Honouring Kampuchea Krom

Friday the 05th of June 2009
Written by HOLLY PHAM and VONG SOKHENG
The Phnom Penh Post

Monks, Khmer Krom activists gather to urge the government not to halt future demonstrations

AROUND 600 monks, opposition politicians and rights activists gathered in Phnom Penh on Thursday to mark the loss of Cambodia's southern territories - Kampuchea Krom - to Vietnam.

The rally at Wat Botum park celebrating the 60th anniversary of the handover of Kampuchea Krom also aimed to draw attention to the human rights abuses still reportedly suffered by southern Vietnam's ethnic Khmer residents, known locally as Khmer Krom.

"We are in sorrow. This date represents all our suffering since 1949, when we lost our land to Vietnam. Our rally today sends a message to the young generation of Khmer Krom to remember our sufferings and sacrifices," said Young Sin, chief of the Khmer Krom monks from Phnom Penh's Sammaki Raingsei pagoda.

Historical watershed

The annual gathering marks June 4, 1949, when an ailing French colonial administration transferred Cambodia's old Mekong Delta territories to its colony of Cochinchina, a precursor to today's Socialist Republic of Vietnam.

It is a loss that is still keenly felt by many Cambodians, compounded by reports of human rights violations against Khmer Krom monks.

A Human Rights Watch report released in January decried the "severe and often shrouded methods" used by the Vietnamese government to stifle demands for religious and cultural freedom.

"We are in sorrow. This date represents all our suffering since 1949."

In a statement released Thursday, Son Soubert, president of the Permanent Committee of the Son Sann Foundation, said the anniversary was an important opportunity "to assert the Cambodian rights on this territory and to defend the rights of Khmer Krom living there".

Pich Seiha, 28, a Khmer Krom monk present at the rally, said he joined the protest to call attention to the situation in Vietnam.

"I joined the rally because I want the national government, as well as the international community, to bring us freedom to live our lives, to do the same work as Vietnamese citizens and the rights to make our own decisions," he said.
But participants claim a last-minute change of venue led to a lower turnout than expected.

On May 28, Phnom Penh Governor Kep Chuktema approved the rally to be held at Chaktomuk Theatre, but it was relocated overnight to Wat Botum park.

Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Son Chhay expressed hopes that in the future the government would be more supportive of the rally.

"We hope that the government will give up its policy against commemorations of Khmer history [and that it] will not restrict or prohibit us from forming a rally," he said.

Koy Kuong, spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, told the Post on Wednesday that the gathering of Cambodia's Khmer Krom community would not affect the relationship between Cambodia and its former political patron Vietnam.

"I think that the assembly... is an expression of their freedom of expression, which is guaranteed by the government," he said.

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Khmer Krom commemorate 4th June according their political party

June 4 2009
By Thach Theary Khmer Krom Network

Political leaders as well as non-governmental organizations in Cambodia have begun to commemorate June 4th, the day France illegally transfer Cochin-China (Kampuchea-Krom) according to their political groups.

The 60th anniversary of the transfer of Kampuchea-Krom to Vietnam organized by the Cambodian People's Party (CPP) member Mr. Kim Vang Chheng who is also the president of the Khmer Krom Reconciliation Committee took place on June 1 to pay respect to Khmer Krom ancestors. Mr Thach Setha, a member of the opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) also plans the commemoration on the 4th June at Chaktokmouk Conference Centre.

In the morning of 1 June, 500 Buddhist monks and about 500 Khmer Kroms have gathered in Wat Ong Ta Minh Temple in Phnom Penh to and pray for the spirit of Khmer Krom ancestors. Other members of Phnom Penh municipality who are members of CPP also attended.

In a speech to the participants at the event, Mr Kim Vang Chheng, a former member of the SRP who have criticised Vietnam in the past prior to defecting to the CPP said in support of Vietnam "the reason his group are commemorating this day is not just to remember the history of Kampuchea Krom which has been lost for 60 years but more than 100 years ago"

"Kampuchea Krom before France transferred it to Vietnam is a society of the rich oppresses the poor that was why Khmer Krom and Vietnamese join together to fight the feudal system" he continues.

On the other hand, Mr Yon Tharo, a member of parliament from the SRP party who were also invited to attend the event said one cannot change history, he also went on to say that the blood and bones of Khmer Krom victims have turned into rivers and stacked up as mountains because of their struggle to defend the religion and culture of the Khmer Krom people in Kampuchea Krom.

