Khmerization

Tuesday, 29 November 2011

Thai, Cambodian foreign ministers to discuss options to help free jailed Thai activists

BANGKOK, Nov 29 -- Thailand's Minister of Foreign Affairs Surapong Tovichakchaikul (pictured) on Monday said he would meet his Cambodian counterpart Hor Namhong soon to discuss bilateral issues and options to help free two Thai activists detained in Phnom Penh for espionage.

The Thai foreign minister said that the bilateral issues to be raised to discuss with Hor Namhong, who is also Cambodia’s deputy prime minister, would cover the Thai-Cambodian Joint Boundary Commission (JBC), General Border Committee (GBC) and Joint Commission (JC) on the Bilateral Cooperation between Thailand and Cambodia.

Mr Surapong said they would also discuss solutions to help the two Thai activists--Veera Somkwamkid and his secretary Ratree Pipattanapaiboon—detained in Cambodia.

A Cambodian court on Feb 1 ruled that Mr Veera, coordinator of Thailand's Patriots Network and Ms Ratree were guilty of espionage, illegal entry, and trespassing on a military zone.

Mr Veera was sentenced to eight years in jail while Ms Ratree was handed a six-year jail term. Their petitions seeking a royal pardon were rejected as the Cambodian government asserted the two must serve two-thirds of their jail terms first.

Mr Surapong said the Cambodian Interior Ministry has also given permission to a Thai medical doctor to visit Mr Veera to treat his congenital rheumatoid condition.

He said on Nov 15, Mr Veera's mother asked for the ministry's help to coordinate with Cambodia to allow a Thai physician to administer a medical checkup for Mr Veera as his condition had worsened.

It was expected that the physician will travel to Cambodia to treat Mr Veera at Pray Sar Prison on the outskirts of Phnom Penh.

Mr Surapong said that the ministry's permanent secretary Theerakun Niyom would meet Defence Minister Gen Yutthasak Sasiprapa to discuss the measures to comply with the International Court of Justice (ICJ)'s decision.

The court on July 18 ordered Thailand and Cambodia to withdraw their troops from the newly defined demilitarised zone in a disputed portion of their border around the historic Preah Vihear temple while urging both countries to work with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to allow the regional bloc's observers to enter the disputed zone. (MCOT online news)

Sin Sisamouth in Lear Hoey Sumatra (Goodbye Sumatra)

Another song : Sin Sisamouth- Rumduol Surin (Rumduol flower in Surin)

Prime Minister Renews Attacks on US Broadcasters

Monday, 28 November 2011

Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer | Phnom Penh

In recent month, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has made a number of public speeches against broadcasters VOA Khmer and Radio Free Asia for critical coverage of his government.

“Go ahead, broadcast my speeches,” he said at a ceremony to inaugurate a bridge in Kampot province earlier this month.

He asked the crowd to point out the RFA reporter present. “Go ahead, insult me,” he said. “I won because you insulted me. The more you insult, the more you make a mistake.”

Cambodia’s broadcast media environment is overwhelmingly favorable to Hun Sen and the ruling Cambodian People’s Party. There are few independent outlets, and media experts say it is difficult to get a license for non-party aligned broadcasters.

Cambodia denies claim of soldiers hired to help Thai PM in case of coup

Thai PM Yingluck Shinawatra (R), whose brother , former Thai PM Thaksin Shinawatra is a good friend of Cambodian PM Hun Sen (L), visited Cambodia on 15th September, 2011.

PHNOM PENH, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- Cambodian government denied Monday that it had allowed or supported some 5,000 hired Cambodian soldiers to help current Thai Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra in case of coup to arise.

In a statement released by the spokesman of the Ministry of National Defense, it said the Cambodian side "denies a fabrication of information and incitement by Mr. Somkiet Phongphaiboon, activist of the People's Alliance for Democracy (Yellow Shirt) at which he alleged that people who are close to former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra had hired 5,000 Cambodian soldiers based along Cambodia-Vietnam border so as to help Thaksin's sister and his people in case of coup to arise."

The statement was made in response to Thai ASTV manager online which broadcast such allegation on Nov. 26.

The statement said based on the spirit of good cooperation between the two governments, Cambodia's Prime Minister Hun Sen has highly valued the work of the General Border Commission (GBC) on the fight against terrorism.

"It is, therefore, the Royal Government of Cambodia insists that the Thai GBC to pay great attention and to take an appropriate action against the activist who had spread such false allegation which brings confusion and may jeopardize the friendship and good cooperation between the governments," it added.

The statement also said that "The release of such allegation is considered as an attempted terrorism act which might harm stability and security in the region, especially, while Cambodia is preparing to host the summits of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations."

Thaksin is known as close friend to Hun Sen and he had made several visits to this country since he was toppled from power in 2006.

Soksamnang enjoys a new lease on life

Soksamnang Vy, 3 1/2, now healthy two years after heart surgery, plays with cousins Sopheun Vuth, left, and Sophea Vuth in the Phnom Penh apartment they share. (Jeff Gritchen, Staff Photographer)
Photo Gallery: Soksamnang & Socheat

By Greg Mellen, Staff Writer
Posted: 11/27/2011

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia - Soksamnang Vy kneels on the floor of his apartment wheeling around two toy Matchbox-style cars that he received as gifts during his stay in the United States.

Soksamnang and his mother, Ratha Pang, share a two-bedroom, one-bath, top-floor unit in downtown Phnom Penh with two other families and a household of 10 when all are present.

At 3 1/2 years old, Soksamnang is a tall, thin and healthy boy. Now more than two years removed from life-extending heart surgery, the only reminder of his trip to the United States is a thin scar that snakes down his chest.

As an 11-month-old, Soksamnang was brought to the United States to have a hole in his heart, known as a ventricular septal defect, repaired.

Soksamnang, the second of four children that Long Beach nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries has sponsored, became a poster child for the way the group had hoped to handle children with heart cases.

In less than five months, the boy arrived in the U.S., had surgery and returned home. The trip was quick, efficient, relatively inexpensive and went almost without incident. His doctors later said that on a scale of one to 10 in difficulty, Soksamnang's surgery was a three.

Soksamnang's name translates as Lucky Friday. Since his surgery, the patients of Hearts Without Boundaries have had more complicated
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cases and lengthy stays.

After returning to Cambodia, Ratha moved with her son from a village to Phnom Penh so the mother could find regular work at a garment manufacturing plant. Her hope is to save some money so Soksamnang can attend a decent school.

She makes about $60 per month and her husband, Bunnro Meas, makes $30 as a border guard.

Like the other parents who have brought their children to the U.S. with Hearts Without Boundaries, Ratha said she wanted desperately to stay, but she also missed her husband and parents.

"I understand (the trip to the U.S.) was just to find a cure," Ratha said, as tears welled in her eyes. "After staying, I asked my aunt to sponsor me so I could find a job and send (Soksamnang) to school."

Ratha said she learned that it couldn't be done, but she adds, "at least I asked."

Ratha says she hopes one day to return to the U.S. to visit the place she says is so clean and well-lit.

The memories of the boy, who learned to walk in the United States, are blurred now.

He remembers Hearts Without Boundaries founder Peter Chhun, whom he calls his uncle, but probably more from Chhun's semiregular check-up calls.

"He says, 'I remember you; send some new clothes,'" Ratha says with a laugh.

For Soksamnang, the main reminder of the U.S. is that scar.

The other lasting effect from his time in the U.S.?

