Editorial | Articles about Cambodia | Khmer
From Kocha Olarn, CNN
Former Khmer Rouge minister, Ieng Thirith, at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia on April 30, 2010
(CNN) -- One of four former Khmer Rouge leaders charged with crimes against humanity was ruled unfit to stand trial and could be set free, a spokesman for the special U.N. court in Cambodia said Thursday.
Lars Olsen said the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia decided that Ieng Thirith, the 78-year-old former minister of social affairs in the Khmer Rouge regime, was "not fit to stand trial as she has dementia."
Prosecutors have 24 hours to object to the court's decision, Olsen said. If there is no objection, Ieng Thirith will be released, he added.
Opening statements by the defendants are scheduled for Monday.
Ieng Thirith was the only woman among the four defendants in the trial, which charges surviving leaders of the four-year Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s with crimes against humanity, grave breaches of the Geneva Conventions, genocide, homicide, torture and religious persecution.
The other defendants are her husband, Ieng Sary, the former Khmer Rouge foreign minister; Khieu Samphon, the nominal head of state; and Nuon Chea, the prime minister, also known as Brother Number 2.
The head of the Khmer Rouge, Pol Pot, was known as Brother Number 1. He died in 1998, long before the U.N.-backed court came into existence.
Under Pol Pot's leadership, the Khmer Rouge regime was responsible for the deaths of millions of ordinary Cambodians during a four-year reign of terror that was eventually halted in 1979 by invading Vietnamese forces.
In 1975, the Khmer Rouge ordered people out of Phnom Penh, the capital, and other cities in Cambodia to work in the countryside.
It is said to be responsible for about 1.7 million deaths, roughly a quarter of the population at the time. Its stated aim was to create a Communist utopia, but instead the regime forced Cambodians into what has been described as a living hell.
City-dwellers were marched into the countryside and forced to work as farm laborers. Those already living in rural Cambodia were expected to produce enough food for the country while teaching farming to those who had never done it before. Currency was abolished, and anyone with an education was considered a threat. No one was allowed modern medicine, and the country isolated itself in an effort to become completely self-sufficient.
The results were disastrous: People died of starvation and disease as soldiers tortured and killed anyone suspected of being disloyal.
In the end, virtually everyone, including the soldiers, became a target due to the leadership's paranoia.
Labels: Ieng Thirith, Khmer Rouge, Khmer Rouge Tribunal
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November 16, 2011
TALKING POINTS AT TODAY’S PRESS CONFERENCE
I- Constitutional crisis
Opposition Members of Parliament decide to provoke a constitutional crisis by resigning en bloc and constitutionally blocking the National Assembly because no dialogue is possible with the Government. The ruling CPP ignores the rights of minority parties and keeps persecuting the SRP. The National Assembly is just a rubber-stamp parliament while the justice system is a political tool for the CPP to preserve and consolidate its authoritarian power. Unacceptable human rights violations and other government abuses must be stopped one way or another.
II- SRP’s objective
The SRP will continue to block any vote or any decision by the National Assembly until the CPP-led government accepts to implement:
- A moratorium on land grabbing and forced evictions in line with a recent Appeal by the United Nations. [“Stealing our land is stealing our life”].
- A change in the composition of the National Election Committee (NEC) in line with the recommendation of the European Union (EU Election Observation Mission in 2008) relative to the organization of any future elections. [“Stealing our vote is stealing our life and our future”].
III-Immediate consequences for the Government if it refuses to meet the SRP demands
1) The Budget Law for 2012 cannot be adopted.
2) Loan agreements recently signed by the Government with foreign countries and international financial institutions cannot be ratified as required by the Constitution (see attached economic analysis showing how the thriving corruption of the Hun Sen regime depends on external borrowings).
IV- Response to Hun Sen
1) About a comparison between him and Gaddafi: I have compared Hun Sen to Muammar Gaddafi on several occasions. But I have also compared Hun Sen to other recently-deposed dictators such as Tunisia’s Ben Ali (removed after 23 years in power), Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak (removed after 30 years in power). I hope Hun Sen will be wiser than Gaddafi by accepting to step down when it is not too late. After 32 years in power, Hun Sen is now the world’s longest-serving prime minister preceded only by Yemen’s president Ali Abdullah Saleh, who will fall soon after33 years in power. Everybody can notice that the worst regimes in terms of crimes and impunity are those whose autocratic leaders have been in power for the longest period of time. Hun Sen is also in good company with Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, who will be removed soon after 40 years of dictatorship including his father Hafez al-Assad’s 29-year reign of terror.
2) About Hun Sen’s threat to file a lawsuit against me in Phnom Penh following my comparing him to Gaddafi: I want to remind Hun Sen and his wife Bun Rany that I have publicly accused them of masterminding the assassination in 1999 of Ms. Piseth Pilika, a renowned Cambodian artist. Given the fact that I have issued this very serious accusation in Paris in a public speech and a public written document, I invite Mr. and Mrs. Hun Sen to be courageous enough to dare file a defamation lawsuit against me before the French Court since it is from the French soil that I accuse them of murder. Mr. Hor Namhong, Cambodia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, has already filed such a lawsuit against me before the French Court. If Mr. and Mrs. Hun Sen do not dare to start a lawsuit against me in France like Mr. Hor Namhong, they would show up their cowardice and would implicitly recognize that they are effectively murderers.
Sam Rainsy
Labels: hun sen, Sam Rainsy
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Vong Sokheng | Phnom Penh Post
Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday accused the opposition Sam Rainsy Party of having a covert plan to subvert passage of next year’s national budget and threatened legal action against any of its members who continued to compare him to Muammar Gaddafi, the former Libyan leader killed last month after a months-long revolution.
“It is painful and insulting to be compared to Gaddafi, and to compare my fate to his,” Hun Sen said. “I am not going to take violent action. I will take legal action if I catch you continuing to compare [me] to Gaddafi.”
Hun Sen’s remarks came while he was speaking to about 1,000 villagers at a ceremony opening the refurbished and widened National Road No 3, which connects Phnom Penh with Kampot province.
The premier also said he had obtained “secret information” that the SRP was attempting to subvert the passage of next year’s budget by forcing four parliamentarians to resign from their seats in the 123-seat National Assembly.
This would result in the legislative body not having the 120 MPs necessary for it to function. Article 76 of the Constitution required that the National Assembly have at least 120 MPs, Hun Sen said.
“The most important of its [SRP] intentions is to prevent us borrowing money from China. When four SRP parliamentarians resign, the National Assembly will consist of only 119 members, and therefore it cannot pass [the budget law],” Hun Sen said, adding that the SRP was attempting to “fully destroy the nation”.
Stepping up his attack, he called for all SRP MPs to resign and allow the National Election Committee to divide their seats among other parties.
He also said internal disputes within the SRP would see it split into five factions, and that it was trying to avoid drawing attention to its own problems by creating havoc inside the National Assembly. Once the National Assembly was in crisis, the SRP would then call for the international community to put pressure on the ruling party, and claim it lacked legitimacy.
“You [SRP] want the international community to put pressure on me, but it is not easy, and if international diplomats are not clear [about the SRP’s manoeuvring], please come to pick up [recorded conservations of SRP members] at my Cabinet,” Hun Sen said, referring to alleged secret tapings of conversations between SRP members.
SRP spokesman Yim Sovann dismissed Hun Sen’s allegations, saying the SRP was preparing for the Senate elections in January. Some of its MPs would resign to run for seats in the Senate, he said. “We have no intention to prevent the national budget passing at the National Assembly.
“However, we want a more effective and responsible [use of government funds] for the nation and the people, because debt from borrowing from foreign countries, which is included in the national budget, lacks transparency and fuels corruption.”
SRP MP Mu Sochua told the Post on Sunday there was “a concerted effort under way to undermine the party’s effort to expand its influence in the Senate”, whose members are elected by commune councils.
The SRP had made significant gains in the 2007 commune council elections, winning 2,660 of the 11,353 seats nationwide.
