China Signed Three Commercial Agreements with Cambodia – Friday, 19.3.2010

http://cambodiamirror.wordpress.com/

via CAAI News Media

Posted on 20 March 2010

The Mirror, Vol. 14, No. 656

“The spokesperson of the Royal Government told Deum Ampil on 17 March 2010 that a visit by a Chinese delegation to Cambodia concentrates on stepping up commercial ties between both countries, and three memorandums of understanding were to be signed.

“The spokesperson of the Council of Ministers, Mr. Phay Siphan, said that a Chinese Deputy Prime Minister, Mr. Hui Liangyu [ 回良玉 ], visits Cambodia for three days from 17 to 19 March 2010. And the visit is not just to improve the already-good relationship with Cambodia, but also to expand commercial ties.

“Mr. Liangyu presided over the signing ceremony of agreements on agriculture, a sector that accounts for almost 27% of the country’s GDP. According to the announcement, another agreement to be signed is in the field of post and telecommunications between the Huawei Technologies of China and the Cambodian telecommunication system of CamGSM.

“It is seen that Cambodia has been successful in agricultural production in the last decade. Also, it is expected that the rice production of Cambodia for 2009-2010 will yield 7.286 million tonnes where 3.1 million tonnes are planned to be exported.

“In February 2010, the Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Cambodia, Samdech Hun Sen, stated that Cambodia plans to invest US$310 million, including a loan of US$240 million from China, to develop the irrigation systems in the country, a key factor to increase rice production for export.

“Many analysts said that paddy rice is a potential for Cambodian investment, but the opportunity to boost export remains weak, as Cambodia has not had sufficient irrigation systems for rice production.

“The Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Chan Sarun, said that the paddy rice cultivation might increase to 3.5 million hectares, while previously, rice was grown on just 2.6 million hectares. And this might yield 12.25 million tonnes.

“In 2008, the total market value of the Cambodian post and telecommunications sector remains unchanged at US$429 million in 2008. According to a report of the Cambodian government, for six years, the average growth of the Cambodian post and telecommunications sector was 31%. There are eight mobile phone companies in Cambodia, except for the Mobitel company that is co-owned by Luxembourg-registered Millicom International Cellular [Note: Interesting in the environment of present discussions of planned increased regulations for the telecommunications sector in Cambodia: Millicom International Cellular's declared Mission is Freedom to access today's world for people in emerging markets].

“Mobitel, also under the name of Cellcard, http://www.mobitel.com.kh/ offers up to 66% of all services countrywide, followed by Camshin under the name of MFone http://www.mfone.com.kh/ with 12%. It is estimated that Cambodia might have more than 4 million mobile phone users among the population of 14 millions, where 90% of the population lives in rural areas. In addition, Cambodia has a potential for rice investment. Besides China, there are other big donors supporting Cambodia such as Japan and South Korea.

“Besides of the loans provided by the Chinese government to Cambodia, also the Kuwait government agreed to provide a loan of US$546 million to Cambodia, where US$486 million will be used to build up irrigation systems and US$60 million to construct roads in northeastern Cambodia, including in Battambang province, the biggest source of paddy rice. Moreover, Kuwait planned to invest US$200 million on rice production in Cambodia.

“Mr. Chan Sarun said, ‘We have money and we have land. They would not have come to invest if we would not have the potential to expand our agricultural systems.’

“It should be noted that the Chinese government had promised to provide more loans for investments for irrigation such as in Pursat, Prey Veng, and Oddar Meanchey.

“Responding to requests by the head of the Cambodia government to the Chinese government to invest more in Cambodia, the Chinese government eased Cambodian exports to China, allowing Cambodia to export up to 418 items of goods. In 2008, investment from China in Cambodia amounted to US$4.48 billion. But in 2009, the investment dropped to US$349.15 million due to the global financial crisis.

“Last December, the Chinese Vice President, Mr. Xi Jingping [ 习近平 ], visited Cambodia, and he encouraged more investments to be made in Cambodia. At that time, the Chinese government promised to provide US$1.2 billion in grant aid and loans for Cambodia to restore infrastructures which were devastated by two decades of civil war in the 1970s.”

Deum Ampil, Vol.4, #438, 19.3.2010

Newspapers Appearing on the Newsstand:

Friday, 19 March 2010

World Bank Failed Lake Residents: Complaint

via CAAI News Media

By Men Kimseng, VOA Khmer

Original report from Washington

19 March 2010

A multi-million-dollar World Bank land project failed to help residents in an impoverished community in Phnom Penh establish legal land titles, allowing their ouster and leaving them in limbo, a US rights group says in an official complaint.

The World Bank’s Land Management and Administrative project failed to protect the people of Beoung Kak lake in northern Phnom Penh, who were pushed out to make way for a lucrative real estate development, the Center on Housing Rights and Evictions says in a Sept. 4, 2009, complaint.

“As Boeung Kak residents were unable to transfer their customary rights into formalized land titles under LMAP, the project not only failed to formalize their tenure but in effect also degraded their pre-existing tenure status,” the Minnesota-based COHRE said in the complaint, a copy of which was obtained by VOA Khmer.

The $28.83 million land management project was initiated in June 2002 and implemented by the Ministry of Land Management but was terminated by the government in September 2009, just a few months before its final date, for having too many conditions.

Local residents said that in 2006, Sras Chak commune, which includes the Boeung Kak community, was declared an adjudication zone, but when they asked to register their land, they were denied and told they lived in a development zone.

“They don’t have a land title, but they have purchasing documents that some of the new residents bought from older ones, and authorities have recognized them,” said Eang Vuthy, a legal education officer of the Bridges Across Borders Southeast Asia, which operates in alliance with COHRE.

“The reason why they don’t have a legalized land title was that in 2006 or 2007 the LMAP declared that Sras Chak commune would be an adjudication zone, but the Phnom Penh municipality stopped the registration process,” he said. “They don’t have a land title, only customary rights.”

Vuthy said that according to the Cambodian land law those who live more than five years on uncontested land are the rightful owners.

There are more than 4,000 families of Boeung Kak residents, some of which have been living there for almost 20 years. Most of them are poor people, while some have guesthouse businesses. Many were evicted after the government decided in 2007 to lease the land to Shukaku, Inc., a developer.

According to the Development Credit Agreement for the LMAP, in order to mitigate the potential harm of evictions from state property, an application of the Environment and Social Guidelines, including the Resettlement Policy Framework is required, COHRE said.

