Cambodia's Home Boys: Another SBS Dateline report by David O'Shea

By David O'Shea
SBS Dateline (Australia)

David O'Shea reports on the fate of nearly 200 Cambodian refugees whose parents fled the killing fields of the Khmer Rouge.

They were granted safe haven in the United States, and have spent most of their life there. But under a policy introduced by former US President George W Bush, refugees who have broken the law are being plucked out of their American lives and deported to Cambodia.

As O'Shea reports in his story - despite the unfamiliar surroundings, and often not even being able to speak the language, they're trying to make the most of life in their new country.

Find out more this Sunday, 8:30pm on Dateline.

On air: 22nd March 2009

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World Heritage Sites to be proposed in Cambodia

Sambor Prey Kuk Temple

Tuesday, March 17, 2009
The Associated Press

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia: Cambodia will ask the United Nations to register four temples - one dating back some 1,400 years - as World Heritage Sites, a government official said Tuesday.Listings by UNESCO, the world body's cultural agency, normally get international assistance to preserve the sites, and inevitably attract a larger number of tourists.

Kum Polin, a senior official at the Ministry of Culture, said the highest priority will be given to the 7th century Sambor Prei Kuk temple, located at what was once the country's capital some 80 miles (128 kilometers) north of the current capital Phnom Penh.

A master plan for development and conservation of the temple is now being drawn up and the submission to UNESCO is expected within three years, he said.

The country will also nominate the Banteay Chhmar temple, built in the 12th and 13th centuries in northwestern Cambodia; the 13th century Nokor Bachey temple east of Phnom Penh; and Oudong, the country's capital in the 17th and 18th centuries, 27 miles (45 kilometers) north of Phnom Penh.

The ancient temples of Angkor, the country's top tourist attraction, were declared a World Heritage Site in 1992, while the 11th century Preah Vihear temple was added to the list last year.

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Watch out!

Click here to watch the slide show

Multimedia slideshow about “visual pollution” in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia, now invaded by advertising signs of all sorts, springing up everywhere like mushrooms and quite unsightly, to say the least.

Images by Vandy Rattana and John Vink/Magnum. Sound by John Vink

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90 years old lady cares for a 60 years old disabled daughter

The 90 year-old Mrs. Ma Krem and her 60 year-old daughter, Soum Phan.

Koh Santepheap newspaper
13th March, 2009
Reported in English by Khmerization

A 90 years old lady from Kampot is struggling to care for her 60 years old disabled daughter due to old age and poverty.

90 year-old Ma Krem, who is from Chress village, Kampong Trach district in Kampot province, said that she and her crippled daughter survived only on the generosity of their neighbours.

The 90 year-old lady said that her husband died in 1983 and all her children, except one, died during the Pol Pot time. She added that her surviving daughter, who is very poor, is struggling to raise her children, let alone helping to feed her and her crippled daughter.

She said that her daughter, Soum Phan, who is also blind and deaf, was crippled since birth. After giving birth to Soum Phan, neighbours told her to abandon the baby but she refused by vowing that she will care for Soum Phan until the end of her life.

She said that in 1979, when the Khmer Rouge forced them to walk through minefields up the Dangrek Mountains, she carried Soum Phan in a basket at one end of the pole while she carried her belongings at another end of the pole. But she refused to abandon her, whereas many parents at that time have abandoned their babies because they can’t take the babies with them.

Neighbours said that the 90 year-old lady and her 60 year-old crippled daughter are living in real hardship. She is surviving on the generosity of neighbours who took pity on her and her daughter.

Through Koh Santepheap, she is appealing to generous people, local and overseas, foreigners as well as Cambodians, to help her and her daughter through to the new year.

Koh Santepheap can be contacted at: kohsantepheap@citylink.com.kh, or at: kohdaily@gmail.com .

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Border talks: Alleged incursions to be raised

Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Written by Thet Sambath
The Phnom Penh Post

CAMBODIAN military commanders said they will press their Thai counterparts during a meeting near Preah Vihear temple today to ensure their troops abstain from making new incursions into Cambodian territory. The meeting, they say, follows a renewed effort from Thai soldiers to put their stamp on Cambodian land by erecting fences and taking patrols into land that does not belong to them. Sao Socheat, deputy commander of Military Region 4, said Cambodian military officials would refer to a 2000 memorandum of understanding requiring soldiers on both sides to abstain from advancing into each other's territory. "If they accept it, then they should not be able to move their troops into Cambodian territory," he said. "Thai soldiers have been moving into disputed territory. They must stop if our border committees are going to work together to demarcate the border," he said. Srey Doek, 3rd Division Commander and the highest-ranking RCAF official on the ground there, said the "problem will be raised during the meeting in order to prevent confrontations in the future".