It held two seats in the Senate and expected to win 10 or 11, she said.
additional reporting by Kim Yuthana and Vincent Maclsaac
Labels: Prime Minister Hun Sen, Sam Rainsy Party, SRP
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Liao Ruo |chinadialogue
Where rule of law is weak, China’s investors should be wary of hiding behind local regulations, writes Liao Ruo, concluding a two-part article.
Perhaps concerned about the negative impact of the “relocations” from Boeung Kak, the commercial attaché at China’s embassy in Cambodia, counsellor Jin Yuan, gave an interview to the Global Times in January, rejecting responsibility on behalf of the Chinese firm. Shukaku bore sole responsibility for the relocations and Erdos Hongjun would only be involved after that process finished, he said, adding that compensation negotiations were being carried out by a special body appointed by the Phnom Penh government and had nothing to do with either company.
Admittedly, according to its contract, the Chinese company isn’t legally responsible for the relocations. But as a 50% shareholder in the joint venture and the project’s sole investor, doesn’t it have a social responsibility to the thousands of residents whose lives have been gravely affected by the scheme?
The Global Times report also stated that “Even though the residents’ buildings are mostly illegal, the development company has still paid out compensation and built alternative housing 20 kilometres outside of Phnom Penh.” The implication is that the residents’ demands are illegitimate, the developers have already done more than necessary and the Boeung Kak locals have no cause to bother the Chinese firm.
But in Cambodia, where the rule of law is weak, legality and justice may not always be one and the same. If you want to be a good investor, you have to make an effort to understand local realities, as well as obeying local rules.
Originally, the banks of Boeung Kak were uninhabited. But after the fall of the Khmer Rouge in the 1980s, Cambodians started to move back to Phnom Penh from the surrounding provinces and some settled here. In 2001, a new land law was passed: if a household could prove that it had lived in one place for the five years prior to 2001, then it owned the property.
Most of the residents around Boeung Kak meet that requirement. But the government has made slow progress certifying land rights, and so their ownership remains unrecognised. After the city government announced the leasing of land to Shukaku in February 2007, the locals started to fear they would sooner or later be driven away – and sure enough, the following year, government promises that locals would not be moved were broken, and pressure started to be applied. The nightmare began.
As the Global Times reported, the developers did provide compensation. Residents were given three choices: US$8,500 in cash; a new home 20 kilometres away from the city and US$500 for moving costs; or temporarily relocation to another site with the option of moving back in five years.
That may sound adequate, but it’s not. Land in the area already costs US$3,000 per square metre. Assuming each household originally had 50 square metres of land, it would have had a market value of US$150,000. And so $8,500 is far from a fair price.
The majority of the displaced residents had no choice but to head to the city’s outskirts and “spend about US$6,000 on a piece of land, and then another three or four thousand dollars building a house,” Sia Phearum, secretariat director of Housing Rights Task Force, a Phnom Penh-based NGO, told reporters. They couldn’t buy land in the city proper for two reasons, he said: one, it is too expensive, and, two, they would only be likely to be relocated again.
Unlike in Chinese cities, Phnom Penh does not have lots of residential property developments, and those that do exist are not built for ordinary people. If the average local wants a house, he or she “buys” a piece of land and builds on it. However, that “buying” normally means obtaining a proof of exchange from the village or county head, which has no legal force. If the government decides it wants the land, that piece of paper is not enough to prove ownership. Of course, residents can go through the proper formalities and have their land rights recognised, but that can cost US$1,500 in bribes to the authorities – more than an ordinary worker might make in a year.
The second option is no better. In early 2010, I visited the replacement housing provided to relocated locals by the developer: rows of single-storey buildings. Inside each house is just a large empty room. There are no kitchens, and the toilets are outside. Basic infrastructure is inadequate.
Most importantly, it’s too far from the city. Cambodia is not a developed nation, and leaving the city means going back to an agricultural society, away from modern infrastructure like electricity and running water. It can also mean losing your livelihood: Phearum said 60% of those who moved here ended up returning to the city and renting somewhere to live.
Moving has also caused employment and education difficulties. The women can no longer earn their usual income setting up small stalls by their front doors, as the area has very few residents – and those who do live here have no money to spend. Many of the men tend to work as motorcycle taxi drivers and this has problems too: it’s a 50 kilometre round-trip to the city, which means spending a lot more on fuel. There’s no nearby school, so some children dropped out. One middle school student told me that he’d missed a year of education, until an NGO gave him a bicycle so he could get to a school 20 kilometres away.
The third option, to move back to Boeung Kak in five years, is even less popular. The developers are promising apartments in high-rise buildings, meaning residents will not be able to run stalls at their front door. The community also has no confidence that the developer will keep its promises.
And so the remaining 800 residents are refusing all three proposals and demanding land where they can build homes near the lake. The developer can continue to say its compensation schemes are more than fair, but in reality the residents have been placed in a hopeless situation.
How did this project attract two or three different Chinese firms, and how can those firms ignore the pleas of the locals? Perhaps it has something to do with who the Cambodian partner is.
Shukaku’s chairman is senator Lao Meng Khin of the ruling Cambodian People’s Party, and a special adviser to prime minister Hun Sen. He is also ethnically Chinese, and always accompanies the prime minister on visits to China. In 2009, Khin was invited to Beijing for the 60th anniversary celebrations of the People’s Republic of China. He is often found lurking in the shadows of large Sino-Cambodian joint ventures.
In March 2004, Cambodian International Investment Development Group (CIIDG) – of which Lao Meng Khin is also chairman – signed a deal with China’s Henan Jinqu Gold, forming Jinqu Mining, to extract gold ore in Cambodia. In November 2004, he imported a train from China South Locomotive and Rolling Stock, the first such purchase from China made by Cambodia. And, in February 2008, a consortium of four Chinese firms, led by the Jiangsu Hodo Group, invested in a special economic zone in Sihankouville, again in partnership with CIIDG.
An investigation by United Kingdom-based NGO Global Witness has found that Lao Meng Khin is also a director of a forestry company that cooperates with Chinese logging business Hainan Wuzhishan Group, and of two more firms which, judging by their names, are likely China-Cambodia joint ventures: Petrol Camchin and Sino Hydropower.
Clearly, he has excellent contacts with the authorities in charge of various resources. Global Witness estimates that Lao Meng Khin and his wife’s company, Pheapimex, has felling rights to 1.33 million hectares of forest – 7.4% of Cambodia’s total land area. According to a US embassy cable released by Wikileaks, Pheapimex has recently obtained usage rights for 315,000 hectares of land for plantations and mining.
Having such a well-placed Cambodian partner may ease the worries of many Chinese investors. But high political benefits also bring high political risks. On September 11 this year, Cambodia’s main opposition party, the Sam Rainsy Party, issued a statement describing Shukaku as “an enemy of the Khmer people”. It warned all law-abiding companies and organisations to avoid any connection with the company, including owning its shares, making joint investments, loans, guarantees, purchasing or supplying products or services or cooperating in any way. Although the governing Cambodian People’s Party still has a strong grip on power and the Sam Rainsy Party is very likely to remain in opposition for the foreseeable future, its rhetoric and the public opinion it represents must be taken seriously.
Liao Ruo is a reporter based in Beijing.
Labels: Boeung Kak Lake, China, eviction, Lao Meng Khin, Shukaku, Yeay Phu
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By Robert Carmichael | M&G
Phnom Penh - A prominent survivor of Cambodia's Khmer Rouge regime said Tuesday she would no longer participate in the UN-backed tribunal, saying it had become a farce.
Theary Seng's decision came days before the November 21 start of the trial of four surviving Khmer Rouge leaders charged with genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes for their alleged roles in the deaths of up to 2.2 million people between 1975-79.
The troubled court has for months battled a rising tide of problems, and Seng said the UN must shoulder much of the blame for failing to tackle issues.
'The United Nations has abstained from fulfilling its duties, and more than that has helped (to) enable the impunity,' said Seng, whose parents were killed by the regime, and who had been recognized by the court as a victim, or civil party.
Seng said corruption, apathy, UN inaction and interference by Cambodian politicians in the tribunal had motivated her decision.
'It's an issue of having enough of this sham, of having enough of this farce that is very much political theatre,' she said. 'I no longer want my name, the memories of my parents, of my family, to be soiled in this process that is no longer legitimate.'