According to his mother: "He really doesn't want Khmer food anymore. He probably got American blood in his operation. He wants french fries."

greg.mellen@presstelegram.com, 562-499-1291

UN food agency warns world's farmland at risk

A Cambodian man walks through a rice field in flood waters at Pea Reang district in Prey Veng province, some 60km east of Phnom Penh on Oct 6, 2011. The United Nations food agency on Monday warned the world will struggle to raise food production by 70 per cent by 2050. -- PHOTO: AFP

Published on Nov 29, 2011

ROME (AFP) - The United Nations food agency on Monday warned the world will struggle to raise food production by 70 per cent by 2050, with a quarter of land considered 'highly degraded' and many farming areas already at risk.

The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) report found that erosion, desertification and climate change were endangering key production systems across the world from the Mediterranean to Southern Africa to South-east Asia.

Many farming areas 'face the risk of progressive breakdown of their productive capacity under a combination of excessive demographic pressure and unsustainable agricultural use and practices', the report said.

FAO said that between 1961 and 2009 the world's cropland grew by 12 per cent while farming production expanded 150 per cent - mainly thanks to a significant increase in yields of major crops because of scientific advances.

Opening Statements Conclude in Khmer Rouge Leaders Trial

Photo: Reuters
Former Khmer Rouge second-in-command Nuon Chea, former Foreign Minister Ieng Sary , former President Khieu Samphan (L-R) attend their trial at the Extraordinary Chambers in the Courts of Cambodia (ECCC) on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, November 21, 2011.

Monday, 28 November 2011
Robert Carmichael, VOA | Phnom Penh

The Khmer Rouge tribunal in Cambodia wrapped up its opening hearings last week. Prosecutors laid out their case against three individuals accused of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity that were committed while serving in top leadership positions in the movement.

It took the prosecution one and a half days to put its argument against the Khmer Rouge leaders to the court.

International co-prosecutor Andrew Cayley said the leaders of the Communist Party of Kampuchea - or CPK - believed they had discovered the secret to waging a successful communist revolution, a solution that other revolutions had failed to grasp.

“The accused believed that previous communist revolutions had failed because class enemies had infiltrated and corrupted those revolutions. The solution the accused seized upon was simply to liquidate all class enemies in their entirety,” Cayley stated.

Cayley went on to explain who those perceived enemies were, and how that drove the mass killings that have come to characterize the time. “The truth, Your Honors, is that the persons the accused considered to be enemies of the CPK were an ever evolving and ever expanding group,” he said.

In the days immediately following the Khmer Rouge’s victory in 1975, enemies were those people associated with the defeated Lon Nol regime, as well as students, teachers, doctors and lawyers, and the residents of urban areas.

By the time the movement was driven from power in 1979, its paranoia meant it saw those enemies everywhere, even - and especially - deep within its own ranks.

In the process the Khmer Rouge purged vast numbers of its own people too.

“And as the DK regime progressed and the paranoid leaders of the CPK convinced themselves that their failures must be due to the CIA, KGB or Vietnamese agents, the focus of their enemy witch hunt shifted from class enemies to internal enemies who had infiltrated the ranks of the party,” Cayley explained.

For their part the defendants and their lawyers described the prosecution’s case as untrue, a fairytale full of generalizations, and “like a novel by Alexandre Dumas”, the creator of the Three Musketeers.

Eighty-five-year-old Nuon Chea, who read for 90 minutes with surprising vigor, showed why he is considered the movement’s chief ideologue, with a lengthy diatribe against the Khmer Rouge’s perennial enemy Vietnam.

Cambodia’s eastern neighbor, he told the court, had long plotted against his nation and wished to exterminate its people.

Nuon Chea said he joined the revolution to defend Cambodia.

Patriotism was a theme taken up by former head of state Khieu Samphan as well. He told prosecutors he had became interested in communism while studying for his doctorate in economics in Paris.

“Today you may see it as a joke. However I shall remind you that at that time communism is the one movement that gave hope to millions (of) youths around the world," Khieu said. "What I actually wanted at that time is the best experience for my country.”

Khieu Samphan also talked about the huge bombing campaign that the United States illegally unleashed on Cambodia in 1969.

The bombing is widely considered to have propelled support for the Khmer Rouge, but it falls outside the strict timeline that the politicians prescribed for the court.

“Could you imagine what my country faced after such a bloody killing? Regardless (of whether) you like or dislike it, the majority of Cambodian people gave their support to us for our opposition against the Lon Nol regime," Khieu stated.

Former foreign minister Ieng Sary spoke only briefly to complain that the court would not take into account the royal pardon and amnesty he had been granted in 1996 in order to get him and thousands of followers to defect.

The three leaders are accused of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity; subsumed within that list are the crimes of murder, extermination, enslavement, imprisonment, torture, persecution and willful killing among others.

In essence they are on trial for devising the policies that led to the deaths of around two million people between 1975 and 1979.

They deny all charges.

The response from Cambodians watching proceedings varied from sympathy for the elderly defendants, to outrage that they continued to deny any responsibility for what took place on their watch.

Tribunal observer Clair Duffy, who monitors proceedings for the Open Society Justice Initiative, says the prosecution and the defense performed well.

And while Nuon Chea and Ieng Sary failed to address the essence of the allegations against them, Khieu Samphan did respond to the allegations the prosecution made, and attacked some of its evidence.

Duffy says the week has allowed a glimpse into the tactics the defendants will employ.

Nuon Chea’s statement focused on the broader political landscape of the time, and the bitter relations between the communist parties of Vietnam and Cambodia.

“For Khieu Samphan his line was: Even though I was in this role I wasn’t a member of the Standing Committee; I wasn’t an effective decision maker; there was chaos in this country at the time and we had no control over this,” Duffy explained.

The trial of the three leaders has been divided into a series of mini-trials, and last week saw the start of the first of those. It will largely examine alleged crimes against humanity in the context of the Khmer Rouge’s forced movement of people.

That charge refers to two events in 1975, when Pol Pot’s troops took control of Cambodia and forcibly evacuated every city and town. Later that year they forced vast numbers to move across the country into work camps.

The prosecution says tens of thousands died during those moves, which turned out to be the first in a series of horrific experiences. In his opening statement Cayley put the scale of what happened in context.

One in four Cambodians died, Cayley said. “A loss of life unknown to any nation since the slaughter of all adult men and the enslavement of the women and children of the island of Milos by the Athenian state 2,400 years ago. When judged in relative terms by the proportion of a national population who died or were murdered, the scope of the human catastrophe unleashed by these accused on this country has no parallel in the modern era.”

The court is scheduled to start hearing evidence on December 5.

Little justice in show trial

Published: 29/11/2011
Editorial
Bangkok Post

The most important international trial of our time began last week in Cambodia. It adjourned after just two days, and will resume in its halting way again next week. The three top surviving men of the most murderous regime in the history of Southeast Asia were in the dock. Nuon Chea, Ieng Sary and Khieu Samphan are too feeble to be able to feel the legal consequence of their actions that the tribunal will eventually pass. The question is whether the trial of these three old men can truly bring closure to a country denied justice for 36 years.

The enormity of the crimes of the Khmer Rouge have long been known, but never widely addressed or, in many cases, acknowledged. The joint Cambodian-international tribunal which called the three Khmer Rouge survivors to the dock last week, took decades to establish a trial system which should have taken a few months. The Cambodian government was the chief stumbling block, particularly Prime Minister Hun Sen. Foreign governments, including Thailand, were sometimes reluctant and never enthusiastic about establishing the special courts to try the men and women who slaughtered or actively encouraged the deaths of at least 2 million and probably more of their fellow Cambodians: at least a third of the country's population was decimated.

Civilians crowded the tribunal last week, most of them survivors of a three-year, nine-month regime now known as the Killing Fields. Many wept, some rushed from the court as the Cambodian, then the British prosecutors, outlined the case against the old men who will be found guilty of crimes against humanity. There were no new charges, no revelations of the horrors of the 1975-1979 regime. The crimes of that era, however, still have the power to shock, and the pain on the faces of the survivors was obvious.