However, the framework was not applied in the case of Boeung Kak. Therefore, in addition to the “weakening of the customary land rights of Boeung Kak residents, the protections that the DCA required have not been implemented by the government,” COHRE said.

More than 900 families have so far been evicted from the Boeung Kak area. Some have been relocated to Damnak Troyeung, some 20 kilometers outside of Phnom Penh, while others received a lump sum of $8,500 in compensation.

“We, the Boeung Kak residents, don’t know where else to seek intervention because three countries have announced registration of our land, but now the government says the land is still in dispute and cannot be registered,” said Thai Nary, a local resident who claimed to have settled in Village 22 since 1993. “I am so hopeless hearing that. I cannot even fix my leaking roof. I almost cry every day and cannot stand up anymore. If I raise my roof a bit higher, I am scared that the company will besiege and stop me.”

Thai Nary and other residents have asked for onsite development.

The residents have asked COHRE for assistance, and the case has so far been brought to the attention of the World Bank’s Inspection Panel, according to COHRE documents.

Officials at the World Bank in Washington declined to comment, referring VOA Khmer to see documents posted on its Web site.

An Inspection Panel’s report dated Dec. 2, 2009, posted on the bank’s site, concludes that in order to make an independent assessment for management compliance, “Bank policies and procedures and related issues of harm in the context of the project, the Panel would need to conduct an appropriate review of all relevant facts and applicable policies and procedure.”

The Panel, however, asked the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors to refrain from issuing any recommendation pending a management meeting with the government.

“The Panel, as it has done in similar situations in the past with Board approval, will not take a position at this time on whether the issues of non-compliance and harm raised in the Requester merit an investigation,” the Panel concluded.

After COHRE’s request for an investigation, on Dec. 17, 2009, the World Bank’s Cambodia manager, Annette Dixon, issued a statement saying the bank was ready to support Cambodia to improve living conditions of people who have been resettled or are facing settlement from land facing development.

An initiative for negotiations between the government and the Bank is underway, sources told VOA Khmer.

Verdict Expected in June for ‘Complicated’ Duch Case

via CAAI News Media

By Kong Sothanarith, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
19 March 2010

A Khmer Rouge tribunal verdict in the trial of Kaing Kek Iev, the prison chief better known as Duch, is expected in June, although judges face numerous complexities brought about by the hybrid, international nature of the UN-backed court.

Duch’s trial, which ended in November 2009, was a test case for the court. Prosecutors have asked he be given 40 years in prison, while the defense asked for leniency. In his monthslong trial, Duch took responsibility for the deaths of thousands of Cambodians and asked families of his victims to forgive him.

In a lengthy interview with VOA Khmer, Lars Olsen, a spokesman for the tribunal, said the case was complicated in terms the laws involved, the differences in languages among international and Cambodia judges and their search for a suitable punishment.

“They will look at what is normal in other courts in dealing with crimes against humanity and with war crimes when they make decision” Olsen said.

The tribunal is a mix of international and Cambodia judges and prosecutors and includes unprecedented procedures for operation. It is now preparing for its second case, which will try Duch alongside four more leaders—Nuon Chea, Khieu Samphan, Ieng Sary and Ieng Thirith—for atrocities, including genocide.

Cambodia Has Role To Play: US Official

via CAAI News Media

By Poch Reasey, VOA Khmer

Original report from Washington

19 March 2010

A high-ranking State Department official said Wednesday that Cambodia plays an important role in some US issues, although the two countries sometimes have disagreements.

Assistant Secretary of State for Asia Pacific Affairs Kurt Campbell said Wednesday Cambodia can help the US in many ways.

“First of all just welcoming the role of the Unites States in Asia is something we very much appreciated,” Campbell told VOA Khmer in an exclusive interview in Washington. “There are a host of new issues we are dealing with in Asia, like climate change, and Cambodia would be affected if climate change continues given its reliance on the Mekong River.”

Under the administration of President Barrack Obama, US foreign policy will focus more on Southeast Asia, he said.

The US and Cambodia recently increased cooperation on many issues, including human trafficking, narcotics and terrorism, but Campbell acknowledged relations had not been perfect.

“There are issues on which our two countries disagree, but one of the things that we are seeking is the kind of dialogue where we are able to balance it,” he said. “We are working closely together with the enduring areas where we still have difficulties.”

The two sides are currently at odds over $300 million in debt accrued under the Lon Nol regime, which the US wants paid back but Cambodia wants turned into humanitarian aid.

Phay Siphan, a spokesman for the Council of Ministers, said the two sides have a good partnership, but they differ on freedoms and human rights.

“The two cultures are different,” he said. “On the US side, there is still a lack of understanding about the reality in Cambodia.”

This year will mark 60 years of diplomatic relations between the two countries, and Campbell said he was looking forward to celebrations in July.

“I think one of the things we want to underscore is our support for Cambodia and our excitement for the 60th anniversary, so that’s why it’s one of the reasons I am looking forward to the visit,” he said.

Court Delays Verdict To Avoid Protest Violence

via CAAI News Media

By Heng Reaksmey, VOA Khmer

Original report from Phnom Penh

19 March 2010

A judge postponed a decision in a land case to prevent a repeat conflict between villagers and police, as protesters burned effigies in front of the provincial court Friday.

The court is hearing a dispute over 65 hectares of land in Kampong Speu province’s Oudong district, where villagers say a Taiwanese company is taking over property they claim to have owned for more than 20 years.

Judge Keo Mony said Friday the court would delay its decision, “to avoid clashes between authorities and villagers like yesterday.”

Twelve police and 13 villagers were injured in Thursday’s confrontation, when police sought to break up an assembly of protesters, using electric batons and water canons. Sun Bun Chhoun, a 49-year-old representative of the 88 families in the case, said villagers will protest the court until they get their land back.

Protesters burnt effigies in front of the court Friday, he said, to prevent the judge from issuing a verdict “without thinking.”

Investigators for the rights group Adhoc are monitoring the protests daily, an official of the group said.

Ky Dara, a representative of the Taiwanese company, said the protesters were not the rightful owners of the land, which the company purchased in 2000 to run a paper factory.

Women Must ‘Dare’ To Demand More: Activist

via CAAI News Media

By Men Kimseng, VOA Khmer

Washington

19 March 2010

Cambodian women need to be engaged in politics and prepare themselves to seek justice and freedom for other women, an opposition politician said Monday.