The Open Society Justice Initiative (OSJI), which monitors the tribunal, urged UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon to appoint an independent panel to investigate 'an unprecedented crisis of confidence' in the court following allegations of misconduct.
The OSJI report followed the surprise resignation on October 9 of German co-investigating judge Siegfried Blunk, who was accused of deliberately undermining the investigations into two further cases that are opposed by the Cambodian government.
In October, a decision by two international judges at the tribunal appeared to support long-running allegations of misconduct levelled against Blunk and his Cambodian counterpart You Bunleng.
They said Blunk and You Bunleng had backdated documents, refused to recognize civil party lawyers, prevented lawyers from accessing the case file, and denying victims the 'fundamental right to legal representation.'
OSJI said that written decision showed Blunk and You Bunleng had shown consistent willingness 'to violate basic legal principles in order to reach pre-determined legal outcomes.'
In its first case, the court last year sentenced the regime's security chief, Comrade Duch, to 30 years in prison after finding him guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity. Duch has appealed his conviction.
Labels: Khmer Rouge Tribunal, Theary Seng, UN
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BANTEAY MEANCHEY, Cambodia, Nov. 15 (Xinhua) -- The Banteay Meanchey Provincial Court on Tuesday convicted the provincial former police chief Hun Hean of taking briberies and sentenced him to 4 years in jail and fined 280,000 U.S. dollars, according to a verdict announced by the presiding judge Im Vannak.
The court also sentenced his accomplices -- the provincial former deputy police chief Chheang Sun to 4 years in jail and fined 10,600 U.S. dollars, and other 2 affiliated former police Hem Sophal, deputy chief of minor crime police office, and Khieu Sara, chief of anti-drug office, were jailed 3 years each and fined 3,200 U.S. dollars and 400 U.S. dollars respectively.
All of them were found guilty of taking briberies in exchange of drug trafficking suspect releases.
Hun Hean and his deputy Chheang Sun were arrested on Jan. 7 and Jan. 10 respectively.
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PHNOM PENH, Cambodia, Nov. 12 (UPI) -- Human rights activists say more action is necessary to stop the trafficking of maids from Cambodia to Malaysia.
Cambodian Member of Parliament Mu Sochua said a recently enacted law banning the practice of sending domestic workers to Malaysia, essentially trapping them into debt-bondage, has not stopped companies from recruiting, training and sending women to Malaysia, CNN reported Friday.
Many Cambodian maids were recruited by labor agencies promising them more money to work in Malaysia. Once they got there, they were forced to hand over their passports and put in situations much like indentured servitude, said Manfred Hornung, a legal adviser for Licadho, a Cambodian rights group.
Just a few days after CNN reported the conditions of these women in October, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen signed a law banning the practice.
CNN's story has awakened the whole country to the human trafficking issue, Sochua said. "I have to say that this piece is just one little part of the whole problem, which is much worse," Sochua said.
The lawmaker added the country's ministries of labor and interior "are not taking any action, noting "many officials and familial members of some ministers actually own these dubious agencies."
Licadho claims that three days after the bill was signed into law Oct. 15, 25 Cambodian maids, wearing shirts with the name of a recruiting agency on them, checked in for a flight heading to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
"It is a heartbreaking story," said Sochua. "I constantly meet with many parents who come to tell me that they don't know where their girls are, they simply disappeared and lost contacts with families after girls left to Malaysia."
The trafficking of women, often young girls, for sexual exploitation and the abuse of sex workers is also rampant in Cambodia, despite the country passing a law in 2009 meant to protect sex workers, CNN reported.
Read more: http://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News/2011/11/12/Cambodias-anti-slavery-efforts-questioned/UPI-89501321142433/#ixzz1dXXEcEUi
Labels: Human Traffic
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By David Ariosto, CNN
Cambodia, long suspected of being fertile ground for human traffickers, has drawn recent attention after reports of sexual abuse and widespread mistreatment prompted government actions to improve the plight of its young women and girls.
Considered a modern-day form of slavery, human trafficking involves the illegal trade of people and commonly includes sexual exploitation and forced labor.
In Cambodia, CNN uncovered stories of suspected abuse; ranging from girls as young as 4 years old being sold for sex - an industry thought to be bolstered by foreign tourists - to young women trapped in debt-bondage, having being lured to neighboring Malaysia for work.
In an effort to unravel a phenomenon that human rights groups say still plagues southeast Asia and the broader region, the CNN Freedom Project highlighted Cambodia because of both its reputation and a recent pledge to better the situation.
But whether recent reforms have since worked to stem the alleged abuses remains a subject of debate.
Domestic labor in Malaysia
Drawn by the prospect of a better life and the promise of more money, many young Cambodian maids working in Malaysia said they were recruited to go there by labor agencies, now only to find themselves unable to leave.
The women - often subject to poor treatment in prison-like facilities - forfeit their passports and are commonly left in a situation tantamount to indentured servitude, said Manfred Hornung, a legal adviser for the Cambodian Rights Group, Licadho.
On October 15, however, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen signed a measure into law banning the practice of sending domestic workers to Malaysia, perhaps in response to mounting criticism.
The ban was enacted just days after a report by CNN's Dan Rivers examined a recruitment agency in the Cambodian capital.
The story "that aired on CNN has actually awakened the country up the whole country on this human trafficking issue again," said Cambodian parliament member Mu Sochua. "I have to say that his piece is just one little part of the whole problem, which is much worse."
She said the report prompted her to further petition the country's leadership to take action.
But only weeks later, Sochua told CNN that labor recruitment agencies in her country were still sending domestic workers to Malaysia, adding that many government officials either own or have close ties to the companies.
The country's ministries of labor and interior "are not taking any action," she said, noting that "many officials and familial members of some ministers actually own these dubious agencies."
Sochua did not identify the officials, ministers or companies to which she was referring and CNN cannot independently confirm her claim.
But a government spokesman called the practice of sending labor abroad "a learning process."
"We are finding out why it has happened and why it is happening," said Phay Siphan, a spokesperson for the country's Council of Ministers.
Recruitment agencies, meanwhile, forge identification papers in an effort to recruit children, charge "excessive recruitment fees" and mislead workers about potential opportunities, according to recent a Human Rights Watch report.
Up to 50,000 Cambodian women have migrated to Malaysia since 2008, the report said.
And yet just three days after the domestic worker ban was signed into law, 25 Cambodian maids - wearing shirts emblazoned with name of a recruiting agency - checked in for an Air Asia flight to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, according to Licadho.
CNN cannot independently confirm that account.
"It is a heartbreaking story," said Sochua. "I constantly meet with many parents who come to tell me that they don't know where their girls are, they simply disappeared and lost contacts with families after girls left to Malaysia."
Sex slavery
Often accused of being both a source of and destination for human sex trafficking, CNN explored allegations of abuse affecting young girls in Cambodia - notably in a village outside the capital of Phnom Penh.
The village, Svay Pak, appears to have a disturbing reputation as a place where little girls are openly sold for sex to foreign tourists.
One of the girls - who CNN is not naming to protect the identity of the victim - says she was forced to work in a brothel before she could read.
"I was about 5 or 6 years old," the girl said. "The first man said to me, 'I want to have sex with you.' At the time I didn't know what to do. No one could help me."
Dozens of girls in her neighborhood told CNN that they've had similar experiences.
Sex workers elsewhere in the country are also subject to other forms of sexual violence, according to Human Rights Watch.
Last year, the group released a report that detailed widespread allegations of 90 female and transgender sex workers that said police "had beaten them with their fists, sticks, and electronic shock batons."
"Several said officers raped them while they were in police detention," the report said. "Every single sex worker we spoke with said the police demanded bribes or stole money from them. Some officers demanded sex."
Two years earlier, the country had passed a law meant to protect sex workers. But rights groups, such as Human Rights Watch, say there is "little evidence that this has happened, or that prosecutions for trafficking have been pursued.
Government officials decline to comment on those allegations.
Timeline
As the CNN Freedom Project continues to examine the effects and root causes of human trafficking, the following timeline reflects key aspects of coverage and events around the region.
