moves to end price gouging as gasoline prices hit record highs

2008-06-06T02:42:00.000-07:00

Written by Kay Kimsong
Friday, 06 June 2008
Tracey Shelton Pump prices remain at records highs, hovering just below 6,000 riels per liter. Finance Minister Keat Chhon has ordered a special ministry committee to be formed to monitor the price of gasoline amid fears the fuel companies were gouging prices, which have crept towards record highs of 6,000 riels ($1.50) a liter during the past few days, a ministry official said. The move, announced June 4, was the first time the government has intervened directly to try and ease spiraling gas prices, which have also driven up the cost of food and other consumer goods. Finance Secretary of State Chea Peng Chheang told the Post that the ministry was worried that fuel companies were taking advantage of skyrocketing global oil costs to unfairly raise local pump prices The new committee, while not putting caps on prices, would "work closely" with the fuel companies to determine how much should be charged for gasoline and diesel. “Petroleum companies need not ask the ministry how much to raise prices, but they need to make sure they are not charging over market value,” he said. The committee will also assess the cost of other consumer goods, which have risen sharply. "The ministry just wants to understand why a company decides to raise prices for this or that, but the ministry will never interfere with a company's pricing decisions ... it is a free market in Cambodia," Chheang said. Officials from fuel companies participating in the June 4 meeting with the finance minister said they welcomed the creation of the committee. “I think the ministry wants to know the price of gasoline to make sure that petroleum companies are not overcharging,” said Hour Heng, vice president of the Cambodian fuel giant Sokimex. “We accept the request of the ministry to control the price of gasoline and diesel,” he said. “It is an acceptable idea." But they also pointed out that their pricing decisions were driven largely by international oil prices. “We can’t predict future international oil prices and are not sure if the price of fuel in Cambodia will increase," Heng said, while Stephane Dion, managing director for Total Cambodge, wrote an email on June 5: “This is a simple question of supply and demand." The government has already tried to curb the price of gasoline by not raising the tariff on imported fuel – a move that officials say will cost the government $300 million in uncollected tax revenue. Diesel is currently taxed at $103 per ton, while the per ton tax on gasoline is $254. Some one million tons of petroleum products, including gasoline and diesel, are imported each year into Cambodia, according to industry officials. Even with this measure in place, fuel company officials say they are making very little money. According to a senior official at Tela Kampuchea Company who did not want to be named, global oil costs have reduced the company's profits to about 200 riels per liter. “We only make a little profit – many people do not know that," he said.

• Mondulkiri families in land dispute plead for PM's help

2008-06-06T02:33:00.000-07:00

Written by Khouth Sophakchakrya

Representatives of more than 800 ethnic Phnong families in Mondulkiri province arrived in Phnom Penh on June 3 to deliver a personal plea to Prime Minister Hun Sen asking that he order the return of traditional farmland allegedly confiscated and bulldozed by a private company.

Srev Kloek, 58, said he was representing 813 households in seven villages of Bousra commune, in Mondulkiri’s Pichenda district, whose plots of land – used sporadically by the Phnong for generations – were taken on April 9 by the Khov Chea Ly Company.

The company had illegally bulldozed more than 1,000 hectares of the ethnic minority’s traditional farmland and threatened villagers who complained with jail, Kloek said.

“We’re not scared by their threats; we just need our traditional rotating farmland. We can’t live without land for our rotating farms,” he said, referring to the Phnong’s agricultural cycle in which they use plots for three years before moving on, sometimes not returning to the same farmland for 12 or 15 years.

Kloek said the land the families were currently tending had not been cleared but those areas the group intended to return to in the future had been leveled.

Most Phnong in the region earned their living by collecting resin, vines and rattan in the forest or by growing cashews, bananas and rice.

However, Kloek said the Khov Chea Ly Company had destroyed almost all their land to make way for a rubber plantation.

“After they did that, it seems like we can’t even breathe,” he told reporters on June 3 during an outdoors press conference near the National Assembly in Phnom Penh.

A representative of the Khov Chea Ly Company, Chey Rithy, attended the briefing and called on the Phnong villagers to return to Mondulkiri.

“The company will give the land back if it really did illegally bulldoze the villagers’ traditional rotating farmland,” Rithy said.

“We only bulldozed those areas without farms or forests,” he added.

Rithy told reporters the government had provided Khov Chea Ly with a 2,700-hectare land concession and the company had so far only cleared land for a road and three bridges.

Mondulkiri deputy governor Nha Runchan said he did not know how legitimate the Phnong villagers’ complaints were, but noted that the tribe had built a reputation for being trustworthy.

“The Phnong ethnic minority always tells the truth, they never lie to anyone. So they would not complain if the company did not illegally bulldoze their farms,” Runchan said.

The Phnong representatives vowed to remain in Phnom Penh until someone working for the prime minister gave them a written statement saying they could continue to use the disputed land.

• US upgrades Cambodia's anti-human trafficking rating

2008-06-06T02:26:00.000-07:00

Written by Seth Meixner

Tracey Shelton

Once a teeming red light district, Street 70 in Phnom Penh is mostly quiet today. Authorities in recent weeks have pushed to rid the city of visible signs of the sex trade.