“We, women activists, or politicians, must dare to speak out to criticize political parties to get what we want, which is to free women from domestic violence and injustice, and [against] the denial of access to health service and poverty,” Mu Sochua, a lawmaker for the Sam Rainsy Party, said on “Hello VOA.”

Mu Sochua, who is also deputy secretary-general for the party, urged women to cast their votes for a party that prioritizes women’s health and education and is committed to fighting discrimination against women.

“We have a policy to, firstly, give women resources, knowledge, and money, and secondly, to ensure that they are on the first, second or third place of the candidate list,” Mu Sochua said.

A caller from Kampong Thom province, Sun Thon, suggested that emphasis be put on younger generations of women so that they can be prepared to be agents of change.

Mu Sochua also encouraged women to pay attention to issues around them by listening to the radio to follow the news and “clearly analyze it.”

Leader Abhisit says Thailand divided

via CAAI News Media

Friday, 19 March 2010

By Alastair Leithead

BBC News, Bangkok

Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva has admitted his country is divided, as protests continue in the capital.

Thousands of demonstrators are still camped out in Bangkok after a week of rallies which saw them daubing blood on the gates of Government House.

But they number far fewer than those who gathered at the start of this week.

Speaking to the BBC from a military base, Mr Abhisit said he had offered to meet leaders of the red-shirt movement to talk about their grievances.

The prime minister appeared confident and pleased with the way he had handled the demonstration so far, but admitted the country was divided, and not just between the cities and the rural areas.

" All governments must try to address the issues that are of concern to urban and rural people alike "

Abhisit Vejjajiva,

Thai Prime Minister

"I'm saying that the divisions do run deep, and that political differences occur in a democracy," he said. "But we have to stick to the rule of law."

"We try to make sure that we can somehow move this country forward in terms of political conflicts, so that they can be resolved through the ballot box and also through the court procedures, depending on the issues, and that all governments must try to address the issues that are of concern to urban and rural people alike."

Mr Abhisit said he was doing all he could to bring Thailand together, including policies to help the economy in the countryside, and said he had offered to meet red-shirt leaders in order to tackle their grievances.

He denied being a puppet of the military, as some opponents suggest, but he gave the interview from the military headquarters where he has been working and sleeping all week.

Demonstrators daubed their own blood on the gates of Government House and the prime minister's house as part of their demonstrations, and they have said they will block traffic in Bangkok on Saturday.

Mr Vejjajiva said he was pleased there had been no violence, saying he was confident the government was in control and managing the situation.

He said he was happy to allow demonstrations in the country, as long as they were constitutional and non-violent.

Thailand: Bangkok: “red shirts” reject overtures by Thai PM

Anti-government demonstrators confirm they will continue their protest, announce new action for tomorrow. They want to see the government resign, parliament dissolve and new elections held. Their target is the ruling elite and the military, against whom they have declared “class warfare”.

via CAAI News Media

By Asia News

Friday, March 19, 2010

Bangkok – Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva yesterday said he was open to negotiations with anti-government 'red shirts' who want fresh elections. But Mr Veera Musigapong, a key leader of the red-shirted United Front for Democracy against Dictatorship (UDD), said there would be no negotiations so long as the government held to its attitude of superiority.

One day after they declared “class war” against the elites, the red shirts showed no sign that they would back off from their threat against the leaders and military who ousted former Prime Minister Thaksin in 2006 and brought to power current Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva.

Anti-government leaders have reiterated their position, saying that demonstrations would end only with new elections. Dialogue will be possible if the government resigns and parliament is dissolved.

Following their unusual form of peaceful protest adopted in the last few days when donated blood was poured at the entrance of the prime minister’s residence and the cabinet office, the “red shirts” plan a fresh round of citywide protests for tomorrow.

Patron Turns Home Movies Into a Feature

via CAAI News Media

By SYLVIANE GOLD

Published: March 19, 2010

HAVING spent the day climbing ancient temples in debilitating jungle heat, Anne Bass didn’t want to leave her hotel room again. Not even for a dance recital at Preah Khan, the 12th-century complex that is one of the jewels of Angkor, in Cambodia.

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

The arts patron Anne Bass, right, with Sokvannara Sar, the dancer she discovered in Cambodia 10 years ago

For Ms. Bass, a mainstay of the society pages and a longtime arts patron, dance is a passion. She returned to ballet class when her daughters, now grown, began lessons; at 68, she still attends religiously. But this performance, in January 2000, seemed one obligation too many.

“I said, ‘I just can’t, I’m too tired,’ ” she recalled this month, while sipping tea in the Greenwich Village studio of her companion of 15 years, the painter Julian Lethbridge. Ms. Bass was in Cambodia with the World Monuments Fund, which had arranged the recital she was about to skip. But at the last minute something — she still can’t figure out what — sent her out the door.

That snap decision started her and a young man named Sokvannara Sar on a cross-cultural adventure that, improbably, turned a poor Cambodian teenager into a ballet dancer and, just as improbably, Ms. Bass into a documentary filmmaker.

In her “Dancing Across Borders,” which opens Friday at the Quad Cinema in Manhattan and then barnstorms through more than a dozen other cities, Mr. Sar travels from the rice paddies of his small village to Ms. Bass’s sprawling estate in Connecticut; from a dance studio in New York to the outdoor stage of the famed ballet competition in Varna, Bulgaria; and, ultimately, to Seattle, where he joins the Pacific Northwest Ballet. Along the way the film’s talking heads — ballet-world stars like Jock Soto and Peter Boal, Cambodian culture experts and Ms. Bass herself — elucidate Mr. Sar’s journey. “Dancing Across Borders” also shows the irrepressible ballet mistress Olga Kostritzky at work as she points Mr. Sar’s feet, turns out his hips and teaches his 16-year-old body to speak ballet’s arcane language.

Mr. Sar, known as Sy (rhymes with ‘we’), is now 25, and looking for another berth after leaving Seattle. But when he first caught Ms. Bass’s eye, he was performing with other students of the Wat Bo School of Traditional Dance at Preah Khan. In 2000 dance, like all the arts in Cambodia, was rebuilding after the chaos and destruction of the Khmer Rouge years. Back in the United States, Ms. Bass recalled: “I started thinking about Sy’s performance and the fact that he didn’t have a future there. And I couldn’t bear to think of that talent going to waste.”