October 3-5, 2011: CNN airs a three-part series that examines a recruiting agency, with alleged ties to the Cambodian government, suspected of trafficking maids to Malaysia. Just before the series airs, the young woman featured in the story begins receiving compensation, she says, but is still unable to leave the factory – her passport confiscated – until her "debt" is paid off. Read more of the report by CNN correspondent Dan Rivers
October 15, 2011: Cambodia's prime minister signs an order suspending the recruitment, training and sending of Cambodian domestic workers to Malaysia. Weeks later an opposition lawmaker says labor recruitment agencies are still sending domestic workers to Malaysia, adding that many government officials either own or have close ties to the companies. CNN cannot independently confirm that account and government officials say stopping the practice is "a learning process."
October 17, 2011: Malaysian Foreign Minister pledges to apologize to Cambodia if allegations of abuse of Cambodian workers in Malaysia are proved to be true.
October 22-23, 2011: CNN airs a two-part documentary called "Not My Life" that focuses on Cambodian brothels, specifically an area not far from the capital, where young girls are prostituted to visiting tourists.
October 24, 2011: CNN correspondent Sara Sidner reports from Cambodiagoogle. as a follow-up to what was revealed in "Not My Life." She files a story that focuses on a young woman who talks about how she endured repeated rapes from the time she was 5e years old. Shortly after the story airs, Cambodian authorities contact Don Brewster who runs the aid group featured in "Not My Life" to say they would act and make arrests. Brewster says he's been "yelling from the roof tops" for the past two years and it's not until CNN airs the story that suddenly there is action.
October 28, 2011: An article in the Cambodia Daily - an English-language daily newspaper - highlights government ties to recruiting agencies, including the one featured in Rivers' report.
October 31, 2011: Human Rights Watch publishes a report based on interviews with migrant domestic workers, government officials, non-governmental organizations, and recruitment agencies that highlight alleged abuses of women and girls in Cambodia and Malaysia, including allegations of forced confinement, heavy debt burdens and rape.
November 6, 2011: Journalist Nick Kristof accompanies a police raid at a brothel in Cambodia and posts message on the social networking site Twitter about how the army showed up and ordered police to cancel the raid as it was taking place. CNN cannot independently confirm that account, and the government has declined to comment.
Labels: CNN Freedom Project, Human Traffic, Malaysia, Mu Sochua
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By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
During a raid on a brothel in Anlong Veng, Cambodia, a Vietnamese social worker reassures several girls who have just been rescued. The girl in the center was a Vietnamese seventh grader who had been trafficked into Cambodia a few months earlier. The social worker herself was rescued from a brothel years ago.
ANLONG VENG, Cambodia AGAINST my better judgment, I found myself the other day charging into a well-armed brothel in a police raid. But I was comforted to be with one of my heroes, Somaly Mam.
Somaly dedicates her life to battling forced prostitution, for she herself was sold as a child to a Cambodian brothel. After enduring torture and rapes, Somaly escaped and reinvented herself as an anti-trafficking activist.
It’s partly because of grass-roots activists like Somaly, both in the United States and abroad, that human trafficking is increasingly recognized as a central human rights challenge. A U.N. agency estimates that more than 12 million people are engaged in forced labor, including sexual servitude. Another U.N. report has estimated that in Asia alone, “one million children are involved in the sex trade under conditions that are indistinguishable from slavery.”
In the abstract, the 21st-century abolitionist movement sounds uplifting and even glamorous. But riding beside Somaly in her car toward a brothel bristling with AK-47 assault rifles, it was scary.
This town of Anlong Veng is in northern Cambodia near the Thai border, with a large military presence; it feels like something out of the Wild West. Somaly, whose efforts are financed mostly through American supporters of her Somaly Mam Foundation, had sneaked into this brothel and surreptitiously photographed very young girls. With the photographs, she convinced Cambodia’s anti-trafficking police to mount the raid.
It didn’t help my nerves that Somaly, whom I’ve known for years, is fearless. Brothel-owners have fought back ferociously against Somaly: They’ve sent death threats, held a gun to her head and shot up her car.
“We all know that our lives are in danger,” she says, a little too cavalierly. “I’ve never been so happy in my life. They can kill me now.”
When Somaly refused to back off, she said the traffickers kidnapped her 14-year-old daughter and gang-raped the girl with a video camera rolling. The daughter was recovered in a brothel, and Somaly blames herself. It’s a credit to the courage of mother and daughter that they remain steadfast, upbeat and close, and determined to make a difference. These days, Somaly is very careful with that daughter and her other children.
The three unmarked police cars ahead of us pulled up in front of the brothel, and the police and prosecutor ran in. Somaly and I followed and watched as police with assault rifles confiscated cellphones from the brothel manager, a middle-aged woman, and her male partner, so that they couldn’t call for reinforcements.
We quickly found five girls and one young woman, three Cambodians and three Vietnamese. The youngest turned out to be a seventh grader trafficked from Vietnam three months earlier, making her about 12 years old.
The anti-trafficking police found 10 rooms equipped with beds and full of discarded condoms in the trash; the rooms all locked with padlocks from the outside, presumably to incarcerate girls inside. Several other young girls Somaly had photographed in her earlier visit couldn’t be found, despite a frantic search of all the locked rooms. “They’re probably kept at another house in town, but we don’t know where it is,” Somaly said.
Soon the mood turned ugly. The brothel-owning family had strong military connections, and the man was wearing the uniform of a senior military officer. Someone inside the brothel must have called in reinforcements, and seven armed soldiers soon arrived to order the police and prosecutor to release the military officer. The prosecutor responded with courage and integrity. He declared that the military officer would have to be taken to the police station. “If you want to stop me, you can shoot me if you dare,” he told the soldiers.
The soldiers backed down, but, in the end, the army officer was not charged. The woman, who had more day-to-day involvement in managing the girls, is expected to be prosecuted, and the brothel presumably will now be out of operation. The girls were placed in a shelter run by Somaly, and they are receiving plenty of love from other girls previously extricated from sexual slavery.
That’s how the battle against human trafficking is being fought around the world. Ultimately, the way to end this scourge is to make it less profitable and more risky for the traffickers. Above all, that means targeting not the girls but putting traffickers and pimps in jail, whether in Cambodia or in New York.
Slowly, that is happening. I can see the progress here in Cambodia, where 10-year-old girls were openly for sale when I began reporting on forced prostitution. Now they’re still sold, but fewer of them, and more discreetly — and traffickers are going to jail. There may well be prostitution a century from now, but we don’t have to accept 12-year-olds being raped until they get AIDS.
In the 19th century, the world conquered traditional slavery. And in this century, with leaders like Somaly, we can emancipate the victims of human trafficking.
I invite you to comment on this column on my blog, On the Ground. Please also join me on Facebook and Google+, watch my YouTube videos and follow me on Twitter.
Labels: ANLONG VENG, Somaly Mam
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As A trimmed-down Water Festival kicked off yesterday, the streets of Phnom Penh – normally congested to the point of immobility – were unusually quiet, void of the thousands of visitors from around the country who typic-ally flood the capital for the annual celebration.
Crowds for the three-day festival are expected to be a far cry from those of previous years after Prime Minister Hun Sen cancelled the traditional boat races on the Tonle Sap river in the face of the worst flooding in more than a decade.
Phnom Penh deputy governor Chhreang Sophan said yesterday he anticipated about half the usual number of people would make the trek from the provinces to the capital.
“Most of the festival-goers are from the countryside and were affected by the floods. The farmers are busy with farming again and cleaning their homes after the water recedes,” he said.
“People can also participate in the festival in their own province, even though they are not coming to the capital. That way, they can reduce their expenditure and save time.”
Deputy Phnom Penh pol-ice chief Y Pro said that even though there would be a significant decrease in activity this year, the city would still have a strong police presence, with about 5,000 patrolling the streets. “City-dwellers will still go out, even if there is not the presence of the people from the countryside,” he said.
Despite the flooding and the decision to cancel the boat races, 45-year-old Nai Pheang made the journey from Kratie province to Phnom Penh in order to sell her hand-carved wooden statues of dolphins and catfish.