Because Mr Hun Sen delayed even this small tribunal for so long, most Cambodians today have no memory of the days of the killings fields. But the three men facing the tribunal were among the tiny handful of hardline, xenophobic communists who were responsible for the fact that when the Khmer Rouge fell to a Vietnamese invasion in January 1979, every living Cambodian knew one or more victims killed by the regime.

The leader, Pol Pot, died in his bed in a remote province. But Nuon Chea, "Brother No. 2" to Pol Pot, was the top policymaker. Ieng Sary, 86 and just as enfeebled, was the foreign minister and unapologetic face of the "Ongka" to the world, including the United Nations. Khieu Samphan, 80 and still able to walk without aid, is the intellectual and probably psychotic author of the Khmer Rouge policy of emptying cities, killing doctors and destroying money.

If the three men live long enough to be judged guilty and given a sentence of life imprisonment, that will be the end of it. Mr Hun Sen said that if there were to be more trials, there could be civil war, meaning that he fears inquiries of just how close he was to the top as a Khmer Rouge military commander during the black years. If the Cambodian people ever are to get justice, it is now or never.To their credit, many of the court officials and tireless Cambodian and foreign workers have laboured for decades to see at least some Khmer Rouge in the dock. The trial of a functionary, chief torturer Duch, 68, was completed in July 2010. He was sentenced to 35 years in jail.

Overall, both international and local law have failed the Cambodians. They deserve more light to be shed on their most terrible times.

Amnesty Calls for Halt to Cambodian Forced Evictions

Photo: Reuters
Cambodian people pass the time in the ruins of a house at the Boeung Kak Lake in Phnom Penh. The World Bank called on the Cambodian government to halt the eviction of another 10,000 people at a controversial real estate development and offered to help those who had lost their homes, (file).

Monday, 28 November 2011
Robert Carmichael, VOA | Phnom Penh

Amnesty International called on the Cambodian government last Thursday to halt a wave of forced evictions affecting tens of thousands of people, a problem that shows no sign of letting up. Amnesty says women are increasingly putting themselves at the forefront in standing up for land rights.

Amnesty’s report tells the story of five women from across Cambodia who have been affected by forced evictions.

The rights group says the Cambodian government is ignoring its international obligations by pushing ahead with forced evictions, and says Phnom Penh risks reversing 20 years of hard-won gains in reducing poverty.

“Amnesty International has been calling for an end to forced evictions for several years now. We’ve documented this extensively and of course the vibrant civil society in Cambodia has also been documenting and reporting on this practice which is unlawful under international law,” said Donna Guest, the deputy director of Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific department.

Women tell their stories

Guest says Amnesty wanted to focus on women and tell their stories as human rights defenders, as mothers and as wives.

"And this is to show the more human face - that these people are not just a statistic, these people have lives," she explained. "These people have had very adverse consequences - some of them have lost their homes, all their possessions, families have been split up. So that is why we are here today - to show the human face.

At the launch of the report, Guest was flanked by three Cambodian women who have been affected by evictions.

One of those women, Hong Mai, was evicted from her home in northwest Cambodia two years ago to make way for a sugar concession awarded to a ruling party senator.

She says armed authorities destroyed her house and all her possessions when they burned down her village and evicted the residents.

Hong Mai was five months pregnant, yet when she traveled to the capital days later to seek help from Prime Minister Hun Sen, she was accused of violating the Forestry Law and put in jail.

Eight months later she was released after signing an agreement to withdraw her claim to her land.

Hong Mai has not seen her husband since, and she and her five children are destitute.

Sanctions requested

She wants consumers in the European Union to boycott Cambodian sugar because, she says, "it is made from the land, life and blood” of people who have been thrown off their land.

Guest says Amnesty does not take a position on issues such as sanctions, but the organization is adamant that development should not come at the expense of human rights.

And as a European-based organization, Amnesty’s staff will continue to meet policymakers in Brussels and other European countries.

“We will ask our membership in the European countries - which are extremely active on this issue - to appeal to their members of parliaments, and also to raise awareness. I think part of any advocacy strategy must be to raise awareness so that people are aware of what’s going on. A lot of people have no idea what’s going on in Cambodia and this report today is an attempt to raise this profile, bring it to international attention, including in the EU countries,” Guest stated.

Amnesty’s focus on women and land rights was bleakly highlighted when a prominent land rights activist at the huge Boeung Kak eviction site in central Phnom Penh committed suicide this week.

Chea Dara, the mother of two children, threw herself off a bridge Tuesday - reportedly after her family was refused land at the lakeside site after a five-year battle.

At the release ceremony for the Amnesty report, Chea Dara's fellow activists wore black in tribute to her.

Cambodia Seeks More Signatures on Landmine Ban

Photo: AP
An unexploded land mine, right, lies in the field at a clearance site of land mines near the Cambodia-Thailand border, in Pailin province, once a Khmer Rouge stronghold in northwestern Cambodia, Sunday, Nov. 27, 2011. Cambodia on Sunday is hosting a six-day international conference on land mine clearance in Phnom Penh.

Monday, 28 November 2011
Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer | Phnom Penh

Cambodia is seeking more signatories to an international landmine treaty, as it hosts a weeklong international conference with nearly 100 countries represented in Phnom Penh.

Cambodia was one of the original supporters of the Ottawa Convention, which has garnered 158 supporter nations since 1999.

“If we do not accelerate the speed and the efficiency of the resolution of problems, we will not reach our final goal for a world free of mines,” Prime Minister Hun Sen said at the opening of the conference Sunday.

“I hope our other friends who are not yet members of the convention will join us in achieving this goal,” he said.

At least 10 countries who are not signatories to the convention—including China and the US—are participating in the conference. China is expected to address the gathering on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, landmines have killed an estimated 1 million people in the last 10 years. And they remain a major obstacle to development.

“In the countries emerging from conflicts, these weapons slow the repatriation of refugees… deprive communities of the productive and safe use of land and natural resources,” said Helen Clark, the international head of UNDP.

DeCoro to Begin Manufacturing Leather Sofas in Cambodia

By DeCoro
Original article at The Sacramento Bee
Published: Monday, Nov. 28, 2011

NEW YORK and PHNOM PENH, Cambodia, Nov. 28, 2011 -- /PRNewswire/ --DeCoro, one of the most highly renowned brands in the leather furniture industry, has announced it is opening a new state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Headed up by Chief Executive Officer Luca Ricci, DeCoro Cambodia Co., Ltd. will again focus on producing the finest quality, popular-priced Italian-style furniture for global consumers. The new facility will employ approximately 1,000 workers and is now fully operational.

DeCoro is the first leather furniture factory ever in Cambodia. In addition to the jobs and general benefits it will create in the country's capital and beyond, the company is making a direct effort to improve the social welfare of Cambodian children by partnering with Amici dei Bambini Association or Ai.Bi. (http://www.aibi-us.org/), a non-governmental organization (NGO) registered in Italy and active in 25 countries including Cambodia. Ai.Bi. is dedicated to finding a family for every child who lives in an orphanage. DeCoro will donate U.S. $.75 to Ai.Bi. in Cambodia for every product it produces.

DeCoro was initially launched in 1997 by Mr. Ricci with manufacturing facilities in Shenzhen, China. The company was the first international sofa company producing in China and was followed by many others.

"DeCoro is back, and as a real Italian company, we will use our knowledge and experience to produce the finest quality, superior designed products at the best possible price," said Luca Ricci, chief executive officer, DeCoro Cambodia Co., Ltd. "Moreover, we are very happy to be involved in supporting social and charitable activities in Cambodia that will help local children here to enjoy a better future."