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CPP backs NEC ban on foreign participation in council elections [... but it is OK for Vietnamese to vote in Cambodian elections?]

On the campaign trail in Phnom Penh during last year's general election. (Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN)

Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Written by Vong Sokheng
The Phnom Penh Post

Election watchdog Comfrel says military, police influence a higher priority.

THE ruling Cambodian People's Party said Monday it supports the ban on foreign citizens participating in the May 17 district, municipal and provincial elections.
In the election, votes will be cast by the 11,353 elected commune council members, but not by the public. The new bodies are part of the government's decentralisation program to improve representation among the National Assembly and the commune councils.

Senior CPP lawmaker Cheam Yeap told the Post his party agreed with last week's ruling by the National Election Committee and said it would help to prevent any violence that might ensue by inflammatory comments by foreigners.

He claimed the CPP had discovered foreigners helping the opposition Sam Rainsy Party in last year's general election, campaigning in Kampong Cham and Prey Veng.

"We are patient with criticisms made by Cambodian politicians, but we don't want to see electoral campaigns conducted by foreigners in support of opposition political parties," said Cheam Yeap. "Their criticisms look down on Cambodia and our people."

But SRP Secretary General and lawmaker Ke Sovannroth denied the allegation. She said the only foreigners who took part in the general election were international observers monitoring proceedings.

The election-monitoring body Comfrel said the NEC had missed the point and ought to focus on more relevant issues. Comfrel Executive Director Koul Panha said the issue of foreign participation was not a priority.

"It happens very rarely and would have no influence - foreigners respect the code of conduct," he said.

Koul Panha said the NEC ought to prioritise focussing on the role of the police and Royal Cambodian Armed Forces in influencing election results. He said the NEC should issue clear regulations on how those bodies participated in elections.

NEC Secretary General Tep Nytha said the regulation was designed to remind all parties that foreigners were not allowed to take part in the campaign, and any party that flouted the rule could be fined.

Campaigning for the election will run from May 1 to 15 and is to see the CPP, the SRP, the Norodom Ranariddh Party and Funcinpec competing to win votes from the country's 11,353 commune councillors. The outcome will determine the composition of the parties at the higher-level district councils and the municipal and provincial councils.

Tep Nytha said CPP candidates were listed at 217 polling stations, the SRP had candidates at 205, Funcinpec candidates were at 71 and the NRP were at 62. A total of 17,293 candidates from the four parties are registered with the NEC.

The CPP's Cheam Yeap said his party was ready to compete with all four political parties in May's election and appealed to each party to actively build confidence among their voters.

"We aren't worried about the influence of those foreigners who back opposition parties, but we don't want foreigners coming here and insulting the Cambodian people," said Cheam Yeap.

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CPP's latest achievement: Cambodians evicted to make way for Hanoi road

House-breakers, employed by local authorities, saw at a resident's house in the Sen Sok district of Phnom Penh on Monday. Residents of the area's Hanoi Road had been warned to leave, but many had not, instead staying to watch in shock as their homes were torn down. (Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN)
A bulldozer tears down houses along Sen Sok district's Hanoi Road on Monday. (Photo by: HENG CHIVOAN)

Pleas fail to stop the Hanoi Road eviction

Tuesday, 17 March 2009
Written by May Titthara and Chhay Channyda
The Phnom Penh Post

Roadside properties demolished by authorities in advance of road-widening project, with affected families calling on the municipality to provide them with fair compensation.HOMES and fences belonging to residents of Teuk Thla and Phnom Penh Thmey communes in Sen Sok district were demolished by Phnom Penh authorities on Monday to make way for a road expansion project, with witnesses reporting that hundreds of armed police were deployed in the action.

Ten families comprising 40 people lost their homes along the Cambodia-Vietnam Frienship Highway - popularly known as Hanoi Road.

The demolition began after Sen Sok district Governor Khoung Sreng on March 6 told some residents living along the road that they had five days to remove their homes, fences and stalls. Residents did not move in time.

Oeum Reun, 53, whose house was demolished Monday morning, said she had lived there since 1979 and would go to Prime Minister Hun Sen's house to ask for his personal intervention.