“This is the fourth year I have done business during the Water Festival, and there are not many customers today. But this is just the beginning. I made the long trip here because I had already prepared my hand-made products [before the cancellation],” Nai Pheang said.
Other vendors who set up their tents around town yesterday seemed unperturbed at the idea that there would be substantially fewer people in the city.
Meatball vendor Mi Seth, 38, who has been selling food during the festival for three years, said that in previous years, she had made only a small amount of money because of the number of vendors in the city.
“This year, there aren’t many vendors, so I believe that my sales will be better,” she said.
Vendor Di Hom said she did not believe the amount of business she does would be much different from previous years.
“Most people from the countryside come to Phnom Penh just to visit the Water Festival and go sightseeing; they do not buy goods. Most of my customers are people living in Phnom Penh, because they have much more money than people from the countryside,” she said.
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Foreign visitors to the 11th-century Preah Vihear temple, on the Cambodian-Thai border, rose almost 78 per cent between January and October compared with the same period last year, despite a deadly border dispute that drew internat-ional attention in February.
About 2,140 foreign nationals visited the 1,000-year-old temple during the first nine months of the year, up from 1,206 in during the same period in 2010, according to data from the Preah Vihear Provincial Department of Tourism.
The border dispute—in which conflict between the Thai and Cambodian militaries erupted in and around the World Heritage site—was little more than a bump in the tourist development of the region, according to Preah Vihear tourism director Kong Vibol.
“There were lots of foreign tourists visiting the temple before the clashes and after the International Court of Justice ordered that the area be a demilitarised zone,” he said.
The court imposed the demilitar-ised zone in July, the Post has previously reported.
The increase had come despite the absence of tour agencies operating at the temple, Kong Vibol said.
Foreign delegations that came to monitor the border situation around the temple had contributed to the higher numbers, he added.
Local tourist numbers fell more than 32 per cent at the temple, tour data showed.
Preah Vihear province experienced a drop of more than five per cent in local tourist numbers, but Kong Vibol said that might improve as flood- waters in many areas receded.
Ang Kim Eang, president of the Cambodian Association of Travel Agents, said that among tourist destinations in Preah Vihear province, the temple was the only qualified attract-ion and most hotels and restaurants were not up to standard.
“We are trying to promote tourism there, but most tourists who visit Cambodia for the first time would prefer visiting the Angkor Wat temple,” Ang Kim Eang said.
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Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer | Kampong Thom, Cambodia
Sen Simon, 36, gazed at her flooded rice field and home from high ground in Kampong Thom province’s Baray commune.
Her daily food and other necessities were taken care of by the government, but she saw little hope for her future, after severe flooding inundated the area last month. Five thousand square meters of her rice crop was spoiled by the flooding, which would make next year tough, she said.
“I’ll lack food and I’ll face poverty,” she said. “It’s difficult to think of what I’ll do in the upcoming year.”
Sen Simon is among tens of thousands of Cambodians displaced by severe flooding across the country, in Cambodia’s largest natural disaster in a decade. At least 250 people have been killed in the flooding, and another 1.5 million affected one way or another, according to the government’s disaster agency. At last count, nearly 400,000 hectares of crops had been damaged.
“My house is flooded,” said Som Vanthon, 56, another resident of Baray commune. “When the water recedes, my house will collapse, because the pillars, bamboo floor and palm-leafed walls will break.”
In the commune’s Chaktuk Lork village, residents have received aid packages containing 10 kilograms of rice, 20 packets of instant noodles, salt, fish sauce, blankets, mosquito nets and fishing nets from the government.
Neang Yong, 38, said that much rice lasts about five days, but she fishes for food and money to buy more rice with. “My living is now very difficult,” she said.
In nearby Santuk district, the situation is much the same: rotten crops, flooded fields, flooded homes.
Tan Sokbeang, 55, who lives in Roneam village, said she has not received assistance from the government. “The village can’t see a rice plant,” she said. “My rice crop is completely spoiled. I’m very worried there will be no rice to eat in the next year.”
Kampong Thom Governor Chhun Chhon said in this province, just one of 17 affected by the floods, a third of the rice crop is destroyed, around 65,000 hectares. Some 4,000 families are facing food shortages and around 2,500 have left for higher ground. Flooding here killed 47 people across the province, he said.
Meanwhile, residents here are calling for more aid. So far, the Asian Development Bank and the UN, along with China and the US, have provided a total $16.55 million in aid to help victims. Government officials say they are preparing to distribute rice seedlings and more food aid. Damage for this year’s flooding is expected to exceed $520 million, in damage far exceeding the $145 million from flooding in 2000.
Labels: Flood, Kampong Thom
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May Kunmakara
Thailand's worst floods in decades had not slowed trade with Cambodia, a Thai official in Phnom Penh said yesterday, claiming many products sought by Cambodia came from areas free of flooding.
Bilateral trade between the two countries rose nine per cent year-on-year in the first nine months to US$2.15 billion year-on-year, with Cambodia’s imports climbing 1.6 per cent to $2.02 billion, according to Thai embassy commercial counsellor Jiranan Wongmongkol.
Those figures come despite a deluge of water across 25 of Thailand’s 77 provinces that has killed more than 500 people, according to the Thai government.
“Trade exchange is normal, because the Thai products exported to Cambodia come from provinces not affected by the floods,” Jiranan Wongmongkol said.
At the same time, some factories‘ inventories had suffered damage from the floods, she said.
Cambodia’s exports, most often agricultural products, were also unaffected, given that the harvest season had passed before the flooding in both countries began.
Cambodia has suffered extensive damage from the worst flooding in 10 years.
The restoration of diplomatic ties following the election of Yingluck Shinawatra as prime minister in July was also listed as a reason for the continued trade between Thailand and Cambodia.
Yingluck is the sister of former prime minister Thaksin Shinawatra.
“If we keep good relations as we are doing now, our trade exchange will become as it was before,” Kong Putheara, director of the Ministry of Commerce’s statistics department, said, referring to the
countries’ close relationship while Thaksin was PM.
Some insiders, however, quest-ioned the notion that trade would continue without interruption.
Thai Business Council of Cambodia deputy manager Kriegn Kria told the Post both countries would feel an impact from slowdowns in farming and manufacturing.
“Things are not so good, because the floods have forced a lot of big factories to close down,” he said.
Jiranan Wongmongkol admitted that the Cambodian market was becoming increasingly competitive, which might affect Thailand’s market share in Cambodia.
Also, Cambodia was now manufacturing some of the products it had been importing from Thailand. Thailand typically exports petroleum, construction materials, food and consumer goods to Cambodia.
Jiranan Wongmongkol said the Thai government planned to boost its engagement with Cambodian traders next year by holding two, rather than one, expositions in Phnom Penh and Battambang, with the aim of growing bilateral trade another 10 per cent.
The Cambodian Ministry of Commerce will host the Ayeyawady-Chao Praya-Mekong Economic Co-oper-ation Strategy sixth annual trade fair on Diamond Island, in Phnom Penh, between December 15 and 18. At least 90 Thai companies are expected to attend.
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The Cambodian and Malaysian governments’ failure to regulate recruiters and employers leaves Cambodian migrant domestic workers exposed to a wide range of abuses, Human Rights Watch said in a report issued on 1 November 2011.
Tens of thousands of Cambodian women and girls who migrate to Malaysia have little protection against forced confinement in training centres, heavy debt burdens, and exploitative working conditions.
The 105-page report, “‘They deceived us at every step’: Abuse of Cambodian domestic workers migrating to Malaysia”, documents Cambodian domestic workers’ experiences during recruitment, work abroad, and upon their return home. It is based on 80 interviews with migrant domestic workers, their families, government officials, non-governmental organisations, and recruitment agents. The report highlights the numerous obstacles that prevent mistreated women and girls from obtaining justice and redress in both Cambodia and Malaysia.
“Cambodia has been eager to promote labour migration but reluctant to provide even the most basic protections for migrant women and girls,” said Jyotsna Poudyal, women’s rights research fellow at Human Rights Watch. “The government should stop abdicating responsibility to unscrupulous recruitment agencies and clean up exploitation and abuse.”