The US government has upgraded Cambodia's anti-human trafficking rating for the first time since 2006, saying that the Kingdom has made a significant effort to combat people smuggling.

The country has been placed this year in Tier 2, the middle category in the US State Department's annual Trafficking in Persons report, putting it alongside countries like Chile, Angola and El Salvador, which are among the 170 countries assessed.

Since 2006 Cambodia has languished on the Tier 2 Watch List after being relegated to the lowest category, Tier 3, in 2005.

"The Royal Government of Cambodia does not fully comply with the minimum standards for the elimination of trafficking; however, it is making significant efforts to do so," said the State Department in its report released on June 5.

"Cambodia is placed on Tier 2 for the first time since 2004 due to the government’s increased engagement in combating trafficking in persons over the previous year," it added.

The assessment follows Cambodia's passage of new anti-trafficking legislation which criminalized all forms of human trafficking, as well as the formation in April 2007 of a national anti-trafficking taskforce.

"This legislation provides law enforcement authorities the power to investigate all forms of trafficking and is a powerful tool in efforts to prosecute and convict traffickers and have them face stringent punishments," the State Department said.

"High-level government officials have spoken publicly about a 'zero-tolerance' policy for officials profiting from or colluding in trafficking in persons," it added.

But the new legislation has been sharply criticized by advocates for commercial sex workers who say the law has also led to an increase in abuses by authorities cracking down on prostitution.

Many sex workers, advocates claim, have been beaten, raped or robbed while in police detention, and the mass closure of brothels has hindered efforts curb the spread of HIV/Aids and other sexually transmitted diseases.

"This law ... increases violence, discrimination and human rights abuses against sex workers. It allows for corruption to spread among law enforcers," said Pich Sokchea of the Women's Network for Unity, who was speaking June 4 at a rally by sex workers against the legislation.

"Many times, when the brothels are raided police rape the women before arresting them," added Sokchea, who is also a sex worker.

Despite its progress, Cambodia remains a source and destination country for persons trafficked both for sex or labor, the State Department points out.

"Women and girls are trafficked for commercial sexual exploitation to Thailand and Malaysia.... Some Cambodian male migrant workers returning from India, South Korea, and Malaysia reported being subjected to conditions of forced labor and debt bondage," it said.

"Children are trafficked to Thailand and Vietnam to beg or work on the streets selling candy or flowers or shining shoes," it added, recommending that the government increase anti-trafficking training for authorities and step up court prosecutions of people smugglers. from Phnom Penh Post

•Sex workers rally against new anti-trafficking law

2008-06-06T02:25:00.000-07:00

Cat Barton

Chanting "save us from saviours," sex workers protest gross police mistreatment during the latest crackdown on commercial sex workers and human trafficking.

For six months they have endured worsening physical and sexual abuse at the hands of police over-zealously enforcing a new anti-trafficking law, but now Cambodian sex workers are fighting back.

More than 500 commercial sex workers rallied together on June 4 to protest the massive escalation of violent police raids on brothels and the criminalization of sex work due to new US-backed "model" anti-trafficking legislation, passed in February this year.

The "day of action," held at the Women's Network for Unity (WNU) in Phnom Penh, called for the repeal of the new anti-trafficking law, which critics say conflates prostitution with trafficking and is so over-broad that even carrying condoms can now get you arrested.

Chanting "save us from saviors" and waving placards saying "condoms protect, police threaten," hundreds of red-shirted sex workers demanded their human rights be respected and asserted they did not need to be "saved" from their jobs in brothels, least of all by lecherous, avaricious police officers.

“During brothel raids the police beat sex workers with sticks, stones, or weapons, and take all their money and jewelry," said Pheng Phally, a sex worker and team leader of the WNU.

"If any sex workers are pretty, the police gang rape them before sending them to the rehabilitation center where there is not enough food and very poor hygiene."

Video-taped evidence of the abuse of sex workers by Cambodian law-enforcement officials was presented at the event, which comes just one day before Minister of Interior Sar Kheng is due to make an announcement on the US State Department's annual assessment of the Kingdom’s anti-trafficking efforts.

WNU's Phally explained that after the new anti-trafficking legislation passed the police ramped-up brothel raids, began targeting street-based sex workers and closing down karaoke bars.

Not only does the new climate of fear and repression make it nearly impossible for the tens of thousands of women employed in the Kingdom's sex industry to earn a living, but they are being "beaten and treated like animals" during the raids, she said.

“We have gathered today to ask the government to repeal the law and stop the violent raids on us, we have rights too and we need to be allowed to earn money for ourselves and our families – sex work is work," Phally said.

The head of Cambodia's anti-trafficking police, Bith Kim Hong, on May 13 denied reports from groups like the WNU that large numbers of prostitutes were being rounded up under the new law’s soliciting clause, only to emerge from jail stripped of their money and possessions, or showing signs of physical and sexual abuse.

“It is not true police are using this law to arrest and extort money from the suspects. We never arrest prostitutes but rather we save them from brothels,” he told the Post at the time.