For more information about DeCoro and its new product line, contact the company at infodecoro@decoro.com.

SOURCE DeCoro

Thai doctor allowed to treat ailing Veera in Cambodian jail

The Nation
November 29, 2011

Cambodia has granted permission for a Thai doctor to visit activist Veera Somkhamkid (pictured) in Pray Sar prison on the outskirts of Phnom Penh in order to treat the detainee for a chronic illness, Foreign Minister Surapong Towichuk-chaikul said yesterday.

The visit is expected to take place next week. Veera and Ratree Pipattanapai-boon have been held since last December, a Cambodian court having convicted them of espionage after they inspected disputed border areas near Ban Nongchan in Sa Kaeo.

Veera was sentenced to eight years' imprisonment, while Ratree was jailed for six years for the same charge.

The two yellow-shirt activists moved against Cambodia in the context of their campaign against Thaksin Shinawatra, accusing the neighbouring country of seizing Thai territory in collaboration with the former prime minister.

Cambodian journalists approve rules for reporting on border conflict with Thailand

Pen Samitthy, president of the Club of Cambodian Journalists.

PHNOM PENH, November 28 (Xinhua) -- Thirty-two editors-in-chief and senior representatives from major print and electronic media in Cambodia have approved rules for reporting on border conflict with Thailand so as to avoid misunderstanding or incitement that may lead to more tension.

In a statement released Monday by Club of Cambodian Journalists after ending of a two-day editors' forum in Kep Province, 180 kilometers south of Phnom Penh, it said all the editors-in-chief and senior representatives from both major print and electronic media adopted 11-point rules for reporting on border conflict, especially with Thailand among other rules for reporting on domestic conflicts.

The statement said the rules were corresponding to the notification on many reports concerning the border conflict between Cambodia and Thailand that began from mid 2008 to the mid 2010.

Among the rules adopted, they agreed that "to avoid any articles that may lead to anger against another race or religion or jeopardize the diplomatic relations as results of unclear and groundless news analysis on their own."

"Avoiding any harm to Cambodian citizens as well as those from the country of conflict with Cambodia, especially, those who are living along the border and the workers including tourists of all nationality," it added.

Pen Samitthy, president of the Club of Cambodian Journalists said the editors' forum is important to help improve professional journalism in Cambodia.

During the whole coverage of border conflict with Thailand, despite no serious harm or damage to the diplomatic relations between the two nations, a few journalists were found less professional and make reports mostly relied on limited sources or one side.

CCJ is the largest and most influential journalists association in Cambodia.

Cambodia and Thai border had conflict in 2008 after Cambodia's Preah Vihear Temple, located near the border line with Thailand, was listed as the world's heritage site.

Monday, 28 November 2011

Updating for the Boeung Kak Women Protesting today in Front of France Embassy (28 Nov 2011)

Top: Tow women being arrested by plain clothes police during the protest (bottom).

For your updating! 28 November 2011: 16.25 PM

Today, many Boeung Kak Lake women are protesting and blocking the road in front of the city hall.

This morning, police arrested three women activists such as Vanny, Chhor Vy, Chantha. Vanny and Chhorvy was detained at Phnom Penh Police Station. Other three women were beaten unconscious, and another woman had tried to commit suicide by taking poison medicine.

Afterward, the government police arrested one more BKL women, Ms. Kong Chantha, at around 15.55 of this noon. Then the police and military police tried to separate the protesters.

Now the residents of the BKL are going to block the road in front of the France Embassy.

Please joint monitoring and for more info. please contact: 068 470 480

In solidarity
HRTF-Secretariat

Angelina on “Danger Trip” to Cambodia: Maybe Cambodia Needs a New PR Campaign

By Faine Greenwood
The Faster Times
November 28, 2011

In the Daily Mail’s continuing quest to say stupid things to an equally stupid readership, mega-celebrity Angelina Jolie’s jaunt to Cambodia with son Maddox is called a “danger trip,” that will take the duo “through a remote area littered with landmines and known for its civil unrest in the days of the notorious Khmer Rouge.”

Right. Known for its unrest thirty-six years ago.

Thankfully, Jolie hired a couple of armed guards to protect them from the deadly cattle, low-income villagers, water buffalo and underpaid traffic police they will doubtless encounter on their perilous journey.

The Daily Mail apparently doesn’t know that the real dangers of the Cambodian countryside – lousy driving and food poisoning – aren’t preventable by heavily armed men with automatic weapons. (Shame, really).

We also hope that poor little Maddox is not scarred for life by 1. seeing a guy carrying a gun and 2. going back to the humble village of his birth.

It’s stupid articles like this that force me to explain to people back home that the Khmer Rouge are no longer whisking people away in the night.

I am met with looks of baffled incredulity when I say that Phnom Penh is exponentially safer than New Orleans, and that I’d take a darkened Cambodian alley over its NOLA or Oakland equivalent any day.

In the eyes of a healthy majority of the Western population, Cambodia has apparently been stuck in time since the Khmer Rouge era, and a vacation there is just-about asking for enslavement in a work camp, a bullet to the head, or at least a solid roughing up by very angry men in black jammies.

Of course, this beats the Americans who ask me with great interest what it’s like living in Africa.

Also, let’s recall that Cambodia’s biggest news story of the year – the worst flooding in ten years, but than again, you probably haven’t heard about that - has been just about ignored by the mainstream media. But Angelina Jolie’s every movement in Cambodia?
Stop the presses!

I don’t really have anything against Angelina, other than that the media outside Cambodia pays attention to her – and only her – whenever she conducts a charity trip here. Cambodia only serves as a conveniently dramatic background to whatever Ms Megacelebrity is doing at the time.

Perhaps Angie should contemplate carrying out a nice PR campaign for Cambodia alongside her other charitable work, so people in the West will stop running stupid stories like the Mail’s.

Taking out ads for Cambodia emphasizing how safe and nice it is and how you can buy all kinds of attractive and reasonably priced souvenirs would be a start.

Cambodia to renew border talks with Thailand in late December

Monday, 28 November 2011
Posted by Serath

PHNOM PENH, Nov 28 (CEN) - Cambodia and Thailand will renew border talks next month after years of deadlock, National Defense Ministry spokesman Chhum Socheat (pictured) said Monday.

“The defense minister of Cambodia, as the host, will send an invitation to the defense minister in order to set the date for the GBC (General Border Committee) meeting which is scheduled for late December,” he said, adding that the invitation would be sent to the Thai Embassy in Phnom Penh.

"Cambodia is now ready for the talks and we are waiting for Thailand," he said. Topics for discussion are expected to include peace and development along the border.

The talks have been frozen since repeated exchanges of gunfire broke out in 2008, bringing deaths and damage to both sides.

Thailand, Cambodia to discuss troop redeployment in December

BANGKOK, Nov. 28 (Xinhua) -- Thai-Cambodian General Border Committee (GBC) meeting will be held in December in Cambodia to discuss in further detail the redeployment of military along both countries' border, Thailand's state-run media MCOT quoted Defence Minister Gen Yutthasak Sasiprapa as saying on Monday.

Related Thai authorities are waiting for Phnom Penh to confirm details of the talks, Gen Yutthasak (pictured) said. The content that Thai delegations will bring up for the discussion has been already approved by the Parliament as required by Article 190 of the 2007 Constitution, he added.

In March following deadly clashes along the two countries' border, Cambodia asked the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague to reconsider its 1962 verdict and to issue provisional measures during the reinterpretation. The court on July 18 ordered Thailand and Cambodia to withdraw their troops from the newly- defined demilitarized zone in a disputed area around the ancient Preah Vihear Temple.