Since 2008, 40000-50000 Cambodian women and girls have migrated to Malaysia as domestic workers. Some recruitment agents in Cambodia forge fraudulent identity documents to recruit children, offer cash and food incentives that leave migrants and their families heavily indebted, mislead them about their job responsibilities in Malaysia, and charge excessive recruitment fees.
Domestic workers told Human Rights Watch that agents forcibly confine recruits for three months or longer in training centres without adequate food, water, and medical care. Some labour agents coerce women and girls to migrate even if they no longer wish to work abroad. Workers who escape from the training centres face retaliation for escaping or for failing to pay debts related to the recruitment process.
The husband of a domestic worker who escaped from a training centre told Human Rights Watch:
The representative from the company said if my wife doesn’t return he will auction this house and land. And if the auction is not enough, they will arrest me and put me in jail.
At times collaboration of government officials with private recruitment agencies makes it almost impossible for workers to seek effective redress, Human Rights Watch found. One domestic worker said that two women had attempted suicide in a training centre in Cambodia after the agency refused their request to return home.
The agency then held a meeting with all recruits. Two police officials were there.
“The police officials told us that if we [attempted to] commit suicide, then they would put us in jail,” one of the workers said. “They also said that we should never try to escape. Even if we escape, the police will find [us] and we will still be sent to Malaysia.”
In the first successful prosecution of a recruitment agency, a Cambodian court in September 2011 sentenced a manager of the VC Manpower recruitment agency to 13 months in prison for illegally detaining child workers. However, the government has failed to arrest and prosecute other recruitment agents involved in similar abuses, and it has not revoked the licence of a single recruitment agency.
“While the conviction of one abusive agent in Cambodia is a step forward, it remains an exception,” Poudyal said. “The Cambodian government should put an end to systematic exploitation of domestic workers by ensuring that all agents are held accountable for their acts.”
Once in Malaysia, Cambodian women and girls often have to surrender their passports to their agents or employers, making it harder for them to leave if they are mistreated. Many work for 14-21 hours a day without rest breaks or days off. And many are forcibly confined to their work places, are not given adequate food, and are physically and verbally abused. Some have been sexually abused by their employers. None of the workers Human Rights Watch interviewed said they had received their full salary.
Malaysian labour laws exclude migrant domestic workers from key protections, such as a weekly day of rest, annual leave, and limits on working hours. Immigration laws tie a domestic worker’s residency to her employer, so the employer can terminate a domestic worker’s contract at will and refuse permission to transfer jobs. These policies restrict domestic workers’ ability to seek redress and to change employers, even in cases of abuse, Human Rights Watch said.
Human Rights Watch documented cases in which the combination of deception and indebtedness during recruitment, forced confinement, unpaid wages, and threats of retaliation for escaping or failing to pay debts amounted to forced labour, including trafficking and debt bondage. Abused workers often turn to the local agents of their recruitment companies, since they are typically the only contact the worker has in Malaysia, but may face intimidation and a return to the same abusive employer. The Cambodian embassy in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s capital, has also returned workers, including those who experienced sexual and physical abuse, to their recruitment agency or employers.
The Cambodian government should introduce a comprehensive migration law, strengthen monitoring of recruitment agencies, and impose significant penalties when violations occur, Human Rights Watch said. The Malaysian government should revise its labour and sponsorship laws to strengthen protection for domestic workers. Both countries should increase support services for abused workers, including legal aid and psychosocial services.
Human Rights Watch also urged Cambodia and Malaysia to ratify the International Labour Organisation Convention on domestic work. The treaty obliges governments to ensure decent working conditions, to impose a minimum age requirement for domestic work, and to protect domestic workers from violence and exploitative recruitment practices.
“When the Cambodian embassy in Malaysia sends abused workers back to their recruitment agencies, it is putting women who have suffered tremendously at risk of further abuse,” Poudyal said. “Cambodia and Malaysia should ratify the new ILO Convention on domestic work, but they should start applying its provisions even before ratification is completed to safeguard the rights of domestic workers.”
Labels: Malaysia, Workers
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Source: ABC News
The sailor was a member of the Perth-based HMAS Warramunga (Department of Defence)
The Royal Australian Navy has named the sailor who died while on shore leave in Cambodia.
Bradley William Livingston, 33, died at the beach resort area of Sihanoukville on Thursday.
He was a Leading Seaman Boatswain's Mate with the Perth-based HMAS Warramunga.
The Chief of Navy has offered his condolences to the sailor's family, who are being provided with support from the Navy.
The death comes almost three weeks after another Australian sailor died while on shore leave in the Indian city of Mumbai.
The Defence Force says the cause of death is not yet known.
Defence investigators are in Cambodia to probe the cause, and say they will not comment further until the investigation is completed.
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RFA
Schools hit by floods in Cambodia's Pusat province.
Some 2,000 schools in Cambodia remain closed as the worst floods in more than a decade continue to wreak havoc in Southeast Asia, where the death toll has risen to 1,000, officials and reports say.
Most of the affected schools are along the lower Mekong and Tonle Sap rivers, said Nhim Vannda, the first vice-president of the National Committee for Disaster Management.
Only 2,000 of 4,000 schools nationwide have reopened since the floods hit 18 provinces and cities in early October, officials said.
Nearly 250 people have perished in the floods in Cambodia so far, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said in its latest flood bulletin.
“We are very concerned about the students' education. I am afraid that they can’t finish their curriculum on time,” said Yoeung Rithy, chief of a village in Kompong Thom province on the banks of the Stung Sen river.
Cambodian Independent Teachers’ Association President Rong Chhun said even while some schools remain open, their classes are delayed due to logistical problems.
School equipment has been damaged and documents destroyed due to the disaster, he said.
“The Ministry of Education must establish a supplementary curriculum for the students to make sure that they can finish their academic year as usual,” Rong Chhun said.
Ministry of Education Director Ung Ngohok said additional classes would be held to prevent affected students from falling behind in their studies.
"The government has also instructed the Ministry of Education to make sure that the students have enough time to prepare for their examinations," he said.
The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has provided U.S $300,000 to help subsidize educational materials in flood-affected areas.
A Ministry of Education report obtained by RFA showed that there are still 900 schools in 15 provinces under flood waters.
Some of the schools where the floods have receded may not have resumed classes because the damage has not been rectified.
Climate change
At least 1,000 people have died in the region's floods, according to an Agence France-Presse tally on Thursday. Millions of homes and livelihoods have also been destroyed by the disaster.
The World Bank warned that climate change will bring more floods and extreme weather to Southeast Asia.
"What we are seeing is there are more floods, more extreme weather events, higher temperature, more variable rainfalls, and we believe that is caused by climate change," Andrew Steer, the World Bank's special envoy for climate change, said in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi.
"And we should expect this to increase, sadly," Steer said.
The death toll in Thailand, grappling with its worst floods in half a century, has reached 533, the government said, and the slowly advancing waters are now threatening the heart of Bangkok, a city of 12 million people.
Vietnam's government has reported at least 100 deaths, including many children, in southern and central parts of the country while a fresh deluge in central provinces prompted the evacuation of some 30,000 people.
At least 106 people have died in flash floods caused by heavy storms in central Burma in late October.
In Laos, 30 people lost their lives in the floods, OCHA said in a statement.
The U.N. body, which does not include Burma in its flood updates, also reported 98 deaths in the Philippines.
Vast swathes of rice paddy fields have been damaged or destroyed in Southeast Asia as a result of the inundations triggered by unusually heavy monsoon rains that began some three months ago.
"To date, nearly nine million people have been affected by torrential rains and overflowing rivers," OCHA said.
Reported by RFA's Khmer service. Translated by Samean Yun. Written in English by Parameswaran Ponnudurai.
Copyright © 1998-2011 Radio Free Asia. All rights reserved
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Source: travelweekly.co.uk/
The travel industry is inadvertently contributing to “internal human trafficking” in Cambodia by developing a view of responsible tourism which encourages travellers to visit and donate to orphanages.
Michael Horton, founder of Cambodian non-profit organisation ConCERT, launched a stinging rebuke on a day of debates about Responsible Tourism opened by Fairtrade Foundation executive director Harriet Lamb.
