via Khmer NZ News Media
Mon, Jun 21, 2010
AFP
PHNOM PENH, June 21, 2010 (AFP) - Cambodia's former king Norodom Sihanouk and members of his royal family will pay a "friendship visit" to Vietnam this week, boosting ties between the neighbouring countries, officials said Monday.
Sihanouk, one of Asia's longest-serving monarchs, was due to leave for Hanoi on Tuesday and return on Friday, accompanied by his wife and his son, King Norodom Sihamoni, according to sources close to the palace.
It marks his first visit to Vietnam for 15 years.
The ex-monarch is sometimes known as the "king-father" of Cambodia, where anti-Vietnamese sentiment is rife, fuelled by resentment at Vietnam's expansion over centuries and the feeling that Cambodia is losing some of its territory.
Vietnam invaded Cambodia in 1978, overthrew the communist Khmer Rouge regime in 1979 and occupied the country for 10 years. Relations have been particularly tense in relation to border issues.
Sihanouk's personal secretary Prince Sisowath Thomico said the "friendship visit" would boost the ties between the two Southeast Asian countries, although he would not comment on the schedule.
"Being retired and no longer doing politics nor diplomacy, my journey and trip to the glorious Socialist Republic of Vietnam will have a strictly private character," Sihanouk said in a statement dated June 14.
Sihanouk abruptly quit the throne in October 2004 in favour of his son, citing old age and health problems, but he remains a prominent figure in Cambodia and often uses messages on his website to comment on matters of state.
Cambodia and Vietnam share a 1,270-kilometre (790-mile) border, which has remained vague since French colonial times, but in 2005 they signed a border accord that has helped calm tensions after decades of territorial disputes. They officially began demarcating the contentious border in September 2006.
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