Cambodia’s “Law on the Suppression of Human Trafficking and Sexual Exploitation” is based on US-style model anti-trafficking legislation that seeks to eliminate human trafficking by criminalizing the sex industry as a whole.

Activists claim it was only passed in a misguided attempt to meet anti-trafficking standards imposed by the US State Department, and point to the fact other US agencies –- such as USAID -– oppose the law. from Phnom Penh Post

Khmer Rouge's top lady makes plea for freedom

2008-05-27T21:57:00.000-07:00

Thursday, 22 May 2008

At times appearing confused, 76-year-old Ieng Thirith faced the Extraordinary Chambers on Wednesday to to ask for bail. (Chor Sokunthea/Pool)

Former Khmer Rouge minister Ieng Thirith, who was the regime's top-ranking female member, appeared publicly before Cambodia's genocide tribunal for the first time on May 21 as she appealed against her pre-trial detention at the UN-backed court.Thirith, who served as social affairs minister during the regime's 1975-79 rule over Cambodia, is charged with crimes against humanity. She is one of five former Khmer Rouge leaders, including her husband Ieng Sary, who have been arrested by the court, known as the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia, or ECCC.The diminutive, bespectacled 76-year-old appeared confused at times, failing once to remember how many children she had and refusing to make a final statement following the nearly nine hour hearing, telling the court that she was "unwell.""I have high blood pressure and when I get angry it rises rapidly," said Thirith, who was seized by authorities from her Phnom Penh home in November.Her lawyers argued that Thirith should not be judged by the alleged crimes of her husband, who served as the regime foreign minister and has been charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity.Thirith's relationship with Sary should "not be used to criminalize the charged party," said her foreign lawyer, British QC Diane Ellis.The court must "consider position of charged person separately from that of the other four accused," Ellis said.
Thirith's Cambodian lawyer, Phat Pouv Seang, has earlier said that his client's deteriorating mental health should be grounds enough for her release, telling the Post that he had Thai-language medical documents proving that she was not fit to stand trial.Both Thirith and her husband traveled frequently to Thailand for medical treatment before their arrest amid rumors that the pair had amassed vast wealth from deals made during the chaotic last days of the Khmer Rouge in the 1990s.But her lawyers denied suggestions that Thirith and her husband had sacked away large amounts of money, telling the court that she did not own property in Cuba, and that her home in the capital belonged to a daughter.Many Cambodians attending the hearing dismissed the defense's claims that Thirith should be treated differently from other regime leaders."I will not be happy if the court releases Thirith or other KR leaders ... because during their time in power they treated Cambodian people very badly like animals," said 60 year-old Sam Soeun, who traveled to the capital from Preah Vihear province.
"I came here in the hopes that the court will find justice for me and for all the other victims," he said.Up to two million people died of starvation, disease and overwork, or were executed as the ultra-communist Khmer Rouge exiled the country's population into vast collective farms in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia in what was to become one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.Tribunal spokeswoman Helen Jarvis told the Post that the hearing had gone smoothly, despite repeated closed sessions that kept the participants in court into the evening."There was a lot to get through and remember we had five civil parties for this case," Jarvis said, explaining that the long hours "did not signal anything." A decision on the appeal is expected in the coming weeks. From Phnom Penh PostWritten by Cheang Sokha and Cat Barton

Dump closure to uproot thousands

2008-05-19T04:37:00.000-07:00

Friday, 16 May 2008

Rights groups fear new wave of homeless to hit Phnom Penh streets

HENG CHIVOAN

Collecting cartloads of cans, cardboard, plastic and glass for recycling can earn scavengers at Stung Meanchey rubbish dump more money than many rural households can make farming, but it is a livelihood set to end when the dump closes next year in favor of a larger, closed-off site near the Choeung Ek killing fields.

Rising in the pre-dawn darkness, Mean Ny is quickly absorbed into the anonymous throng of scavengers in Phnom Penh’s Stung Meanchey dump, a vast wasteland of sodden rotten trash that grows each day as the capital disgorges hundreds of tons of refuse.

Only a few short kilometers distant, but a world away from the city-center’s wide boulevards, dotted with modernist shopping malls or the metal and concrete skeletons of future skyscrapers, the capital’s poorest pick out a grim living, collecting plastic or aluminum – anything that can be sold for a few cents.

“I have to get up at three or four every morning in order to get things for recycling, like plastic, rubber and paper, before the others,” the 50-year-old told the Post, standing knee-deep in a pile of trash.

This existence, however miserable, still carries with it the familiar rhythms that Mean Ny has grown used to during the past 16 years.

HENG CHIVOAN

About 400 families will be affected by the closure of Stung Meanchey, according to local NGOs’ estimates.

But upheaval is not far away, as authorities plan to start closing the Stung Meanchey tip next year, a move which threatens to uproot thousands of scavengers and create a wave of newly homeless in Phnom Penh’s streets, advocacy groups warn.

“There are more than 1,700 children and about 400 families who will face unemployment and loss of income,” said Sry Chanratha, of Pour un Sourire d’Enfant (PSE), a French NGO set up in 1995 that provides education to children at Stung Meanchey.