Horton said tourist visits to orphanages in Siem Reap were exacerbating the problem of child poverty, with some owners keeping children dirty and malnourished to encourage donations.
He also said that 72% of children in orphanages were not orphans but merely came from poor families, and described the movement of children across the country to institutions where tourists visit as “simply internal child trafficking”.
Instead, Horton urged delegates to develop an approach to responsible tourism which focused on community based-support and poverty reduction, and “not just providing a satisfying experience for paying guests”.
Horton’s views were echoed by responsible tourism expert Professor Harold Goodwin, who pledged his support for the campaign, and UNWTO secretary general Taleb Rifai, who said there must be a shift away from the concept of tourists as superior to local people who were seen as attractions.
Earlier in the day, Lamb opened the fifth World Responsible Tourism Day by calling on all travel companies to place responsible tourism on boardroom agendas.
“Maybe these tough times could be a chance for a radical rethink. This is the ideal time to be brave and innovative and take this vision for responsible tourism to the heart of your business,” she said.
Lamb said she hoped the launch of the first UK fair-trade holiday package to South Africa on Wednesday would be the “first building block” towards a certified fair-trade movement for travel.
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Thailand's worst floods in half a century have killed 533 people (AFP, Joan Manuel Baliellas)
HANOI (AFP) — Climate change will bring more floods and extreme weather to Southeast Asia, a World Bank official said Thursday on a visit to the region, where hundreds have died in severe inundation.
"What we are seeing is there are more floods, more extreme weather events, higher temperature, more variable rainfalls and we believe that is caused by climate change. And we should expect this to increase, sadly," Andrew Steer, the World Bank's special envoy for climate change, told reporters in the Vietnamese capital Hanoi.
Thailand's worst floods in half a century have killed 533 people and damaged the homes and livelihoods of millions around the country.
In neighbouring Cambodia, the deadliest floods since 2000 have killed at least 247 people while more than 100 have died in Vietnam, mostly in the southern Mekong Delta.
Steer, who cancelled plans to visit Thailand on his regional tour because of the disaster, said the floods there were "consistent with what we know to be true about climate change."
The United Nations says climate change, fuelled by hydrocarbon-based energy systems, is the world's most pressing environmental issue.
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Author: Richard Woodard | just-style.com
Cambodia has won praise from the WTO for its “solid” economic performance and relatively open economy, at the conclusion of the country’s first Trade Policy Review.
The WTO highlighted the fact that Cambodia’s per capita income had more than doubled in the period under review, while the poverty rate had fallen from 35% to 26%.
Organisation members also congratulated the country for successfully emerging from the global economic crisis without having to adopt protectionist trade measures.
Describing Cambodia's economy as relatively open, the WTO pointed to a trade-to-GDP ratio of about 65% and noted that exports accounted for a large proportion of employment growth.
However, the WTO is urging the country to step up efforts to diversify its goods exported and markets targeted, fearing that Cambodia is over-reliant on relatively few products and countries.
Furthermore, the organisation said Cambodia still had “significant work to do” to improve its business environment and to address infrastructure bottlenecks.
Despite the praise for Cambodia’s economic achievements, local business leaders are lamenting the lack of financing for manufacturing exports - which hurts the garment industry especially hard.
Van Sou Ieng, president of the Garment Manufacturers Association of Cambodia, told the Phnom Penh Post that manufacturers finance themselves, largely with support from parent companies in Hong Kong and Taiwan. But smaller local companies without overseas ties often lack resources.
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Source: member // Jesuit Refugee Service International
Battambang (Cambodia), 9 November 2011 – More than 100 unexploded devices have been found near a small school in northwestern Cambodia.
The unexploded devices – including anti-personnel landmines, anti-vehicle weapons and cluster munitions – were found within a five square kilometre radius of the school and some as close as 100 metres from areas where the school children and villagers frequent on a daily basis.
The school, situated in the Phnom Kpaus village of approximately 500 inhabitants, is attended by 84 students.
"Fortunately, in the last week the whole village has been littered with signs reminding the inhabitants of the existence of these deadly devices", said Javier Olaguivel, who works in the nearby diocese of Battambang and cooperates with JRS in Cambodia.
"As you can see anti-personnel landmines and cluster bombs in Cambodia continue to be not just an isolated issue but a day-to-day problem that's far from being resolved. There are still more than four million landmines and cluster bombs waiting to destroy people's lives even in supposedly safe areas, such as Phnom Kpaus village", continued Mr Olaguivel.
"It's heart breaking to see Cambodians forced to live and work in areas marked by the 'Danger!! Mine!!' signs because they don't have anywhere else to go or any other way of making ends meet", added Mr Olaguivel.
According to JRS, situations as flagrant as these remind us that much more help is needed not only in Cambodia but in many other heavily mined countries before the remnants of war are effectively cleared. Moreover, it also clearly underlines the importance of banning the production, stockpiling and use of these weapons.
For the JRS press statement on forthcoming review of the Convention on Conventional Weapons see http://jrs.net/news_detail?TN=NEWS-20111109080254 and for information on the involvement of the organisation in international campaigns see http://www.jrs.net/advocacy?LID=71&L=EN
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By Stephanie Scawen in Asia | http://blogs.aljazeera.net
Environmental activists call on the government of Cambodia to conserve Prey Lang forest [EPA]
"Tell me how can we fix Khmer culture," my driver asked me, as we sat outside the CRCK rubber concession in Prey Lang forest.
"Education, education, education," I replied. "So that people know corruption is wrong and can be stopped."
"Yes, but our leaders, they are rich and they were educated overseas. They have education, but it seems to make no difference," he retorted. "What can we do?"
It's heartbreaking to see the rapid destruction of the last and largest primary forest of its kind left on the Indochina peninsula.
About 3,600 square kilometres of land that is quickly falling victim to the chainsaw.
Tens of thousands of people who live around the forest and rely on it for their livelihood are seeing their primary source of income disappear.
Resin trees are protected under the constitution from being felled.
Villagers can tap the resin and sell it for use as a sealant on boats, as a fragrant oil, and the flammable properties of some species allow it to be used as a slow-burn wick.
About 20,000 of these trees were felled in the first six month of this year alone. And that was just in one district.
People are going hungry and growing angry.
And it's not just the resin trees. Luxury Asian hardwoods are being picked off and shipped off at night.
Locals talk of hearing the sound of chainsaws after dark in the forest. Other villagers who have moved to the area are hired for their oxcarts to help drag the logs deep out of the forest, indirectly complicit in the destruction.
Activists say if the cutting continues at its present rate, there will be nothing left in a year.
At the CRCK concession, they were meant to plant rubber. The land was cleared, the trees felled, but the land wasn't suitable for rubber. So now they grow cassava.
Yet it's guarded by police armed with AK47s and M16s.
We need the guns to protect ourselves, the police tell me.
"From what?" I ask.
I can't get an answer, but they are here to confront several hundred villagers from the four provinces that cover Prey Lang, who've been trekking deep through the forest for the last three or four days to protest against the logging.
The district governors have been ordered to get their villagers back. How they hope to do this is not clear, but police reinforcements have been arriving over the last 24 hours.
The last time villagers tried to protest outside CRCK they were surrounded by armed police and prevented from even fetching water from the river for two days until they had to give up.
The deputy district governor told us there would be 500 police to stop the protest.
If they can put that much effort into stopping a protest, you have to ask why they can't do the same to protect the last great wilderness in Cambodia.
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Is helping indigenous people develop community forestry good for development, or is it better to let foreign companies log the native forest and replace it with rubber plantations?
By Duncan Green Thursday 10 November 2011 04.44 EST guardian.co.uk
Hea Samoeun is chief of the resin collectors in his village in Cambodia. Photograph: Duncan Green
Last week in Cambodia, some questions on forestry and development came into sharp relief. I visited a region where Oxfam's local partner is helping indigenous people develop community forestry and resist the encroachment of foreign companies (as well as Cambodian ones, and the odd party or army boss) intent on logging the native forest and replacing it with rubber plantations.