Sokvannara Sar taking part in the ballet competition in Varna, Bulgaria

So without giving it too much thought — “It was quite naïve” — Ms. Bass, one of the richest women in the United States thanks to her 1988 divorce from the Texas billionaire Sid Bass, offered to bring Mr. Sar to the United States to study ballet. Then on the board of the prestigious School of American Ballet, she had a plan: “I thought that I would announce to the school that I had found this really talented dancer, that he would move into the dorm, and occasionally I’d take him out for dinner or something.”

It wasn’t quite that simple. The elegant curlicues and stylized movements of Cambodian dance are difficult to learn but, Mr. Sar found, not particularly germane to ballet.

“Cambodian dance is very slow and low to the ground,” Mr. Sar said in a telephone interview. “There are no turns and very little jumping. It is not as demanding as Western ballet.”

He’d had no idea “this ballet thing,” as he calls it in the movie, would take so long to learn or be so hard on his body. “I was already a performer in Cambodia,” Mr. Sar said. “Here I was almost less than a 10-year-old boy.”

He was not immediately accepted at the school, so Ms. Bass hired Ms. Kostritzky to coach him. And she bought a video camera to record his progress.

“It was just to give his mother on the other side of the world an idea of what he was doing,” she said. “I never thought I was making a movie. If I had,” she added with a laugh, “I assure you, it would have been a lot better.”

Those home videos revealed Mr. Sar’s increasing prowess. In 2006 he made it to the Varna semifinals, and afterward Ms. Bass invited some friends — “two New York City Ballet dancers, some writers, artists and art critics and a few friends who had a connection with Sy” — to dinner in Connecticut to show them some clips she’d received of the Varna competition.

She enlisted a film student to label the various ballets and edit them into a DVD.

“Once I saw how easy it was, I said: ‘Listen, I’ve also got television footage from his performance in Phnom Penh.’ Then there was the classroom footage, and I had photographs. And he just put together this little film that I showed my friends.”

Her friends were impressed, and they urged her to turn the story into a feature-length documentary. When she did a reality check with dance-world friends, they concurred. Ms. Bass signed the Emmy-winning documentary maker Catherine Tatge to direct.

“As we were working,” Ms. Tatge said by phone, “it became clear than Anne had really been living and breathing this story, had spent a long time nurturing Sy.” Ms. Tatge stepped into a more advisory role as co-producer, and Ms. Bass took over as director.

Three years and $700,000 later, Ms. Bass said, “I surprised myself with how much I was engaged by the process.”

She was especially taken with the job of editing: “There were so many different ways the story could have gone. There were stories within stories.”

Some of the stories she left out are about her. There’s no mention of the dispute that led her to resign from the School of American Ballet board in 2005, or evidence of the bond she now shares with Mr. Sar. (“She’s like my American mother,” he said.)

“I would happily have not been in the movie at all,” she said. “It’s very hard to look at yourself. I just ended up trusting my editors. Where they really felt they needed me, that’s where I ended up.”

The film also ignores Ms. Bass’s charity work in Cambodia. “Anything you do there makes a difference,” she said. “Anything.”

And now when she visits a fledgling dance school she’s become interested in, she takes her video camera. “If I make a film of them someday,” she explained, “I want to have something from the very beginning.”

By Ancient Ruins, a Gay Haven in Cambodia

Arantxa Cedillo for The New York Times

In Siem Reap, Bon Theorne serves a drink at old-Shanghai-themed Miss Wong.

via CAAI News Media

By NAOMI LINDT

Published: March 21, 2010

IT was 10 p.m. in Siem Reap, and while most tourists were tucked in after a long, hot day exploring the temples of Angkor, things were just getting going at a bar called Linga. Pairs of European men in their 30s and 40s wearing unbuttoned collared shirts and checkered krama scarves sipped fruity cocktails and jostled for space with the young Khmer crowd, who huddled around small tables in anticipation of the main event: the Saturday night drag show.

A statuesque Khmer performer who went by the name Beyoncé took to the stage draped in a black, body-skimming floor-length gown and wearing a blond Afro wig. Soon, everyone was on his feet, belting out a song from “Dreamgirls.” The traffic outside literally stopped. Curious travelers, Khmer families and little girls peddling red roses craned their necks to get a better view as the song’s syrupy melody wafted into the jasmine-scented evening air.

Homosexual acts are not outlawed in Cambodia, as they are in a few Southeast Asian countries, but outward displays of affection and untraditional lifestyles are rare. Yet in Siem Reap, a small town that gets about a million tourists a year, gay visitors and locals are carving out a little haven. In the last few years, a small flurry of gay-friendly bars, restaurants and hotels has opened up in the city’s center and beyond, with wink-wink names like the Golden Banana and Cockatoo.

The scene is bolstered partly by Web sites like Cambodia Out (cambodiaout.com), which started in early 2009 and is believed to be the first commercial site in the country devoted to the gay community. Other sites like Utopia (utopia-asia.com) and Sticky Rice (stickyrice.ws), which appeal to gay people throughout Southeast Asia, have also raised the city’s profile.

But the new spots also reflect a growing acceptance, in a country that still hews to age-old Khmer values and where the concept of homosexuality seemed nonexistent until recently. In fact, there is no word for “gay” in Khmer. The most commonly used term is kteuy or ladyboys, based on the misperception by many Cambodians that homosexuals and transvestites are one and the same.

The stereotypes are slowly fading. In 2004, after watching thousands of same-sex couples in San Francisco rush to the altar, Cambodia’s much-loved King Norodom Sihanouk wrote on his Web site that gays should be allowed to marry because God loved a “wide range of tastes.”

His successor and son, King Norodom Sihamoni, holds similar views. “The Cambodian Royal Family, as a whole, share the same point of view as the King-Father,” Sisowath Thomico, a spokesman for the royal family, wrote in an e-mail message. “We’ve always been very tolerant about sexual preferences as some Khmer Royals are/were openly gays/lesbians.”

And last year, a lesbian-themed film by the Khmer novelist and director Phoan Phuong Bopha, “Who Am I?” was a sleeper hit. “Love between people of the same sex is a very new topic in Cambodia,” the director was quoted as saying in The Phnom Penh Post, in an article headlined “Who Am I? Brings Same Sex Issues Out Into the Open.”