Mr Yon Tharo continues to say that he is able speak Khmer in this [Khmer Krom] accent and his ability to write in Khmer and also went on to become the representative of the people is owed to the struggle of Khmer Krom ancestors in Kampuchea-Krom not in Cambodia. He stresses that he Khmer Krom culture, religion, language and literature that Khmer Krom remain to this day is not been given by anyone but through the production from blood and skins of Khmer Krom ancestors of all generations.

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[Cambodian-American US] Marine meets extended family while deployed in Cambodia

Petty Officer 3rd Class Bunthoeun Ham, the Khmer translator for 3rd Medical Battalion. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).
Vouch Nap grips the arm of her great nephew, Petty Officer 3rd Class Bunthoeun Ham, the Khmer translator for 3rd Medical Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, during his deployment to Cambodia for a medical and dental civil action project. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).

Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz
http://www.okinawa.usmc.mil

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia (June 5, 2009) -- An hour and a half outside of Phnom Penh, the capital city of Cambodia, a man in a cowboy hat wearing a blue surgical mask waits anxiously as a van pulls up.

One of the passengers is his nephew, Bunthoeun Ham, whose parents fled Cambodia in the 1970's to escape the bloody and violent hand of the Khmer Rouge and the civil wars that followed its fall from power.

The van arrives and the man in the cowboy hat, Moun Ey, approaches his nephew and sweeps him into an embrace that leaves no doubt they are family, even though this is their first time meeting.

Ham is a petty officer 3rd class in the U.S. Navy who served as the Khmer translator for the 3rd Medical Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, during the Cambodia Interoperability Program 2009.

It was the combination of good timing and eavesdropping that got Ham, a personnel specialist with the personnel support detachment, CLR 37, 3rd MLG, his place on the 3rd Medical Battalion deployment to Cambodia as their translator and ultimately his opportunity to meet the family that his parents had forlornly left behind.

In November, Ham arrived on Okinawa for his second tour and while checking in he overheard Petty Officer 1st Class Mark Craig, who was one of the coordinators for the Cambodia Interoperability Program 2009, speaking about 3rd Medical Battalion's deployment to Cambodia. Ham inserted himself into the conversation and vouched for his credentials as a native speaker.

Ham did not hear anything for a few months but followed the recommendations of Craig to get his passport and medical records in order then he was contacted by Craig, followed by a phone call in Khmer. On the other end was Maj. John Cherry, the Cambodian foreign affairs officer for the III Marine Expeditionary Force. Cherry asked Ham a few questions and the stuttering petty officer replied in Khmer, receiving a stamp of approval from Cherry.

Within weeks he was touching down in Phnom Penh with a plane full of Marines and sailors who had no ability to speak the language. A language that he had spoken his entire life, but when he stepped off the plane he was anxious about how good his Khmer was.

He didn't have the opportunity to avoid his role as translator. The officials from the airport who were processing the passports of the service members recognized his name as Khmer and sought him out.

Ham felt shy and stuttered a bit during his first Khmer exchange, he said.

But, he got used to it quickly. Over the next two weeks, he was immersed in the culture and language that he had always known was his but had never truly experienced, Ham said.

The Cambodia that Ham found was not the Cambodia that his parents left behind. Their Cambodia was victim to constant gun battles, the sounds of which echoed almost constantly across the rice paddies.

The refugees would move about in large groups and Ham's parents told him, "You just stayed in the middle and tried not to get shot."

Ham's visit to the Killing Fields, where thousands of Cambodians were killed during the brutal reign of the Khmer Rouge made Ham realize the sheer scale of the horrors his parents endured, he said. But, the people of Cambodia have recovered from those horrors.

Phnom Penh is a budding metropolis filled with new construction and motorbikes that seem to drive with little caution. The provinces, where the medical and dental civil action project occurred and his family live are developing.

"You see growth everywhere, and I know there is plenty of room for more," Ham said.

The medical and dental civil action project was deeply rewarding for him, Ham said.

In Khmer, people are referred to as older brother or older sister instead of sir or ma'am, so, for Ham, that meant he was helping the members of his very large extended family, he said.

It was his meeting with his actual family though that moved him to tears because of all of the sacrifices that his parents made to ensure that he and his siblings had a better life. He took special liberty to be able to visit them and see all the sights. The visit allowed him to see the life that he would have had if his parents hadn't left, Ham said.

The visit to his parents' villages took careful navigation on narrow roads and then further navigation on foot through the rice paddies to meet everyone.

An afternoon at the sea with his father's family wrapped up the day for Ham and his family. They parted ways thinking it was his last opportunity to see them.