“We don’t have the ability to help them yet,” said Chanratha, who directs PSE’s social and external school program.

“But we are trying to find funding from other NGOs in order to assist them to get real jobs and houses.”

Municipal authorities say the Stung Meanchey tip, which opened in 1962 as Phnom Penh’s main dump site, is now a 17-acre (6.9-hectare) blight on the rapidly-expanding capital and needs to be closed.

Stinging clouds of dry-season dust and smoke from smoldering trash heaps give way to deep, stinking mud in the monsoon, as the stench of fumes leaking from deep inside the decades of compacted refuse smother nearby neighborhoods.

According to our plan, we will not allow rubbish collectors to work at the new site and we will build a fence around it. – Sao Kunchhon, waste management dept.

“We’re changing the place where rubbish is dumped because we want to make a good social environment in the city and [Stung Meanchey] is too near,” said Sao Kunchhon, director of the Phnom Penh’s waste management department.

“We can’t keep it like this forever,” he added, saying that it is unclear what will happen to the old dump site, but that the government is in discussions with foreign investors who might construct a power plant on the land that would use the accumulated garbage as fuel.

A new landfill capable of eventually handing 1,500 tons of rubbish a day will be opened in Bakou village, some eight kilometers outside the city near the Choeung Ek killing fields, he said, explaining that unlike Stung Meanchey, the dump will be closed to scavengers.

“According to our plan, we will not allow rubbish collectors to work at the new site and we will build a fence around it,” Kunchhon said.

This leaves people like Ny desperate over their future.

“My family’s income will be worse than today because we’ve been depending on this dump since 1992,” she said.

“I feel like I’m going to suffer a lot when the Stung Meanchey dump moves to another place. I really don’t want it to move, but I can’t stop them,” she added.

Despite the pending closure, impoverished Cambodians continue arriving at Stung Meanchey each day hoping to scavenge enough to feed their families, said Mech Sokha, director of the Center for Children to Happiness (CCH), a local NGO based at the dump that helps orphaned children and those with HIV-positive parents.

Like PSE’s Chanratha, Sokha fears that hundreds, if not thousands will be driven onto the streets when the dump closes, adding to the ranks of destitute families and street children living in ragged clusters near the capital’s main tourist areas.

“I’m worried because they will lose their jobs and there will be more street children and homeless old people in the city,” Sokha told the Post, explaining that families could sometimes earn more scavenging for a day at Stung Meanchey than they could in their rural villages. Written by Mom Kunthear (from Phnom Penh Post)

Workers find themselves at center of political tug-of-war

2008-05-19T04:35:00.000-07:00

Friday, 16 May 2008

TANG CHHIN SOTHY/ AFP

Prime Minister Hun Sen makes a speech during the inauguration of a mosque in Phnom Penh on May 15. Hun Sen and his political opposition have for the first time targeted Cambodia’s blue-collar workers as key assets in the upcoming national elections scheduled for July 27.

Better pay and working conditions for Cambodia’s industrial workers have become the centerpiece of party platforms ahead of July 27 national polls as the country’s politicians seek for the first time to tap into a vast voter pool they had previously ignored, party officials and election monitors say.

The leaders of the country’s three main political parties all went to the workers on May Day this year, appealing to garment factory employees and dockworkers alike for their ballot.

“If you like my leadership, vote for the CPP,” Prime Minister Hun Sen told hundreds of workers gathered at the Sihanoukville port, promising job security if his ruling Cambodian People’s Party was returned to power and calling on factory owners in the country’s strike-prone garment sector to treat their workers like “partners for life.”

Elsewhere, opposition politicians with the Sam Rainsy, Human Rights and Norodom Ranariddh parties were touting higher wages and labor rights in exchange for support in what many observers say will be a one-sided election favoring the CPP.

But despite being the clear favorites, Hun Sen’s embrace of the working classes signals a change in political strategy and marks the rise of industrial workers as a powerful constituent, observers say.

“This is the first time they’ve done this – they see opportunity in the growing number of workers. Before their numbers were small and the workers did not attract the attention of the political parties,” said Hang Puthea, executive director of the Cambodian election monitor Nicfec.

“It is important for the parties to attract workers because their numbers have increased by so much,” he told the Post.

“Each party believes that if they can attract those workers, the parents of those workers who live in the countryside and their friends will also vote for that party,” he added.

A simple calculation reveals exactly how big the worker vote could be: the garment sector alone employs an estimated 350,000 people, each supporting family at home that could multiply the total voter strength by three, five or even ten times, depending on the size of each employee’s family and circle of friends.

Some 8.1 million voters have been registered so far.

The total number of industrial workers is thought to be more than 500,000, monitors say.

“If 50,000 votes can win a seat in parliament, then half a million votes will swing 10 seats,” Puthea said.

That is no small number for Cambodia’s opposition trying to claw back some power from the CPP, which looks set to be able to form a government on its own this year, shedding a coalition government agreement that has been in place since the early 1990s.

All three minor parties are trading on Cambodia’s rising cost of living to give them the leverage they need to swing the workers’ vote.