The new open-mindedness is attributed to Theravada Buddhism, the predominant religion in Cambodia. “When you’re looking at Buddhist countries, you’re going to encounter an openness and tolerance,” said Caroline Francis, a spokeswoman for the Cambodia field office of Family Health International, a public health organization involved with gay-related health issues. “The religious teachings aren’t being used to arrest or persecute people because they’re gay or lesbian.”

One of the first gay bars to open was Linga, an airy cocktail lounge with artwork on the walls and large windows that face the Passage, a bustling and prominent street. Linga draws a mostly male crowd that’s both Khmer and Western and seems to signal a newfound openness for gay Cambodians. And like many nightclubs throughout Cambodia, prostitution and sex tourism are not hidden from view.

“I grew up in a small town, so I know what it’s like to think, ‘I’m the only one,’ ” said Martin Dishman, 48, a former hotel manager from Greenfield, Ind., who opened Linga in 2004. Perhaps not surprisingly, many of Siem Reap’s most visibly gay bars and hotels are owned by Westerners.

A more refined newcomer is Miss Wong, an old-Shanghai-themed boîte with cherry-red walls and gold silk lanterns. While its owner is gay, it caters to a broader clientele. On a typical night, a mix of men and women, expatriates and tourists, artists and entrepreneurs, and straight and gay people all mingled over lemon-grass-infused vodka concoctions and mocha martinis topped with dollops of chocolate.

But Siem Reap isn’t really a party town. Town life revolves around Angkor Wat, and by sunrise the streets hum with tuk-tuks whisking tourists to the temples. “This will never be the place to swallow four tablets of ecstasy and stay up until 4 a.m., dancing under a full moon in sequin hot pants,” said Dean Williams, an expatriate from New Zealand who owns Miss Wong.

That might explain why there are more gay-owned hotels than bars. The newest and arguably most flamboyant is a male-only resort called Men’s, which features 10 sleek rooms decorated with male nude paintings, a large outdoor swimming pool and a sprawling, black-and-gold tiled sauna and a Jacuzzi.

Upscale travelers prefer Viroth’s Hotel, a graceful seven-room haven in a renovated 1960s modernist house. While Viroth’s does not promote itself as a gay hotel per se, the owners Fabien Martial and Kol Viroth do nothing to hide their 10-year relationship.

And the word seems to be out. On a recent Friday night, the hotel’s nearby restaurant, also called Viroth’s, was filled with a sprinkling of male couples sharing bottles of French wine and dishes like chicken curry and minced pork grilled in kaplou leaves.

But for gay Khmers seeking a home, the place to be is the Golden Banana. It started as a humble B & B that opened in 2004 and has since expanded to three properties, including a stylish boutique resort with 16 rooms that feature platform beds constructed of flecked sugar palm wood and soaking tubs on the terrace.

Guests might include backpackers in T-shirts or silver-haired male couples in matching polo shirts, who mingle freely at the palm- and bamboo-fringed swimming pools, sipping lime and mint iced tea. But under the direction of Dirk de Graaff, an expatriate from the Netherlands, the resort has taken on a second role: as a sanctuary for young Cambodian men exploring their sexual identity.

IN a poor country where traditional family remains strong, young Cambodians are encouraged to marry and have children early. Many same-sex couples in Siem Reap still keep their relationship a secret; some have wives for appearance’s sake. Khmer men who visit gay saunas often conceal their faces behind motorcycle helmets until they’re safely inside. And lesbians remain largely invisible.

Still, things are looking up for the city’s younger gay generation. On a recent evening, young staff members from the Golden Banana — which include both straight and gay men in their early 20s — were laughing it up at the newly opened Heart Rock Bar, an unpretentious dance club across the street from Miss Wong that’s become a popular spot for gay men.

Beyond the glow-in-the-dark hearts on the walls and the stainless-steel cocktail tables, the dark and spacious club offered little décor or ambience, but the crowd of mostly younger Cambodian men didn’t seem to mind. They drank cans of Angkor beer, grooving to Top 40 hits by the Black Eyed Peas and Lady Gaga, smiling broadly late into the night and dancing freely with whomever they liked.

EU delegation leaves Cambodia, says visit "largely positive"

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/

via CAAI News Media

Mar 19, 2010

Phnom Penh - A delegation of European Union legislators left Cambodia Friday saying they had obtained 'largely positive' impressions from their two-day visit, but warned progress was needed in a number of areas.

The EU is Cambodia's largest foreign donor and one its key export markets.

During their two-day stay, the delegation met with members of the government, opposition parties, international donors and civil society representatives to learn more about Cambodia's political situation, human rights and economic position.

Werner Langen, the chair of the European Parliament's delegation for relations with the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), said Cambodia had made significant progress in the three decades since the Khmer Rouge 'terror state' was overthrown.

But he said Cambodia still had much to do in areas such as human rights and freedom of expression.

'We have made it clear that the EU has international standards that it wishes to see applied,' Langen said. 'We made it clear that human rights and the state of law are part and parcel of democracy.'

Ivo Belet, the delegation's deputy, said the team was also interested in closer cooperation in the field of energy.

'This is a country with enormous potential for renewable energy - solar energy and hydropower energy,' he said. 'The EU has a lot of knowledge on that issue.'

In a reference to the government's ongoing efforts to use the law to pursue its critics, including members of the opposition Sam Rainsy Party, Belet said the delegation was convinced Cambodian democracy 'is strong enough to afford an opposition.'

He added that European Parliament legislators have a responsibility to monitor how the EU's money is spent, not least since it is Cambodia's largest donor.

'But as elected representatives we are accountable to our own taxpayers,' Belet said. 'We will out of a budgetary obligation keep on monitoring the fight against corruption, which is of course linked to the democratic process.'

Langen said the country's new anti-corruption law - which was passed by parliament last week and has been criticized as vulnerable to abuse by the political elite - ought to reflect international standards.

'Even good laws are worth nothing if they are not maintained - and for that you need a reliable and independent judiciary,' he said, adding that the law should be applied equally to all.

Cambodia is currently ranked by corruption watchdog Transparency International as the 158th most corrupt country in the world out of 180 nations surveyed.

Bilateral trade between Cambodia and the EU bloc was worth around 900 million dollars last year; the bulk comprised Cambodian garment exports.

Cambodia suspends marriages to South Koreans

Cambodia suspends marriages to South Koreans

Via CAAI News Media

By Agence France-Presse

Updated: 3/19/2010

Cambodia has suspended marriages between South Koreans and its citizens to curb human trafficking, the foreign ministry said Friday.