I expected a black-and-white case but, as so often happens, found a much more complex picture. First, the community forestry: the village of O Preah in Kratie province (north-east Cambodia) is home to 67 families of the Phnong indigenous group, who have set up a rather successful community resin association. They tap resin from three species of trees and sell it to varnish and paint producers in Cambodia and neighbouring countries – and since they formed a producer association to market collectively, things have been going well. Until now.
The Vietnamese company Dong Nai/Dong Pu has been granted the land under the Cambodian government's new economic land concessions law – large parcels of land are sold off to investors, usually foreign, for logging and industrial agriculture.
Hea Samoeun, chief of the resin collectors, said members are not happy. They spoke to the commune council, but were told to get jobs on the plantations. "We don't want to work for the company – resin collecting is what we have done for years. The company tried to negotiate by offering us $3 a tree, but if we agree they will cut down everything – so the community said no. They came back and offered us $200 per family and some land for two years for seven families, but we still said no. Why? Because in one day we can earn maybe $12 from collecting resin and still have time for fishing. The company pays you $3.50 and you work from morning to night."
The problem is the economic land concessions law overlaps with the law protecting resin trees in the community forest. Land titles have only been introduced in Cambodia in the last decade (previously all land belonged to the government), so the land rights of Hea Samoeun (as with most Cambodian farmers) are legally murky.
And here's where the politics and power kick in. The law is only part of the story, and sometimes it seems a fairly minor part (although Hea Samoeun shows us his carefully filed legal complaint, adorned by 67 red ink thumbprints from the largely illiterate villagers).
"It is illegal under the land law to log resin trees – the forestry administration tells us it should be up to five years in jail for cutting down a single tree," said Hea Samoeun. "The government claims the community agreed to give up the land, but has never shown us any document – and the law says it should be published."
The two sides are at a stand-off. So far, so black and white. But wait. On a car journey, we pass dozens of neat rows of worker housing and a clinic, all built by Dong Nai/Dong Pu. The rubber plantation will provide jobs for 20 times (maybe more) as many people as currently make a living from resin collecting – poor Cambodians migrating into the forest from the lowlands. After all, rubber tapping is just a form of organised resin collection. Provided wages and conditions are acceptable, isn't that development too?
The compensation that Dong Nai/Dong Pu offered was better than in many similar situations elsewhere in Cambodia, and the company stopped logging at the first protest – that's not what we've seen in far bloodier land grabs in Uganda and elsewhere. One local NGO even holds them out as a model of good practice.
Cambodian activists counter that the plantation jobs are badly paid, and will go to incomers (so what?), that the loss of biodiversity and other "environmental services" is an issue, and that indigenous people do badly when they migrate from their home village. Apples and pears – culture and economics; economic rights v indigenous rights v human rights (all supposedly indivisible). If the process was fair and transparent, it might be possible to argue out the pros and cons, but politics and power obscure and skew every decision.
As for Hea Samoeun and his people, it's incredibly hard to see a successful outcome. The companies don't want to engage and formal laws and politics are often a shadow play, while the decisions come from informal and unaccountable power and money.
Can we make a convincing business case for a different approach, and would investors even listen? Could a pro-poor investor make a decent profit and pay decent wages (eg for rubber), or buy their products from smallholders (with government or NGO support)? And would the government support such an effort?
Our outgoing country director thinks this is one way forward. NGOs have made some progress on other value chains, eg pharmaceuticals, garments and supermarkets, by being propositional and working with progressive businesses to develop the business case. Might it work for forests too?
Like I said, a much more complicated picture than I was expecting – what have I missed?
Labels: forest ecosystems, Hea Samoeun, Oxfam, The Vietnamese company Dong Nai/Dong Pu
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PHNOM PENH (Xinhua) - Cambodia had received the fixed asset investment of $476 million from its ASEAN member countries in the first nine months of this year, an increase of 66 percent versus the same period last year of $287 million, according to the government's reports on Thursday.
From January to September this year, the country had granted licenses to Vietnam's investment projects worth $246 million and to Malaysia's projects of $230 million, showed the reports from the Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC).
During the first 9 months last year, the country received the fixed asset investment of $287 million, of which, $152 million from Malaysia, $114 million from Vietnam and $19 million and $2 million from Singapore and Thailand respectively.
The reports recorded that the ASEAN countries investing in Cambodia are only Malaysia, Vietnam, Thailand and Singapore.
From 1994 to September 2011, among ASEAN, Malaysia is the largest investor in Cambodia with the accumulative investment of $2.6 billion, followed by Vietnam at $812, said the CDC's data.
Thailand and Singapore are the third and fourth with $746 million and $636 million respectively.
They invested in various sectors of businesses here including agriculture, especially rice mill and rubber plantation; industries, garments and construction materials; mineral resources; tourism; aviation; telecommunications; and banking and finance.
The Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) groups Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam.
Labels: ASEAN
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Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni (C) greets the crowds during a celebration marking the 58th anniversary of independence from French protectorate, in Phnom Penh Nov. 9, 2011. (Xinhua/Philong Sovan)
PHNOM PENH, Nov. 9 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia commemorated the 58th anniversary of the declaration of Independence Day from French protectorate on Wednesday.
The event was held at the Independence Monument under the presidency of Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni and the participation of National Assembly President Heng Samrin, Cambodia 's Prime Minister Hun Sen, the First Vice President of Senate Prince Sisowath Chivan Monirak, and other high-ranking officials, diplomatic corps, armed forces, as well as students, totaling about 20,000 people.
During the celebration, King Norodom Sihamoni laid the wreath and lit the victory torch inside the monument.
The victory flame will be kept burning for three days.
Cambodia gained independence from the French protectorate on Nov. 9, 1953 after the retired King Norodom Sihanouk had conducted the royal crusade in 1952.
France had ruled Cambodia for 90 years until the country declared independence.
Editor: Chen Zhi
Labels: Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni, Independence, Prime Minister Hun Sen
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Men Kimseng, VOA Khmer | Washington, DC
With the Khmer Rouge tribunal facing its second case and continued criticism over its handling of two more, a leading court monitor says the UN needs to consider itself a partner and “set an example.”
“Since its inception, there has been no one on the UN side to take full responsibility for the success or failure of the court,” Long Panhavuth, a monitor for the Cambodia Justice Initiative, told “Hello VOA” Monday.
“Mostly when there is a problem, the UN tends not to acknowledge a problem and seems to push it to the other side to take responsibility,” he said. “They are also slow to respond to an issue.”
The UN was slow to address corruption allegations that dogged the court early after its inception and has not fixed other challenges to the court, he said.
In a Facebook comment prior to the show, Seang Sophagna, a staff member on the UN side of the court, said the tribunal is a chamber of the Cambodian court. “The UN role is to assist not to control or oversee.”
Long Panhavuth disagreed, saying that UN officials do not clearly understand their role at the hybrid court.
“Some UN officials see their role as just coming in to assist, which requires that they give only advice,” he said. “But they actually perform their full roles as prosecutor, investigator and judges representing the international side.”
He suggested the UN side see itself as a “partner,” not as an “adviser.”
Labels: Khmer Rouge, Khmer Rouge Tribunal, UN
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Sourcea:Xinhua
As many as 374 schools in Cambodia remain closed, leaving more than 40,000 students mostly in primary schools unable to attend classes due to flooding, a government official said Wednesday.
Chan Sophea, director of primary school department of Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports said more than 40,000 students from 374 schools have yet returned to their classes as flooding has not receded fully.
According to Chan Sophea, roughly 1,400 schools in 13 provinces across the nation were inundated by flooding that began since August this year.
Of the 374 schools remaining closed, only four are at secondary level, the rest are at primary level and most of them are located in provinces that lie along the Mekong River or Tonle Sap Lake.
Keo Vy, spokesman of the National Committee for Disaster Management said some 51,000 families who had evacuated from homes due to flooding have all returned to their homes.
However, he said, aid reliefs will be continued to be distributed to those who are severely affected for at least three more months.
It has been the worst flooding that hit the region in a decade, with at least 250 people killed and 1.5 million people affected.
The flood is estimated to have cost Cambodia 521 million U.S. dollars, mainly due to damages of rice paddies and roads.
Labels: Flood
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Former Khmer Rouge minister, Ieng Thirith, at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Court of Cambodia on April 30, 2010