Double-digit inflation has hurt most the country’s urban workers who during the past year have found themselves priced out of many staple goods.

Aside from promised wage hikes, the opposition has vowed to end pricing monopolies over fuel and curb living costs.

“If you vote for the CPP, you will get only one sarong, but if you vote for Sam Rainsy you will get another $20 [wage] increase,” Sam Rainsy, leader of his self-named party, told some 3,000 garment workers gathered at his party’s headquarters in Phnom Penh on International Labor Day.

Meanwhile, Norodom Ranariddh’s party spokesman Muth Chantha reminded workers that the prince, who remains in exile amid a host of legal problems, attracted investment to Cambodia, creating jobs.

All the pre-election wooing, however, has done nothing to convince labor activists that party leaders have their interests at heart.

Chea Mony, who took over the reins of Cambodia’s largest labor group, the Free Trade Union, in 2004, told the Post that “political parties have been cheating workers since 1993.”

“Every song they sing is sweet,” he said, urging workers not to be lured into a false sense of hope by the rhetoric.

“Consider each party’s policy platform on labor issues before deciding which one to support in the elections,” he said.

Nicfec’s Puthea also said trying to win the workers’ vote was a bit of shrewd international spin-making on the part of the parties.

“If any party can convince the workers to vote for them, it shows that the party supports international labor rights and raises its profile” outside of Cambodia,” he said. (from Phnom Penh Post)

Child labor surges with building boom

2008-05-19T04:29:00.000-07:00

Friday, 16 May 2008

TRACEY SHELTON

A girl stacks unfired bricks in a kiln at the state-run Prey Konkhla brick factory in Battambang, May 9.

B ATTAMBANG – Sy Oeur was 12 years old when she dropped out of school in a desperate bid to keep her impoverished family afloat. Despite her age, she quickly found a job working ten-hour shifts in a brick factory for which she is paid 6,000 riels a day.

She says she doesn’t mind the long hours or dangerous work as she’s happy to be able to help her family.

Behind the glitz and glamour of Cambodia’s recent construction boom is an army of under-aged, under-paid workers such as Oeur. The surge in demand for cheap labor has prompted thousands of children, some as young as six, to abandon their schooling and accept hazardous work in factories or on construction sites.

A new research study released May 8 by local rights NGO Licadho and World Vision draws attention to the gross child rights violations that underpin Cambodia’s latest burst of economic development.

The study was launched in Battambang where an estimated 500 children are currently employed in the province’s 26 brick factories.

“Most of these children are forced to work at the brick kilns because of poverty,” Vann Sophath, deputy director of communication and advocacy for Licadho, told the Post at the launch.

Conditions in the brick factories meet the International Labor Organization’s (ILO) criteria for the “worst forms of child labor,” the report claims. Factory work hinders education opportunities – around 74 percent of child workers do not attend school – and carries health risks ranging from third degree burns from the kilns to respiratory problems from brick dust.

Factory owners “never pay for treatment” when their workers are injured on the job and very few factories have any safety procedures in place, said Sophath.

Protective glasses, helmets and work shoes were almost unheard of among the children interviewed, less than half of whom were wearing gloves, hats or masks during work. Fewer than 20 percent of the children interviewed in the report said they had received work safety information from their employers.

The most common tasks performed by children in brick factories include loading bricks to and from kilns, extracting and grinding clay, and operating machinery. Brick making machines are hazardous as hands or arms can be easily caught in the constantly grinding moving parts.

Children working at the brick kiln receive an average wage of 5,000 to 6,000 riel per day with children under ten years old receiving 1,000 riels.

“Work in the brick factory is quite hard but I do not have any choice because my family needs the money,” said Kouch Chantha, 14, who, like all his siblings, works weekend shifts at the factory.

“I actually do not want to come but I am forced to work here by my mother because if I don’t come here I will have nothing to eat,” he said.

Most children, particularly those of a very young age, begin work alongside their parents and 30 percent said they lived at the factory in which they worked with either their parents or other relatives.

Pressure from parents who rely on their children’s wages to provide for the family means many child brick factory workers are resigned to their fate, said Chea Ravy, a child welfare worker at World Vision’s drop-in center for child workers in Battambang.

“They have only known one thing their whole lives: How can they build a dream?” Ravy asked.

Many factories in Battambang are taking on more child workers due to the recent constriction boom, said Eng Soeur, the owner of Ponlok Thmey Brick Factory which currently employs 50 workers. February and March were particularly busy months this year as brick prices rose to 400 riel per brick and his factory reported average sales of 150,000 bricks per month.

Although Soeur himself does not allow children to work fulltime at his factory, he does now allow child workers on weekends and holidays.

The construction boom has also resulted in a higher percentage of females working in brick factories.

Sok Seth, director of the Ministry of Labors’ Prey Konkhla Vocational Training Center – which includes a state-run brick factory which employs children – estimates that 70 percent of child brick workers are girls as boys are needed for heavier work on construction sites.

“The regulation in my center is not to hire children to work but we cannot enforce it 100 percent because the children sometimes come along for work with the mother,” Seth told the Post during a visit to the center on May 9.