"We sent a note to the South Korean embassy on March 5 informing them about the temporary suspension in marriage applications between Cambodians and South Koreans," ministry spokesman Koy Kuong told AFP.

The spokesman said the measure was taken after a Cambodian matchmaker was sentenced this month to 10 years in prison for bringing 25 women from the countryside in an attempt to broker marriages with South Korean men.

Authorities are reviewing procedures to combat human trafficking, Koy Kuong added.

South Korean news agency Yonhap reported Friday that the number of Cambodian women marrying Korean men had more than doubled, from 551 in 2008 to 1,372 last year.

In March 2008 Cambodia imposed a ban on foreign marriages to prevent human trafficking, amid concerns over an explosion in the number of brokered unions involving South Korean men and poor Cambodian women.

The ban followed an International Organisation for Migration report that said many Cambodian brides suffered abuse after moving to South Korea in marriages hastily arranged by brokers who made large profits.

The restriction was lifted about eight months later after new laws were introduced to prevent women becoming mail-order brides.

Huawei in $200m Cambodia network deal

via CAAI News Media

19 March 2010

MobiTel in Cambodia has signed a network expansion deal worth $200m with Huawei

Huawei Technologies has entered into an agreement with Cambodia’s biggest mobile phone operator, MobiTel, worth $200 million. The world’s second largest maker of telecom equipment will provide services and equipment to MobiTel to improve its network coverage in Cambodia.

MobiTel has 2.5 million subscribers accounting for 67% of the market. It is a unit of Royal Group, which owns companies dealing in financial services, hotels, real estate, television and restaurant franchises.

According to a senior executive at MobiTel, talks have been held for years. The deal was signed during a three-day visit to Cambodia by China’s deputy prime minister, Hui Liangyu.

Liangyu also struck two deals with Cambodia’s agriculture and telecom ministries to strengthen cooperation between the countries. GTB

Czech Republic's President Vaclav Klaus welcome Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni at Prague Castle in Prague

Czech Republic's President Vaclav Klaus (R) and his wife Livia (C) welcome Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni at Prague Castle in Prague March 18, 2010. REUTERS/David W Cerny

Czech Republic's President Vaclav Klaus (R) and his wife Livia welcome Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni (L) at Prague Castle in Prague March 18, 2010. REUTERS/David W Cerny

Czech Republic's President Vaclav Klaus (L) welcomes Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni at Prague Castle in Prague March 18, 2010. REUTERS/David W Cerny

Czech Republic's President Vaclav Klaus (L) welcomes Cambodia's King Norodom Sihamoni at Prague Castle in Prague March 18, 2010. REUTERS/David W Cerny

Anti-govt protests delay Thai signing of exchange accord

via CAAI News Media

BANGKOK, March 19 (Reuters) - A week-long rally by red-shirted anti-government protesters has delayed Thailand's signing of an accord for East Asian countries to cooperate in fending off future attacks on their currencies.

Currencies

A parliament session scheduled for last Tuesday was postponed for lack of a quorum after politicians in Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva's coalition failed to show over concerns protesters might lay siege to the legislature. The supporters of ousted former premier Thaksin Shinawatra rallied for a seventh day on Friday [IDnSGE62I02Y]. They have vowed to march around Bangkok on Saturday and say they would only target parliament if Abhisit sought to go there.

Among the 13 nations who would be part of the accord, Thailand is the only country yet to sign the agreement to pool $120 billion of foreign reserves set aside for helping countries cope with short-term dollar liquidity or balance of payments problems.

Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij is barred by the Thai constitution from signing the accord until parliament approves it.

"We are trying our best to get parliament to approve it during the current parliament season before it goes into recess on May 20," Thanitpol Chaiyanant, a lawmaker in Korn's Democrat Party, told Reuters.

The accord, called the Chiang Mai Initiative Multilateralisation Agreement in recognition of the Thai city where the regional cooperation was originally proposed over a decade ago, will come into effect on March 24 even without Thailand's signature.

Countries already acceding to it are China, Japan, South Korea, and the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), which comprises Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar.

To ratify the accord, the signatures of China, Japan, South Korea, plus five ASEAN members, are required to bring it into effect.

The initiative is launched at a time when most of its cash-rich signatories face no immediate need for financial assistance, having piled up foreign reserves earned from big trade surpluses and capital inflows in recent years.

China alone had $2.4 trillion of foreign reserves, the world's largest, at the end of 2009. Japan's reserves stand at $1 trillion and South Korea's $271 billion. (Reporting by Vithoon Amorn; Editing by Martin Petty and Jerry Norton)

Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia strengthen triangle development

via CAAI News Media

03/19/2010

The fifth Conference of the Joint Coordination Committee for the Development Triangle of Cambodia-Laos-Vietnam (CLV) took place in Banlung City, Ratnakiri province (Cambodia), from March 16-18, opening new prospects for trade promotion among these countries.

Officials from the three countries and representatives of provinces in the triangle reviewed the results of the second meeting of the sub-committees for coordination between CLV provinces and agreed on modifications of the Memorandum of Understanding signed on November 26, 2008, which incorporated other provinces into CLV: Vietnam’s Binh Phuoc, Cambodia’s Kratie, and Laos’ Champasak.

The CLV conference also approved the proposal on establishing a list of CLV-originated goods that enjoy preferential taxes, and a joint technical sub-committee to devise policies and introduce incentives for more investment into CLV.

Participants in the event agreed that Vietnam will host meetings on the development of CLV tourism.

Previously, a CLV market was held in Banlung City on March 14-15, attracting businesses from CLV provinces.

Klaus hosts dinner for Cambodian king

via CAAI News Media

19 March 2010

Prague, March 18 (CTK) - Czech President Vaclav Klaus and his wife Livia hosted a gala dinner for King of Cambodia Norodom Sihamoni, followed by a concert by the child choir Zvonecek (Small Bell), yesterday.

Simahoni, who speaks Czech, has been on a private week-long visit to the Czech Republic since Sunday.

Klaus and Sihamoni had a 20-minute eye-on-eye meeting before the dinner.

The concert held at the Spanish Hall of Prague Castle in honour of Sihamoni was also attended by Czech Prime Minister Jan Fischer and his wife, Education Minister Miroslava Kopicova and other guests.

Klaus and Sihamoni also met four years ago. They called for the development of Czech-Cambodian relations at all levels.