Bangkok and Phnom Penh earlier agreed to follow the ICJ's order and will use the GBC as a platform to consider details in implementing the court's order.

The two neighboring countries share a common border of approximately 800 kilometers (500 miles) long but demarcation has never been fully completed. The 11th-century Preah Vihear has been the subject of age-old border dispute for decades. Although the ICJ awarded the Hindu temple to Cambodia in 1962, the dispute over area adjacent to the temple has never been solved.

Listing of the temple to Unesco's World Heritage Site in 2008 fueled tensions between the two countries, resulting in military build-up with sporadic skirmishes. The latest deadly clashes on Feb. 4-7 and Apr. 22-28, 2011, when both countries exchanged firing and shelling, caused loss of lives of civilian population and soldiers on both sides as well as massive evacuation of residents along the border.

Editor: Fang Yang

Cambodian garment workers strike at big brand supplier

Striking garment workers.

Published on Nov 28, 2011

PHNOM PENH (REUTERS) - About 1,000 Cambodian garment workers went on strike on Monday at a factory producing clothing for global brands Gap, J.C. Penny and Old Navy, demanding that the plant reinstates suspended trade union representatives.

Garment-making has been Cambodia's main manufacturing industry as it recovers from decades of conflict. Last year, the sector grew 28 per cent and contributed more than US$3 billion (S$3.9 billion) towards the country's US$11 billion economy.

It employs 300,000 people, many of them women, at scores of factories, owned mostly by Chinese and Taiwanese companies but it has seen its share of industrial action over pay and conditions.

The president of the Workers Friendship Union Federation said the strike would go on until the South Korean-owned factory, Cambo Handsome, on the outskirts of Phnom Penh, took back three union representatives suspended after being accused of stealing two T-shirts.

Cambodian, Vietnamese provinces sign MOU

Monday, 28 November 2011
Posted Serath

PHNOM PENH, Nov 28 (Cambodia Herald) - Leaders from Rattanakiri province in northeast Cambodia and the neighboring Vietnamese province of Kon Tum have signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation for socio-economic development, the Vietnam News Agency (VNA) reported.

The report said the document, signed in Kon Tum City on Sunday, includes an agreement to ask the two governments to open more border gates to further foster socio-economic development.

VNA said the two provinces had also agreed to continue cooperating in teaching the Vietnamese and Khmer languages and developing human resources.

"The two provinces will continue (to) keep order and security in the border area and turn it into an area of peace, friendship, cooperation and development as well as facilitate the land border demarcation," it said.

The report said Rattanakiri also pledged to continue helping Kon Tum in searching for and repatriating the remains of Vietnamese volunteer soldiers and experts who died during the resistance war in Cambodia.

Thailand, Cambodia to discuss troop redeployment next month

BANGKOK, Nov 28 (MCOT)- A Thai-Cambodian General Border Committee (GBC) meeting is scheduled in Cambodia next month when the military of the two countries will discuss the redeployment of soldiers stationed at the border, according to Thai Defence Minister Gen Yutthasak Sasiprapa (pictured).

Gen Yutthasak said the upcoming GBC meeting will be held in Cambodia and now the Thai authorities are awaiting from Cambodia to confirm details of the gathering.

He said the content Thailand would bring up at the meeting has been approved by Parliament as required by the Constitution.

Redeployment of troops will be discussed at the meeting, he said, adding that the gathering would be held in a positive atmosphere.

The International Court of Justice (ICJ) on July 18 ordered Thailand and Cambodia to withdraw their troops from the newly defined demilitarised zone in a disputed portion of their border around the historic Preah Vihear temple while urging both countries to work with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) to agree to allow the regional bloc's
observers to enter the disputed zone.

Thailand and Cambodia earlier agreed to follow the ICJ's order and use the GBC to consider details in implementing the court's order.

At the GBC meeting, it is expected that both sides will specify the forces to replace soldiers at Preah Vihear in accordance with the court order. (MCOT online news)

Exploring India's cultural heritage [in Cambodia]

The Hindu
CHENNAI, November 28, 2011

A Tamil Brahmi letter dated to 2nd century CE excavated from Phu Khao Thong in Thailand, Mahabaratha scenes in Angkor Vat in Cambodia, a bilingual inscription at Kandahar and the many forms of Lord Ganesha in South East Asia, all provide evidence of India's cultural influence in Asia.

The book, ‘From Kanchi to Cambodia – Greater India revisited', is an attempt to explore how the 2,000-year-old traditions and culture of India amalgamated in the cultures of many countries in Asia, says T.K.V. Rajan, an archaeologist and its author.

New approach

“The idea of the book is to leave behind the Euro-centric or America-centric approaches as the East has been deeply influenced by India for thousands of years,” he says hoping that the book will be a starting point to study the archaeological linkages in Asian countries.

India's influence was not purely on religious lines.

Role of trade

Trade was also an important element in India's ties with South East Asian countries, he says, emphasising the fact that India's trade with ASEAN countries was bound to expand by leaps and bounds in the immediate future.

The book was released here on Sunday by T.S. Sridhar, Additional Chief Secretary, School Education department, and the first copy was received by N. Kamakoti, Managing Director, City Union Bank.

Villagers salute Chea Dara [This land activist committed suicide because of land evictions or was there a foul play?]

Khouth Sophak Chakrya
Monday, 28 November 2011

The Phnom Penh Post

Photo by: Heng Chivoan
A monk sprinkles water over the body of Chea Dara, whose body was pulled from the Mekong hours earlier on Saturday in Kandal province’s Kien Svay district.

A mother whose family face eviction from their home at Boeung Kak lake was farewelled at a funeral on Saturday evening, hours after her body was found in the Mekong River.

Chea Dara’s body was identified by family members on Saturday in Samraong Thum commune, Kien Svay district, Kandal province, after three boys fishing in Samraong Thum commune earlier reported seeing a body floating there.

Chea Dara’s husband, Doeur Phou, told the Post on Thursday that his wife had jumped off the Chruoy Changva bridge because authorities had condemned their family to homelessness.

One week earlier, Chea Dara learned her house was the latest to be cut from a 12.44-hectare onsite relocation area that Prime Minister Hun Sen set aside in August for more than 750 families facing eviction from Boeung Kak after a private company leased the land for real estate development.

Lim Thearin, 27, Chea Dara’s brother in-law, found her body after renting a boat and conducting a search following the boys’ report.

“Though the body was somewhat swollen, we still identified it as Chea Dara’s because her physical appearance did not change completely,” he said.

Three days of dredging the Tonle Bassac River and the lower part of the Mekong had been unsuccessful in finding Chea Dara’s body. Lim Thearin said he and other family members rented a villager’s boat to take Chea Dara’s body from Samraong commune to a boat port in Khos Prak village, Phoum Thum commune, Kien Svay district.

They later took Chea Dara’s body to a cemetery in the nearby Vichet Naram pagoda.

Bov Saophea, 36, the representative of village 21, which was Chea Dara’s village, said she examined the body and attended the funeral, but Chea Dara’s husband and sons did not directly examine the body.

Yesterday, following Chea Dara’s cremation, her family took pieces of her bones to the stupa in Moha Muntrei pagoda in Phnom Penh and will do so again today.

Six missing after border shooting [Thai soldiers killing Khmers like animals?]

By Cheang Sokha and Meas Sokchea
Monday, 28 November 2011
The Phnom Penh Post

Police and military officials were searching for six missing Cambodians yesterday who villagers believe were shot dead by Thai soldiers on Saturday night after entering the Khun Han district of Thailand’s Si Saket province in search of luxury timber.