Seth stressed that parents, as well as the brick factory owners, need to consider more carefully the future of their children and the dangers they face in this kind of work.

However, he added that if factory owners ceased hiring children the earnings of many families would decrease markedly, which is why many parents are not happy with the work of NGOs who are trying to combat child labor.

An estimated 1.4 million Cambodian children between the ages of seven and 14, or more than 50 percent, are engaged in some for of labor, mostly in the agricultural sector, according to international agencies.

Written by Cheang Sokha and Tracey Shelton, from Phnom Penh Post.

◘Coalition offers reveal opposition in disarray

2008-05-06T04:23:00.000-07:00

Friday, 02 May 2008
TANG CHHIN SOTHY/ AFP SRP leader Sam Rainsy says he wants a mass coalition of all political parties who oppose the ruling CPP, but analysts say the pride of party leaders could hamper any potential merger. It was only moments after his return on April 29 from a campaign sweep through Canada and the US that political leader Sam Rainsy declared his readiness to merge with Cambodia’s two other major opposition parties as the country races towards national elections in July.

Only such a marriage would have a chance at diminishing the power of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s ruling Cambodian People’s Party’s (CPP), which observers expect will become absolute in the absence of the coalition government deals which have resulted from previous polls.

But Rainsy’s offer was not without conditions and accusations aimed at the very partners he is seeking, something analysts say reveals an opposition hopelessly at odds with itself and unlikely to loosen the CPP’s stranglehold over Cambodia’s political affairs.

“They do not have confidence in each other,” said Chea Vannath, the former director of the Center for Social Development who is now an independent analyst.

“They must merge together to compete with the CPP, but ... they cannot call for a coalition only as the election arrives,” she told the Post on April 30.

“A coalition is a very important force, but each (party leader) is too proud and will not agree to work together.”

Corruption, legal problems and even messy personal lives have come into play and Rainsy and leaders of the Human Rights Party (HRP), headed by former activist Kem Sokha, and Prince Norodom Ranariddh’s self-named political organization point fingers at each other, while at the same time pledging to support a coalition.

Upon returning to Cambodia, Rainsy demanded that the “weak points” of both of his potential allies be addressed or all three risked being “held hostage” by the CPP.

Kem Sokha, who has been at the center of a vicious whisper campaign over alleged graft, needed to sort out corruption allegations made by his former employees at the Cambodian Center for Human Rights, according to Rainsy.

The Prince, in self-imposed exile since he was ousted as head of the royalist Funcinpec party amid a flurry of legal assaults, including one for adultery, must tidy up his private affairs, Rainsy said.

“No one else can help him with that,” he told the Post.

These comments have not gone down well, with Kem Sokha shooting back that Rainsy – the long-time darling of foreign pro-democracy campaigners – has no real commitment to form a coalition, as well as legal problems of his own that could jeopardize the opposition’s election chances.

The HRP has long pushed for a coalition with the two other opposition parties, but the plan is still “a failure,” Sokha said, adding that while he would unconditionally join Rainsy, he did not know if he could merge with the Prince’s Norodom Ranariddh Party, or NRP.

“He (Ranariddh) is different from me,” he said, accusing the NRP of shamelessly using a joint meeting with his own group to encourage defections to the NRP.

“This is a divide and rule policy it does not demonstrate the good will you need to form a democratic coalition,” Sokha said.
The disarray is, however, just more evidence of the CPP’s pending election landslide, according to government spokesman Khieu Kanharith.

“This is five riels being divided between three people,” he told the Post on May 1.

The opposition “merged many times before but those mergers were always broken – it is no worry to the CPP,” he said.

Officials at the NRP, while professing to want a coalition, claim that the two other parties simply waited until it was too close to the July 27 elections to realistically merge.

Registration for parties ends on May 12, and NRP spokesman Muth Chantha said, “When the election will arrive so soon why … hold press conferences about coalitions?

“We cannot merge now into one big party, it is too late. It is very deceptive to claim we can.”

Credibility remains elusive for the fractious opposition, said Koul Panha, executive director of the Cambodian election monitor Committee for Free and Fair Elections, and the most recent bickering does not help.

“The merger must be sincere … but do these three leaders have the will to do this?” he said.
Written by Meas Sokchea from Phnom Penh Post.

◘Govt shrugs off Thai border complaints over Preah Vihear

2008-04-26T00:57:00.000-07:00

Friday, 18 April 2008

AFP

Employees of local NGO Heritage Watch document the ancient temple in Preah Vihear near the Thai-Cambodian border, in this undated file photo.