"This is crueller than what Pol Pot's soldiers did to us - they mistreated me and then made me put my thumbprint on the form allowing them to demolish my house," she said.

"If they want to kill me I don't care because my house has been ... demolished."

"It's up to them - if they want to kill me, I don't care because my house has been completely demolished."

Oeum Reun said she was not interested in being relocated to the four-by-eight metre site at Thnot Chrum that the municipality was offering. "I would rather die than live at Thnot Chrum. I want to live in this area."

The expansion plan requires a width of 22 metres for the road, 8 metres of which will be for drainage infrastructure.

Sek Sovanna, a lawyer for the Community Legal Education Centre (CLEC), which has been representing the residents, filed an injunction with the Municipal Court last month seeking to halt the construction and has also filed complaints to City Hall. But she said CLEC has yet to receive any response.

"The authorities wrote to them in 2004. Since then the residents have tried asking the authorities to negotiate, but they kept quiet until the end of 2008," she said.

"If they had expanded the road to the width they said in 2004, it wouldn't affect the villagers - back then they said it would be widened by 8 metres along the 4-kilometre length. Now they have turned up and said it must be widened to 30 metres."

Sek Sovanna said the authorities were obliged to pay compensation since the residents were living there legally.

She added that in 2004 there were 90 families, but more than half had left since they did not dare stand up to the authorities.

District Governor Khuong Sreng told the Post Monday that the authorities could not delay the project simply because residents had failed to move and said most would get no compensation.

"They have to respect our notice. This is for development, and City Hall has a policy only to speak to those whose entire houses are affected," he said. And because the expansion project "affected only one or two complete houses", the authorities had offered those people a plot of land each in Thnot Chrum village.

He said that other affected families had lost fences and pavement area and therefore would not be entitled to compensation.

"They have big houses and villas," he said.

No compensation

Resident Prum Navy, 38, said her 14-metre house had lost 12 metres of its length to the project.

"My house has just 2 metres left - how can I live?" she asked. "I would like compensation from the authorities to buy a new house, but they say they have no plan to provide any compensation."

She said of the 10 families that had lost their property, just one had been compensated.

"The authorities came to demolish our houses with rage - they came to tell us on Friday and gave us just three days. And today they have come and destroyed them," she said.

"We are poor people and we don't have power like them. So they can do anything to us."

Chen Ton, 60, watched as her house lost 12 metres of its length, leaving her with just 2.5 metres of living space. She said the authorities showed no pity for the poor.

"We don't deny that the authorities need to develop, but they should know how this affects us. We are humans, not animals," she said.

"They use their power to destroy our houses. We have asked them about compensation since 2004, but they never spoke with us."

Resident Tey Narin told reporters that none of the residents dared to confront the police and the authorities and simply left their houses and fences to be demolished: "No one dares to protest - we fear being arrested," he said.

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The right to land is theme in dialogue between Sweden and Cambodia

Text and photo: Jan Nordlander
Government Offices of Sweden

A hundred thousand people in Cambodia have been forced to move from their land. Sweden drew attention to the humanitarian situation of the homeless in the first dialogue meeting between Sweden and Cambodia.
The first dialogue about human rights between Sweden and Cambodia took place at the end of February in Phnom Penh. The theme was land rights. The participants made a field visit to the place to which families from a slum area in the city had been forced to move by being evicted. They were given an opportunity to speak both to those who had received new housing and those who had become homeless.

The UN estimates that around 100 000 people in Cambodia have been forced to move from their land in the last ten years, and that at least as many will be evicted in the next few years. Although compensation is given, poor people in urban slum areas are primarily affected. In the mountain areas, traditional ways of life in entire societies are threatened by collapse when owners are forced to leave their property through expropriation.

The humanitarian situation of the homeless important

The Swedish delegation urged the Cambodian authorities to take measures to alleviate the humanitarian situation of the homeless and to investigate the abuses claimed to have taken place during the evictions. The delegation also urged the authorities to establish guidelines for future evictions together with the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (COHCHR), should such evictions be necessary.

Other discussions covered legislative work in human rights, the fight against corruption and impunity, measures to prevent torture, the conditions of work of NGOs and the trials of the Khmer Rouge.

Sweden is to examine the possibility of supporting Cambodia in its work on human rights, including training officials, reporting to the UN Human Rights Committees and upgrading Cambodia's national committee for human rights.

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