Neth Hing, who lives in Oddar Meanchey’s Trapaing Prasath district, told the Post that 13 people showed up at her doorstep yesterday morning, telling her they were survivors of a group of 19 Cambodians who had entered Thailand via the Thmor Pres border crossing.

“They came to [my home] this morning about 11:00. They fled because of shooting; they said that six people died,” Neth Hing said. “They said this [while] they were sitting [at my house].”

Local use of yuan likely to rise [Will the Chinese yuan replace the U.S dollar?]

By Don Weinland
Monday, 28 November 2011

The Phnom Penh Post

REUTERS
A 100 yuan bank note next to a US$100 note. China would make the yuan more flexible in either direction and currency reforms have begun to achieve results, Premier Wen Jiabao said this month.

Although several Cambodian banks will soon offer cross-border remittance services in Chinese yuan, experts and bankers say the Kingdom’s close economic ties to China may prompt a rapid increase in the domestic use of the currency.

Cambodia’s Union Commercial Bank recently reached an agreement with the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China for clearing and settlement transactions in yuan, UCB chief executive Yum Sui Sang said.

The bank planned to offer yuan remittance by the end of this year as demand for the service was evident, he said.

“I genuinely believe the time is ripe for the internationalisation of the yuan,” Yum Sui Sang said. “I have witnessed stronger and stronger demand for the yuan as a clearing and settlement currency, especially here in Cambodia.”

Despite preferential Chinese policy slowly edging traders towards cross-border settlements in yuan, its usage abroad is still highly regulated.

In July, 2009, the Chinese government allowed companies in Shanghai and Guangdong to settle trade with ASEAN nations in yuan.

The policy became all-inclusive less than a year later, and came to include an up to five per cent export tax rebate for Chinese companies that settled accounts in their own currency.

The Chinese government limits personal cross-border transactions to about US$12,500 at current exchange rates, according to the Bank of China website. Transactions for registered companies abroad are unlimited but require letters of credit from recipient companies in China.

Early next year, the Cambodian Public Bank will also offer settlement services, according to country head Phan Ying Tong, who said the volume of business between the two countries would make settlements in yuan commonplace.

“There are a lot of products being imported from China right now, so the increase in this service in Cambodia would be huge,” Phan Ying Tong said last week.

The bank’s research has shown there are as many as one million Khmer-Chinese in the Kingdom, as well as about 50,000 people who hold Chinese passports.

Government-brokered deals aside, trade between domestic Chinese and mainland businesses would only continue to grow, Phan Ying Tong said.

Remittance in yuan, as opposed to the dollar, would also save both parties at least 0.4 per cent on exchange rates, he added.

Total trade between Cambodia and China was expected to reach $2 billion this year and $2.5 billion in 2012, Minister of Commerce Cham Prasidh said in October.

Bilateral trade was worth $1.44 billion in 2010, Ministry of Commerce data showed.

ANZ Royal Bank said in July it would also offer yuan payment services, but company officials were not immediately available for comment.

Nguon Sokha, director-general and spokeswoman at the National Bank of Cambodia, said small yuan remittances to China were already happening at Cambodian banks with strong connections to China.

The volume of such transactions was sure to increase, given recent business trends between the countries, she said.

“There’s lots of co-operation between the two countries, so future transactions will be very big,” Nguon Sokha said, adding that many Chinese suppliers still preferred dollars.

The Chinese government is a big lender to Cambodia, second only to the Asian Development Bank.

Chinese concessional loans to China as of October were worth $1.16 billion – more than 29 per cent of the Kingdom’s total concessional debt, according to data compiled by the NGO Forum.

China’s interests in yuan lending to Cambodia is a topic of debate among experts.

“It makes sense to hold reserves of the currency that you owe the most,” Jonathan Leightner, an Asia specialist and economics professor at Augusta State University in Georgia, said.

“It also makes sense for Cambodia to hold yuan instead of dollars as its foreign reserves.”

Cambodia could protect itself from future appreciation of the yuan by switching dollar- denominated loans to those calculated in yuan, according to Leightner, who formerly taught at the Johns Hopkins-Nanjing Centre in Nanjing, China.

Before the 1997 Asian financial crisis, Japan encouraged debtors to switch from the dollar to the yen, Leightner added.

The suggestion fell largely on deaf ears and, when the yen appreciated against the dollar, borrowing countries found themselves subject to increasing levels of debt.

China has been under increasing pressure to allow its currency to freely appreciate against the dollar. The People’s Bank of China stops the yuan from rising or falling 0.5 per cent against the dollar past a daily set exchange mark, regardless of demand for the currency.

China and Cambodia’s exposure to the US dollar – in terms of foreign reserves and, for Cambodia, its usage as the default national currency – made continued dollar settlements an attractive option for both countries, Jayant Menon, principal economist at the Asian Development Bank’s Office of Regional Economic Integration, said.

Still, the potential for long-term appreciation against the dollar reduced uncertainty for traders in the two countries when accounts were settled in yuan, Menon said.

Exposure to the yuan should offer a counter-balance to a depreciating and volatile US dollar, he said.

The relative scale of the Cambodian economy could also let yuan settlements go under the radar, despite China’s reticence about international exposure of the currency, Menon said.

“Cambodia, being a rather small economy, can probably still get away with using some [yuan] without having any major impact on the international volume [of the currency].

“In that sense, it could probably do more yuan invoicing without it much being noticed.”

The global role of the yuan was still subject to much speculation, given the expected change of leadership in China next year, Leightner said.

Despite the small steps in internationalising the yuan under President Hu Jintao, China’s fifth generation of leaders might not have the same policy goals, he said.

“I believe that having the yuan replace the US dollar is the goal of some policymakers in China.

“Whether these policy makers will dominate, I do not know,” Leightner said.

Mine-free world comes at a price

By Kristin Lynch
Monday, 28 November 2011
The Phnom Penh Post

Photo by: Pha Lina
Prime Minister Hun Sen and Helen Clark, administrator of the UN Development Programme, examine devices designed to repair bones damaged by landmines prior to the 11th annual Meeting of the States Parties in Phnom Penh yesterday.

Prime Minister Hun Sen kicked off the Kingdom’s largest international conference to date yesterday by making an impassioned, albeit indirect, appeal for continued international aid in order to achieve Cambodia’s goal of becoming a mine-free country by the year 2020.

“In this era of economic difficulty and uncertainty…we cannot be deterred and our accomplishment should not be compromised by the financial turmoil,” the premier said during the Opening Ceremony of the 11th Meeting of the States Parties, a formal gathering in Phnom Penh of the 158 states that have signed the Anti-Personnel Mine-Ban Convention. Also known as the Ottawa Treaty, the treaty prohibits the use, stockpiling, production and transfer of anti-personnel landmines.

“Without intensifying the speed and efficiency of the way in which we address our respective problems, our ultimate goal of a mine-free world will remain at a distance,” he added. Hun Sen’s veiled appeal comes on the heels of last week’s release of the 2011 Landmine Monitor report, which indicated that international mine-action aid to Cambodia had fallen sharply – by nearly a third – to US$24.3 million between 2009 and 2010.

This drop in funding occurred despite a trend of increasing help globally for anti-landmine efforts, the report indicated. Worldwide aid from donor countries rose by 8 per cent in 2010 to US$480 million, according to the report.

Speaking on the sidelines of yesterday’s opening ceremony, Cameron Imber, programme manager for worldwide demining agency HALO Trust, lamented this decrease in international aid, saying his organisation’s funding had dropped by nearly 40 per cent over the past three years, from US$7 million in 2008 to US$4.3 million this year.

“The results are obvious. Less funding means less deminers on the ground, which means less mines are removed,” he said.