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. Written by Cat Barton and Vong Sokheng from Phnom Penh Post

Gloomy year ahead, predicts royal astrologer

2008-04-21T04:37:00.000-07:00

Friday, 18 April 2008
Thungsakdevi, a female angel, rides a rat over Sothearos Blvd, Phnom Penh, to mark the start of the Year of the Rat on April 13.
Cambodia’s official predictions for the New Year have been made and things are not looking good. From flooding to rising food prices to jealous wives, it looks set to be a tricky Year of the Rat – if the predictions are to be believed, that is.
Once a year, royal astrologer Im Borin publishes his predictions for the year ahead. His predictions appear in a small but widely distributed paperback book adorned with Technicolor pictures of the Buddha.
On 13 April – the day when the year of the pig was symbolically ended by Thungsakdevi, a female angel, riding a rat into Cambodia – Borin made his first predictions.
The Kingdom will be seriously threatened by flooding, rainfall will be unreliable and the yield of the average paddy field will drop, said Boran, who also runs the Committee for the Research of Astrology, Khmer Culture and Custom (CRAKCC) at the Royal Palace.
Worse yet, inflation will not be easing anytime soon, according to Borin.
He said the price of basic goods will continue to rise, fruit and vegetable harvests will be poor and Cambodians’ quality of life will deteriorate.
There will be more violence in the Kingdom than there was last year, predicted Borin.
On the second of three days of predictions, Borin added to the grim picture he had already painted by saying the price of salt would increase.
That will be of minor concern to some, though, as Borin also said wives of high-ranking government officials would be in a foul mood over the coming year, being easily frustrated and angered.
There would also be more malaise in small communities, he added.
The third day of predictions focused on governance. Borin predicted that even if government officials emerged victorious from arguments with “their enemies” while maintaining the peaceful relations with them, there would still be chaos in the country.
“Every prediction I make, I make according to traditional rules, but use of these traditional rules has declined,” Borin wrote in his book.
“I made predictions from the few remaining rules as I want the younger generation to know about this part of Cambodia’s history.”
While Cambodia’s urban centers are rapidly modernizing, Borin’s predictions still carry a lot of weight throughout the country.
One farmer from Angseong commune, Bati district, Takeo province, who declined to be named, told the Post by phone on that he and other farmers in the area were worried about the predictions regarding rainfall.
“I believe about 50 percent of the Khmer New Year predictions because it is our local tradition,” he said. HENG CHIVOAN (from Phnom Penh Post)Written by Vong Sokheng

Thousands homeless as city burns

2008-04-19T04:30:00.000-07:00

Friday, 18 April 2008

Cramped housing, lack of resources blamed for difficulty fighting fires

TANG CHHIN SOTHY/ AFP

People carry belongings away from a fire in Phnom Penh’s Russey Keo district, April 11, which the deputy director of the city’s firefighting unit, Um Chantha, said was the worst disaster he had witnessed in recent years.

Large plumes of black smoke have become a familiar feature of the Phnom Penh skyline as Cambodia reaches the peak of the hot season, with seven major fires wreaking havoc on the capital over a ten-day period.

During the first four months of the year, 27 fires have each caused extensive damage to various parts of the city. This figure represents a significant increase on 2007, when only 37 fires were recorded for Phnom Penh during the entire 12-month period, said Um Chantha, deputy director of the municipality’s firefighting unit.

“House fires are often caused by the carelessness of homeowners who do not have any kind of defense against fire,” Chantha said.

“At hotels, big companies or enterprises, they have fire extinguishers but normal residents do not have these on hand.”

Chantha said the April 11 slum fire at Teuk Thla commune in Russey Keo district, in which 450 houses were razed and thousands left homeless, was the worst disaster he had witnessed in recent years.

His team was unable to access the area quickly or easily and this hindered their attempts to stop the blaze, he said, adding that limited resources for firefighters was a major problem.

“We have only eight operational fire trucks in our unit,” he said. “This is not enough; we need roughly 20 more fire trucks to help.”

Ouch Sokhon, police chief of Chamkarmon district, said 44 houses burnt to the ground on April 16 in Sangkat Psah Demtkov.

The fire was caused by faulty wiring and although it destroyed the properties in their entirety, no one was seriously hurt.

One resident, who referred to himself only as Pheap, said his home was completely destroyed by the fire.

“I have nothing now,” he told the Post. “I lost all my property which I had saved for a long time to buy.”

According to Pheap, most of the houses in the area are wooden and were rented out to people from the provinces who are now working in Phnom Penh. “They do not understand how to prevent fires,” he said.

“I was always concerned about the risk of fire from neighboring houses as they didn’t seem to be careful,” he said. “Now finally the fire has happened and we have all lost everything.”

The blaze was the second fire to occur in the Sokhon neighborhood within a week following one at the Nagaworld hotel and casino complex – one of the country’s biggest hotels – on April 12. About 100 tourists were evacuated from Nagaworld after a fire broke out at a construction site inside the complex.

Local police chief Sokhorn said the ramshackle nature of many urban communities in Phnom Penh made it harder to stop fires.

Residents of the Psah Demtkov community had ignored municipal construction restrictions and expanded their houses at the expense of the road through the community, Sokhorn said, adding that the access lane on which the community is based was too narrow for fire engines to pass.

If the trucks had been able to access the area quickly, they would have been able to prevent the fire spreading through all the houses, Sokhorn said.