On Friday, Sihamoni will be granted an honorary doctor's degree at the Academy of Performing Arts (AMU) from which he had graduated.

Sihamoni, 56, says he considers the Czech Republic his second homeland. He attended primary and secondary schools in Prague and then graduated from AMU at which he studied ballet.

Sihamoni arrived in Prague at the age of nine. The Czechoslovak embassy in Paris was the sole institution that reacted to his parents' effort to secure dancing education for him.

During his previous private visit to the Czech Republic in 2006, Sihamoni was granted Prague's honorary citizenship, becoming the first king to hold the title.

VN-Cambodia highway opens

via CAAI News Media

March, 19 2010

CAMBODIA — The 70-km long Highway 78 stretching from Banlung Town in Cambodia's Ratanakiri Province to the Le Thanh border gate in Viet Nam's Central Highland Gia Lai Province opened to traffic yesterday.

Deputy Prime Minister Truong Vinh Trong and Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen cut the ribbon to inaugurate the highway which cost US$25.8 million to upgrade and was paid for by the Vietnamese Government's preferential credits.

Speaking at the inauguration, Trong put emphasis on the highway's significance, saying it was an important strategic infrastructure work designated to serve socio-economic development and contribute to ensure security, and national defence between Viet Nam and Cambodia.

The highway would also benefit the Laos-Viet Nam-Cambodia development triangle as it had created an additional East-West corridor connecting Cambodia's Ratanakiri Province with the Central Highlands and central provinces in Viet Nam, Trong said.

He also hailed the highway as a symbol of Vietnamese-Cambodian relations. — VNS

Vietnam firms need long-term plan in Cambodia

via CAAI News Media

03/19/2010

Vietnamese enterprises need to map out long-term strategies for deeper penetration into Cambodia, according to a HCM City trade seminar organized by the Ministry of Industry and Trade’s Vietnam Trade Promotion Agency on March 18.

Tran Van Thi, lecturer at the Marketing and Finance University, told the seminar that the Vietnamese enterprises should set up more factories in Cambodia.

This also suggested setting up franchises and more promotions at border gate economic zones as ways for Vietnam to improve its position as the third biggest exporter to the potentially lucrative market, after Thailand and China.

Currently, there are 97 markets located along the border gates and 37 others within border gate economic zones.

More border gate economic zones will be set up in Dak Nong, Gia Lai, and Kontum provinces for further business cooperation.

Bui Thi Thanh An, head of Viettrade said, it was vital to create more exports as Cambodia was the key gate to transport Vietnamese goods to other ASEAN countries.

Experts told the seminar that Vietnamese businesses need to capitalize on their strengths compared to Cambodia, for example, Vietnamese manufacturers are able to produce better quality goods for less money, and open more distribution channels.

Cambodian farmers rise up over "land-grabbing"

via CAAI News Media

Fri Mar 19, 2010

By Prak Chan Thul

PHNOM PENH (Reuters) - Nearly 1,000 angry Cambodian villagers rallied on Friday to oppose what they said was land-grabbing by a local business tycoon, the latest in a series of flare-ups over land disputes in the impoverished country.

The protest in Kompong Speu, 48 km (30 miles) from Phnom Penh, came a day after irate farmers burned down makeshift wooden shelters on a sugar plantation, accusing the company of colluding with the authorities to rob farmers of their land.

Villagers who spoke to Reuters by telephone said some protesters had planned to torch offices belonging to the Phnom Penh Sugar Company, owned by Senator Ly Yong Phat, which was awarded a 9,500-hectare land concession there. The plan was later called off, they said.

Farmer Sun Theng said he had been working the land for 20 years and he and other villagers had been offered meagre compensation of between $100 and $200 for each hectare. They now faced arrest over the torching of the shelter, he said.

"Villagers didn't agree with it but the company said 'if you don't take it, you people will get nothing'. They became angry," Sun Theng said, adding that the protest would continue until there was an amicable solution.

Another farmer, Sao Choeun, added: "The company looks down on us -- how can we survive with $200 per hectare?"

BIG CONCESSIONS

In a move to attract foreign investment to improve its nascent economy, Cambodia has awarded big concessions to companies, mainly from China, Vietnam and South Korea, to run mines, power plants and farms.

Cambodia is also relying on foreign help in modernising and expanding its agriculture, mining and energy sectors to create jobs and boost exports, especially of commodities like rice, rubber and sugar.

However, that has led to a rise in what rights groups and international donors say is a trend of forced evictions by state officials profiting on the sale and lease of farmland and urban real estate for use by foreign and local companies.

Indigenous Cambodians on Wednesday urged the government to suspend hundreds of concessions awarded to foreign and local companies they say are operating on disputed land.

The issue illustrates a risk for investors in Cambodia, where corruption is rife and land deals are sometimes agreed with influential politicians and officials without going through proper legal channels.

Chheng Sophors, an investigator for local human rights group Licadho, said land disputes were becoming increasingly common and a long-term solution was needed.

"Before giving a concession, the government should study carefully the impact on the local communities," he said.

Kang Heang, the provincial governor, said the villagers had cost the company at least $20,000. He blamed rights groups, rival businessmen and politicians for stoking the unrest.

He said the land belonged to the state and the deal was transparent, adding that arrests would be made.

"This kind of thing is normal. When there's new investment, there are problems," Kang Heang told Reuters.

(Editing by Martin Petty)

Father opts for heart surgery for Cambodian toddler

Socheat Nha and her father, Phin Ken. (Photo provided)

via CAAI News Media

By Greg Mellen, Staff Writer

Posted: 03/18/2010

LONG BEACH - The father looked at his 2-year-old daughter, who has a hole in her heart, and had to make the hardest decision of his life. But really, he felt he had no choice.

To move forward means throwing the child in harm's way by allowing her to undergo heart surgery with a very real chance of death.

To do nothing, leaves her to a slow irrevocable demise, measured in years, perhaps decades. She could live into her 40s or 50s or be dead before her 20s. In any case it's a life of progressive decline. Maybe just as bad, this choice means the death of hope.

This is what Phin Ken, an impoverished farmer from Cambodia, has had to wrestle with in the sleepless nights he has spent here in the United States. A journey that began with magical hope turned to despair and now has left him with a choice that has gnawed at his soul.

Peter Chhun, who brought the father and child to the U.S. recalls when Phin made his decision.

"He looked at me with teary eyes and said, 'Well, if I return her to the Cambodia without surgery, she will die. If I decide to go through the surgery, maybe I have a glimpse of hope."'