Cambodia ratified the Anti-Personnel Mine-Ban Convention in 1999 and it officially took effect in January 2000. Signatories to the Convention have 10 years from the date of ratification to clear their states of mines. However, unable to meet this mandate, the Kingdom applied for, and received, a 10-year extension in 2009, giving it until January 2020 to eradicate all landmines from within its borders.

During this week’s conference, Cambodia will be required to report on the progress it has made toward achieving this ambitious target, which is also one of the country’s nine Millennium Development Goals.

Prime Minister Hun Sen also lauded Cambodia’s mine-clearance efforts, saying that if trends for the first 10 months of this year continued, 2011 would be the first year “since the country was unified” that mine casualties would dip below 200.

Some experts, however, have questioned the reliability of casualty statistics in determining mine-clearance effectiveness. At times, declining casualty rates simply indicate that locals are becoming more aware of their surroundings and less likely to venture into areas known to be contaminated with mines, they say.

Phnom Penh is hosting the week-long Meeting of the States Parties for the first time in the conference’s 11-year history. More than 1,000 delegates representing more than 100 countries are expected to attend.

Hun Sen's cousin jailed for forging documents

Court jails government official and Hun Sen's cousin for forging documents

Monday, 28 November 2011
Posted by Serath

PHNOM PENH, Nov 28 - The Phnom Penh Court on Monday sentenced a government official to a jail term of four and a half years and a cousin of Prime Minister Hun Sen, Mrs. Dy Prim, to a term of two and a half years for falsifying government documents.

Seng Yean, vice director of the inspection department at the Ministry of National Assembly and Senate Relations and Inspection, and land broker Dy Prim did not appear in court.

The government official was found guilty of falsifying government documents to get a piece of land in Phnom Penh for Dy Prim in exchange for USD 200,000.

Boeung Kak women protesting and arrested NOW (28 November 2011)

For your updating!

Please kindly join monitoring now at in front of the city hall.
Contact information: 068 470 480

Regards
HRTF Secretariat

Sin Sisamouth- Rumduol Surin (Rumduol flower in Surin)

Another song: Som Thnorm Prolorm Snae (Caressing My Darling)- by Sin Sisamouth

[Australia's] Sanitarium Berkeley Vale ambassadors take the coast to Cambodia

Sanitarium Ambassador team flying to Cambodia to participate in an International Children's Care project.

28 November, 2011
The Central Coast Express-Advocate

Wyong, NSW, Australia
by Pauline Priest

FOUR Sanitarium Berkeley Vale ambassadors are in Cambodia, distributing a stack of Berkeley Vale Soccer Club gear donations to children.

Kerryn Walsh, Shauvaune Caffery, Simone Gardoni and Julie Praestiin are travelling with the company’s chief executive Kevin Jackson.

The trip is part of an international Sanitarium employee reward program.

The ambassadors are distributing soccer shirts - there are enough for about 20 teams, in all sizes - plus boots and balls.

Mr Jackson said he was thrilled to be supporting the project, which aimed to help provide a brighter future for children.

“The donation of sporting goods by Berkeley Vale Soccer Club and its members will mean 300 kids no longer have to share just eight pairs of boots when they play soccer,” he said.

The ambassadors will also work with the International Children’s Care (ICC) organisation, helping to paint and prepare a new school in the ICC’s Hope Children’s Village for its opening.

The school was built with the help of a $30,000 donation from the Sanitarium Ambassador Awards Program and a $5000 contribution by Sanitarium’s marketing department.

While they are in Cambodia the ambassadors will also help with education and hygiene programs and conduct a sports and obstacle course for 300 children.

Northpoint [California] Travels to Cambodia: Learning the Language

Sunday, 27 November 2011
Prescott eNews
Written by Mia Mazanedo

Students learn to speak Khmer in preparation for a trip to Cambodia.

As part of our preparation for our Cambodia trip, we’re learning to speak their unique language, Khmer. So far we’ve learned basic words, just enough to get us around, but when we interact with the people we’ll get a greater understanding of the language.

To us, the words and pronunciations are quite different than we’re used to, requiring sounds we don’t normally use. It exercises our minds and takes work, but the advantages definitely outweigh the difficulties. Being able to speak their language will earn us respect from the Cambodian people, since it shows we’ve taken the time to understand their customs and language. For, learning the language also gives us a greater understanding of the culture.

There are many things about the language that are quite different than English. Also, the way they interact is very different. It seems as if they have a greater respect for each other, as they have different words to express different levels of respect. There are different greetings for a parent or elder than for a friend or a younger sibling. Also the levels of interaction between male and female are unlike what we are used to. The women are expected to respect men, though that respect also depends on a person’s age. For example, the word for “yes” is different for a woman than a man. But this small divide in their society does not make them a lesser culture in the world. Unlike most of us, the Cambodian people have a great respect for each other; the words used towards strangers are filled with as much respect as if they are talking to a brother.

We also have learned to greet another as well as say our goodbyes. When greeting another, it is proper etiquette to press your hand palm to palm and to a bow, the size of the bow signifying the level of respect. This action is accompanied by the words, “cumriup sua” as a formal greeting. It’s amazing when you think about all the small details of body language that you don’t normally notice that get taken into account in other countries. What we don’t realize is that something as small as pointing your feet at another could be interpreted as disrespectful. These are the details we are learning about before leaving.

This is such an amazing opportunity that we are getting. It will, I’m sure, alter our way of thinking towards the daily luxuries for which we are very lucky and give us a new view and respect towards other ways of living. I’m looking forward to speaking with people who have a different view on living and music and life in general. The connection language creates when there is no barrier is something impossible to replicate, which makes us all very lucky that we are getting this amazing experience so early on. I’m confident that this trip will not be soon forgotten.

Northpoint Travels to Cambodia!

In January, ten students and two staff from Northpoint Expeditionary Learning Academy will travel to Cambodia to spend two weeks exploring the country and learning about its culture. They will get to take music lessons, stay in a countryside village, and interact with Cambodian performance troupes. Under the Khmer Rouge, 90% of Cambodia’s musicians, artists, and performers died, and since then the country’s artistic traditions have slowly been recovering. The Northpoint students will help by doing a service project: they will construct a rehearsal space for a new music ensemble.

This is the first in a series of articles written by students going on the trip. This fall, the students are studying Cambodian language and culture and are doing much fundraising to support their travel. To donate and support these students, please visit http://northpointacademy.org/student-travel. For more information or to get involved, call 928-717-3272 and ask for Jeff Dyer.

Cambodian village gains hope from a child's healed heart [courtesy of the U.S's Long Beach community]

Top: Davik Teng, 12, and her mother Sin Chhon, stand in the doorway of their new home, built with contributions by U.S. well-wishers. (Jeff Gritchen / Staff Photographer)
Bottom: BATTAMBANG, CAMBODIA - Davik Teng, left, and her sister Davin Teng, make dinner in their new home on September 16, 2011. (Jeff Gritchen / Staff Photographer)

By Greg Mellen, Staff Writer
Posted: 11/26/2011
Read original article and see more pictures at Long Beach Press-Telegram.

In 2008, Press-Telegram reporter Greg Mellen and photographer Jeff Gritchen traveled to Cambodia with the Long Beach-based nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries and chronicled in pictures, video and words the journey of Davik Teng, the nonprofit's first patient, from her rural home to the U.S. for life-extending open-heart surgery. Since then, several other children have also made similar journeys.

Earlier this year, Mellen and Gritchen returned to Cambodia to check on the children and their new lives. The first part of the series appears today, and the second part will appear Monday.

SVAY CHROM, Cambodia - Prosperity has come to this tiny hamlet nestled off a dirt road near Battambang, Cambodia.