Firefighters eventually broke a brick wall around one property to get hoses through. Two hours later the fire was extinguished but the 120 families in the area – nearly all renters – were left homeless and sifting dejectedly through the smoldering remains of their former homes. (from Phnom Penh Post)

Written by Cheang Sokha

Cambodia a 'victim' of region's drug traffickers

2008-04-19T03:59:00.000-07:00

Written by Vong Sokheng

Friday, 04 April 2008

TRACEY SHELTON

Lour Ramin: “Because of stricter law enforcement in other countries, criminals have turned Cambodia into a drug lab.”

Lour Ramin is one of many loyalists to the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) who long ago determined to devote himself and his career to the party. Since 1979 he has been involved in government security affairs. During the State of Cambodia (SoC), he was responsible for national security. After the national elections in 1993, he was promoted to a position at the Department of Foreign Immigration to communicate with the outside world and to head up Cambodia’s role in the fight against terrorism. His career has enabled him to send all three of his children to be educated in Australia; one is a permanent resident there. Now Secretary General of the National Authority for Combating Drugs (NACD), Lour Ramin spoke to Post reporter Vong Sokheng about the fight against drugs, including the high profile raid a year ago that busted a major amphetamine lab in Kampong Speu. Following that raid, CPP advisor Oum Chhay was arrested. He committed suicide last August.

Why did you decide to take this job?
I am with the national police and I have to respect orders and assignments. That is my duty. Whatever bad situation or danger there is, I have to fulfill my obligation.

How do you respond to questions about CPP officials being involved in the drug business?
We have never denied this issue. It is an issue of personality; it is not a connection to the government institution. We must punish those who made a mistake, such as the case of Oum Chhay, even if he holds the title of Okhna. [Editors note: Chhay was an advisor to the National Assembly and to CPP Honorary President Heng Samrin. He jumped to his death from the first floor of Phnom Penh anti-drug police offices on August 21, 2007, six days after he was arrested at the Cambodian-Thai border town of Poipet. He was suspected of being involved in the transportation of four tons of chemicals used in the production of methamphetamine.]

How do you combat drug trafficking?
The National Authority for Combating Drugs is the most important body in the government’s policy to fight against drug trafficking. We have four approaches. First is to reduce the sources of drug supplies, especially drug plantations. With this we have been very successful. Marijuana plantations used to be big problem for Cambodia but now they are no longer an issue.
The second is to reduce the user base. We focus on education as a priority. We actively alert people to the danger of drugs and we have been able to reduce the consumer base and the smuggling of drugs into the country.
The third is to strengthen law enforcement. We have been struggling with this; with an amendment to the law and by strengthening human resources for law enforcement, we are seeing results. For example, in 2007 we cracked down on a large-scale drug lab, something which had never before been seen in Cambodia. We arrested the suppliers.
The fourth approach is cooperation with the international community. Drug trafficking is an international issue. We have paid a lot of attention and worked with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime as a very important partner. We have an MoU with our neighboring countries – Burma, Laos, Thailand, Vietnam and China – under the coordination of the UNODC. We have participated in international forums in Asia and Asia-Pacific.

What is your assessment of the drug problem?
Cambodia has been the victim of drug traffickers. Previously, criminals used Cambodia only as a transit area, but because of stricter law enforcement in other countries, criminals have turned Cambodia into a drug lab. We cracked down on them in time. They continue to use Cambodia as a transit area where drug smuggling flows from the Golden Triangle to get to international markets.
Drug users are still increasing. Even as we strengthen our abilities, we see that if the source of the drugs is not stopped, Cambodia will remain victimized by drugs. We have reduced drug trafficking but we still cannot keep it under control. We are determined, along with ASEAN countries plus China, under the coordination of the UNOCD, to free Cambodia of drugs by 2015. But the target is very difficult.

Are there other drug labs under investigation?
Besides the large-scale drug lab which we cracked down on in Kampong Speu, we have had some information about attempts to set up drugs labs in other areas. But so far we haven’t found any.

What kind of drugs do you find in Cambodia?
We find that production of amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) is popular because of the consumers. This kind of ATS production is increasing in the region and in Cambodia. We’ve found heroin being smuggled from the Golden Triangle through Cambodia to the international market. Cocaine comes from Europe and transits Cambodia on its way to neighboring markets.

How many people are addicted to drugs?
In 2007 we found 11,000 Cambodian people were addicted to drugs, but the figure was not an accurate one. According to the experts, the figure should be five or ten times as much. The users were between 15 and 40 years old. The number of users that inject was also increasing, especially in Phnom Penh and other provincial towns where there was tourist and economic growth.

Does the drug situation create security issues that could impact local people?
Among the consumers, we found that they were involved in violent crimes, such as robbery and murder, and traffic accidents. These are cases that concern us. HE Sar Kheng, the Minister of Interior and head of the NACD, has paid attention to this issue and has encouraged police officials to take action in order to reduce crimes related to drug use.

What are your biggest concerns?
The flow of ATS because we don’t have enough experience or ability to control these chemical substances. The other difficult issue is there is no medicine for the treatment of users. We are looking forward to getting them access to medical care and to integrate them into the peaceful society.
Within the provincial health centers, we have established about 11 small rehabilitation health centers and they at least can provide services to 100 drug addicts.