Reproduced
from KI Media
A
New Chapter of Betrayal Is Being Written in Our History
26 June 2012
Op-Ed by
Khmer Academy
'No stability, social development or economic progress can justify the loss of national sovereignty and territorial integrity. To believe otherwise is to succumb to treason, a misdeed that my conscience, and I trust yours too, can neither accept nor allow.'
OUR country
is presently going through another dark moment of its history as we witness a
new chapter of betrayal is being written. The authority has recently admitted
that several villages, including the birth place of H.E. Heng Samrin, the
current Chairman of the National Assembly, will be ceded as part of the Eastern
border demarcation process. This is totally in contrast to what it has said,
and unjustly prosecuted those who disagreed, for years that not a single
millimeter of our lands would be lost.
The
authority, with its justification, wants us to believe that due to the
different accuracies found in maps with different scales, some adjustments
along the border have to be made, thus unavoidably resulting in some villages
on both sides being swapped. If that is really the case, why so far only
villages on our side but none on the other side have been identified to the
public? It is incomprehensible and unacceptable that the alleged errors and map
inaccuracies only occur on our side. How can a village where the Chairman of
the National Assembly and his siblings before him were born, raised and farmed
belong to another country? Note that on the 6th of August 1966, Hanoi declared:
"Thlok Trach village [is] on Cambodian territory". Why is it no
longer the case?
Several
other central questions with regard to the entire border demarcation process
remain unanswered. The complete lack of transparency and public consultation
since the beginning of the process only confirms the suspicion by some and
allegation by others that our lands are being ceded to the neighbor, illegally
and deliberately.
It is
evident that the Eastern border demarcation constitutes an application of the
so-called 1982 and 1985 treaties which were signed when our country was
officially recognized by the U.N. as under occupation. As such, the entire
demarcation and the treaties which form its basis are flawed; they are not only
in violation of our sovereignty and constitution, but also in contrary to the
known international laws.
'It is a mistake of historical proportions to assume that border conflicts can be resolved through a one-time land concession.'