Of course, in this poverty-stricken nation, prosperity can be relative and incremental.

While cash may be in short supply here, there are other currencies. They are memory and hope.

This is a village that remembers how a little girl was saved from a slow spiral toward death and now represents something else - that miracles are possible, even in a desolate little village like Svay Chrom.

It is here where Davik Teng was born and has been raised. Nearly four years ago, she was slowly dying in a tiny, tilting bamboo hut. She was without hope, tucked away in a place few knew about.

Today Davik is strong and healthy, and her family compound has been upgraded. Davik's tiny hut has been replaced by a larger dwelling that is more like a real house. The same is true for her cousins next door.

Otherwise, life remains the same. There is still no electricity or running water. The villagers still fill their cisterns with water from a small, murky pond. Chickens still run pell-mell through the compound. Employment is scarce and what there is barely pays - $2 a day or less. Several of the men in the village, those young and healthy enough, have gone to Thailand to seek work.

Time passes, the seasons roll by marked by the rainy and dry seasons, elders die and children are born. Life in Svay Chrom goes on, in some ways the same, but always in flux.

But villagers here know lives can change in an instant. They've seen it.

Profound changes for girl

For Davik and her family, life turned on a dime into something none of them could have imagined in the dark years when Davik's damaged, overworked heart fought a losing battle.

Davik suffered from a birth defect in her heart, a hole through which blood sloshed between the ventricle chambers. The hole, or ventricular septal defect, forced her heart to pump much harder to circulate and oxygenate blood through the lungs. Eventually the defect causes excessive tension and irreparable damage to the lungs and can also result in congestive heart failure.

Dr. Vaughn Starnes, who would repair Davik's heart, said she would likely have died in her 30s without the open-heart operation she underwent in 2008 in Los Angeles.

The defect made breathing hard, deprived Davik of energy and kept her weight low. As a result, while her cousins and village children played and went to school, Davik stayed home alone in a corner of the small tilting hut.

With the help of Long Beach nonprofit Hearts Without Boundaries, which discovered the girl by chance, Davik was brought to the United States and underwent surgery at Children's Hospital Los Angeles.

Now 12 years old, Davik is a tall, healthy preteen. She attends classes in nearby Battambang, at the Newton Thilay School, thanks to help from donors in the United States.

She shows virtually no effects from the defect except for a long thin scar that snakes down from her collarbone.

School days

There is a whir of activity at the Newton Thilay School on a typical day. There are 11 students in Davik's Khmer class. Davik towers over most of her fourth-grade classmates. She is even taller than her teacher.

Because of the years missed due to her heart defect, Davik is trying to catch up academically.

Even among her classmates who are two and three years younger, she has to work to keep up.

This is her first year of consistent formal schooling, and although she is behind, Davik is making strides.

"She works hard," says Davik's new Khmer teacher Sorth Seert.

On this day the children are studying the Asian fable of the rabbit and the snail.

In the tale, a rabbit is outwitted in a race by a group of snails, who space themselves along a course so that each time the confounded rabbit looks up, it sees a snail far ahead in the distance and can never catch up and is eventually worn out and defeated.

In class, students act out a rendition of the fable. Davik plays the rabbit, unaware of any seeming irony.

In Cambodia, education is still only beginning to emerge from its dismantling during the deadly Khmer Rouge era. Public schools are notoriously unreliable and corrupt, with teachers requiring payment to give students the lessons they need to advance.

Newton Thilay is a midlevel private school that doesn't meet the academic standards of elite institutions but far exceeds public schools.

Bunra Rath, the branch manager of the school, says it is for "poor and middle-class students."

Davik's tuition and school supplies, which cost about $420 per year, are picked up by donors in the U.S.

Even that modest amount is well beyond what her family can afford. Before Davik's chance encounter with her benefactors, Newton Thilay might as well have been in another universe to Davik and the millions of children just like her.

The Friday school day ends with a "respect the flag," celebration. Kids sing the Cambodian national anthem, do calisthenics and sing, in English, "If You're Happy and You Know It."

Life back in the village

This is Davik's new life, a life of learning, making new friends, expanded horizons and facing opportunities once unfathomable.

It is in Svay Chrom where the physical manifestations of change are most apparent.

The tiny tilting, bamboo hut where Davik grew up is gone.

In its place is a roomy, whitewashed structure with a rough-hewn brick foundation, white walls and a corrugated tin roof.

The floor is still dirt and there are no utilities, but it is unrecognizable compared with the old home.

Inside there is actually headroom along with two full-sized beds and a dresser/display case stuffed with clothes, toys, inexpensive jewelry and other bric-a-brac Davik received during her stay in the United States.

Across a wall in the room are newspaper clippings, tearsheets and photographs from the Press-Telegram, which chronicled Davik's journey from Cambodia to the United States.

When Davik and her mother, Sin Chhon, first returned to Svay Chrom in 2008, the front door had been torn off the bamboo hut in the previous rainy season.

The family had cash provided by well-wishers in the U.S. and Sin decided to have the new house built.

In addition to the roomy main room, there is a small kitchen area off the back and an enclosed outhouse nearby.

The other addition to the household is Ravith Rom, Davik's 11-month-old half- brother. Soon after returning to Cambodia, Sin remarried. She is currently a stay-at-home mom.

"Life is a little better after the trip (to the U.S.)," Sin says through translation. "You can see I built a new house. I can find enough money for food, but I don't have any extra money."

Although the family still struggles with poverty, it at least now has hope.

"It was not just a trip to repair a heart," Sin says of Davik's journey. "If she hadn't been found, it was only a matter of time. It was a long death sentence. There's no way I could have afforded to find a cure and send her to school. There's no way."

Sin and Davik are not the only ones to benefit from the trip to the United States.

Davik's older sister Davin, often overlooked in her sister's tale, is back in school.

The 16-year-old had started working in construction, like her mother once had, before U.S. donors provided money to allow her to finish her studies in public school.

Davik's cousins, who live next door, also have rebuilt their bamboo house thanks to several hundred dollars they received from U.S. donors. That house, like Sin's, has the white walls and tin roof, which replaced the old bamboo.

Otherwise, the pace of life remains the same as Davik and Sin's U.S. adventure slowly dissolves into the fabric of life, like a phantasmal story from a different existence.

"I talk to my friends and tell them I went to America and had my heart fixed," Davik says through translation. "Some kids don't believe me, but I just show them my (scar)."

Sin still dreams about the U.S., about the lights, the activity.

The memories, naturally, are laced with a certain melancholy for a lifestyle she experienced only briefly.

"Of course it's hard to adjust to life (in Cambodia) after. I often told people how great it was. How it was light, unlike here where it's dark.

"I know I don't have hope (of going back.) I hope one day Davik has a chance to go and continue her education there."

Davik is asked to demonstrate some of her new-found English skills.

Somewhat abashed, she launches into a song about fruit salad to the tune of "Frere Jacques."

It is at once an odd confluence of the girl Davik was and the teen she is becoming.

As the light fades into early evening and storm clouds scuttle in from the west, the time for visiting is over. There is dinner to be made, everyday life to return to.

Davik, Sin and visitors share an awkward moment before the visitors decide it is time to leave.

As she looks ahead to an uncertain future, one that will likely be decided as much by those who came to her rescue as anything she has power over, Davik understands on some level that she has a role to play and a responsibility in whatever the future holds, not only for her but her family in Svay Chrom.

"I study hard now and maybe one day I can have a good job," Davik says.

It may not sound like a lot, but in Cambodia, where prosperity and sometimes the life of a little girl can be tenuous, it is everything.

greg.mellen@presstelegram.com, 562-499-1291

A Change of Guard

Tuesday, 29 November 2011

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