Ken chose to take the biggest gamble of his life and go ahead with surgery on his only child in the hope she can have a normal life.

The surgery is perilous with a 10 percent to 15 percent chance of mortality and no guarantees afterward.

To make this happen, however, Ken, his struggling family in Long Beach and a fledgling nonprofit in Long Beach need to find a way to pay for the procedure.

Already of couple of fund-raisers have been planned.

Ken and his daughter, Socheat Nha, were brought to the U.S. by Hearts Without Boundaries, which helps children with heart ailments receive life-altering surgeries unavailable in Cambodia.

Socheat suffers from several heart ailments, including a hole in her heart called a ventricular septal defect. In advanced countries such as the U.S., it is a condition that is repaired in infancy.

The ailment causes high pressure in the lungs from oxygenated blood flowing back into the lungs rather than to the rest of the body. Untreated, the ailment shortens life expectancy and is marked by increasing fatigue, breathing difficulty and cyanosis, or turning blue.

Initially there was hope Socheat would undergo serious but generally safe open-heart surgery to repair the hole. Hearts Without Boundaries brought two other children for whom hospitals have donated their facilities and staff, while the nonprofit arranged and paid for travel and living expenses.

That was supposed to happen with Socheat.

However, when she was examined by doctors in Las Vegas, they canceled surgery, deeming it too risky.

However, after a follow-up exam by San Diego cardiologist Paul Grossfeld, who initially examined the girl in Cambodia, another possibility emerged.

With Socheat's condition improved, Grossfeld conferred with Dr. William Novick, a renowned surgeon. Novick runs the International Children's Heart Foundation, which specializes in treating children with congenital heart defects in developing countries.

He also performs certain surgeries that won't be performed in the U.S. for a variety of reasons.

What Novick proposes is a more complex procedure he has performed and written about for the Society of Thoracic Surgeons. It is called a "flap valve double patch closure," which he helped design.

The procedure for children who already have already suffered damage from the lack of surgery early in life, uses a patch to repair the defect in the heart and has a second smaller patch over a hole in the first patch that can release when there is hypertension.

Grossfeld described it as being a kind of "pop off valve."

It is not the best scenario, but for children in developing nations with limited options for care, it's a last best resort.

As Novick wrote when describing the procedure, "In most sophisticated countries of the world, these pulmonary hypertensive events can be managed with either sophisticated pharmacologic agents ... or circulatory assist devices."

If Socheat lived in the U.S., Grossfeld said, she would likely be treated with medications to stabilize her blood pressure and oxygen levels until, hopefully, it would be safe to operate.

The emotion is evident in Grossfeld's voice when he talks about Socheat, in part because he knows that with adequate medical care early in life, her father would never have had to make such a heart-wrenching decision and she would not have to be exposed to such dangers.

Grossfeld's hope is one day he can help bring a cardiac lab to Cambodia so that hundreds of children with conditions like Socheat won't have to lived diminished and shortened lives.

Grossfeld said in the United States, 10 percent to 15 percent mortality rates are unacceptable, but for children like Socheat there are no other options.

"If you're Cambodian, you have to reset your expectations," he said.

According to the International Children's Foundation, about 1 percent of children in the world are born with heart defects. Only a third of them are diagnosed and fewer still are ever treated.

Novick, who has offered to do the surgery on Socheat, was unavailable for comment and traveling between India and Egypt to perform operations.

He has proposed treating Socheat in the Dominican Republic. Although Novick is donating his services, it will cost Ken, his family and Hearts Without Boundaries more than $10,000 for the hospital, travel to the Dominican Republic and lodging there.

Meanwhile, the father can only wait and worry about the future for his child.

"He looks confused but determined," Chhun said. "He says 'I have nothing else. I'm here, I'm here and I must go through this."'

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

Vietnam’s market share in Cambodia up

At a fair showcasing Vietnam-made goods in Cambodia.

via CAAI News Media

March 19, 2010

The market share for Vietnamese goods in Cambodia rose steadily in early 2010, making it a topic of discussion at a seminar on integrating into the Cambodian market, held in Ho Chi Minh City yesterday.

The market share has climbed by 40% over the past three years with aquatic products, construction steel and processed agricultural products taking lead from 67% to 80%, according to Tran Thi Van, a representative of the Trade Promotion Department under the Ministry of Industry and Trade.

By the end of 2009, Vietnam had deployed 63 projects at a total cost of US$900 million in the neighbouring country.

Cambodia is among the top three investment destinations out of 50 countries and territories Vietnam has targeted. Two-way trade between the two countries this year is expected to stand at US$2 billion. (VNA)

Cambodia set to renovate genocide museum

via CAAI News Media

By SOPHENG CHEANG,Associated Press Writer

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia – Cambodia's Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum, established in what once was a torture center operated by the radical Khmer Rouge regime, will be renovated, officials said Friday.

Officials said the museum's physical infrastructure will be upgraded, as will its archive of materials that document the atrocities of the ultracommunist regime.

The museum, formerly a high school in Cambodia's capital, Phnom Penh, was turned into S-21 prison after the Khmer Rouge took power in 1975. Of the estimated 16,000 men, women and children who passed through its gates, only a handful survived. An estimated 1.7 million people died as a result of the Khmer Rouge's radical policies from 1975 to 1979.

Culture Minister Him Chhem said that the museum has never had a major renovation. He said the unique photos and documents it holds could be damaged if not better cared for.

The museum's director, Chey Sopheara, said UNESCO will help build two more entrances to help ease traffic, as well as new space for parking, a garden and public toilets. UNESCO is also working with the museum to preserve copies of the original documents by storing them digitally on a computer network server.

The existence of S-21 prison was a well-kept secret until discovered in early 1979 by Vietnamese troops who invaded Cambodia to oust the Khmer Rouge from power. They discovered the corpses of recently killed prisoners, as well as an astonishing quantity of photos and documents that the prison's overseers failed to destroy in their haste to flee capture.

The museum's archive includes 4,186 confessions _ often falsely given by prisoners under torture _ 6,226 biographies of prisoners, 6,147 photographic prints and negatives of prisoners and other items.

The prison was commanded by Kaing Guek Eav, also known as Duch, who is currently under detention at Cambodia's U.N.-assisted genocide tribunal.

His was tried last year for war crimes and crimes against humanity and the verdict is expected later this year.