But the next day, after a morning of sightseeing in Phnom Penh, Ham returned to the hotel only to have a Cambodian woman approach him with a strangely familiar face.

Alin, Ham's cousin, waited almost five hours in the lobby of the hotel for him to come back. She had never met or seen him before but her family had said that he looked identical to her father, she said.

She was incredibly anxious and a little scared waiting for Ham to come back from his sight seeing, she said. The hotel staff informed her when he walked in and he was all the way across the lobby and almost into the elevator before she mustered up the courage to speak to her American cousin.

The two spent the next two days getting to know more about each other and exploring Phnom Penh.

It felt good to let Alin experience the city as a tourist with the leisure to eat from food vendors and experience her culture, Ham said. She normally works seven days a week with no days off so that she and her husband can afford to eat and live in their modest apartment.

Ham says that he misses his family now that he has returned to Okinawa, and hopes to be able to return to Cambodia in his role as translator again. His ability to help the Cambodian people and reconnect with his family made his job with 3rd Medical Battalion rewarding.

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Cambodians receive much needed medical, dental, vision assistance [from US Marines]

Children from the school next to the temple and the children of the patients waiting in line play with each other on the temple grounds. They were very curious and keen to interact with the Marines and sailors of 3rd Medical Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).
Petty Officer 3rd Class Pinch Santos, a hospital corpsman with 3rd Medical Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, takes blood pressure reading of a Buddhist monk during the Cambodia Interoperability Program 2009. Thousands of people came from all over the province to receive medical care from the combined U.S. and Royal Cambodian Armed Forces. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).

A young patient is held by his mother while a U.S. Navy hospital corpsman with 3rd Medical Battalion, checks his pulse. Thousands of children were seen during the 10-day Cambodia Interoperability Program 2009 medical and dental civil action program. Many of them were suffering from infections and typical childhood ailments. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).
United States Agency for International Development sponsored local nongovernmental organizations to set up informational displays on temple grounds providing health information to waiting patients. An avian flu display station passed out hats to raise awareness on the issue. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).
Dentists and dental technicians with 3rd Medical Battalion, removed hundreds of teeth during the program. Dental saw an average of 100-150 patients everyday for dental surgery. (Photo by Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz).

Glimpse of Hope

Lance Cpl. Stefanie C. Pupkiewicz
http://www.okinawa.usmc.mil

WAT BAKAN, PURSAT PROVINCE, Cambodia (June 5, 2009) -- The provincial roads in Pursat, Cambodia, are unlit and relatively deserted at 1 a.m. On the morning of May 19, a woman on a motorbike clutching her sick infant in one arm rumbled down a two-lane highway.

She still has another hour's distance to cover before she reaches Wat Bakan, the district Buddhist temple, to receive treatment from the U.S. and Royal Cambodian Armed Forces at a combined medical and dental civil action project.

Her name is Chera and she arrives early knowing she will have to wait six more hours before the vans transporting the U.S. service members arrive and patient care begins for the day.

Despite her long journey and hardship, she could do nothing but smile and thank the service members for eventually helping her and her child.

Chera's story is just one of the 12,333 patient stories told to sailors from 3rd Medical Battalion, Combat Logistics Regiment 35, 3rd Marine Logistics Group, along with Royal Cambodian Armed Forces doctors and medics providing medical, dental and vision care during Cambodia Interoperability Program 2009.

The operation began May 11 with a goal to see 1,000 patients a day during the 10-day mission. By the eighth day, the medical and dental civil action project reached the 10,000 patient mark.

Prior to the start of CIP '09, medical and dental civil action program planners coordinated with local nongovernmental organizations associated with the United States Agency for International Development to provide health education on everything from safe sex to preventing the spread of avian flu.

When the project wrapped up May 20, Brig. Gen. William Faulkner, the commanding general of 3rd MLG, arrived on site for the closing ceremony and to express his pride in his Marines and sailors for their hard work.

"The operation has been a complete success and has strengthened the relationship between the United States and the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces," Faulkner said.

Throughout the program, the interoperability between both countries' service members was apparent in all areas of the operation, from the U.S. Navy hospital corpsmen working alongside RCAF medics, to the U.S. Navy doctors working general triage side by side with the RCAF doctors.

"The U.S. Navy optometrists worked especially close to the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces ophthalmologist," said U.S. Navy Lt. Robert Senko, an optometrist with 3rd Med. Bn. "The U.S. optometrists triaged the patients and provided them with eye exams and glasses while the Royal Cambodian ophthalmologist removed cataracts and pterygiums obstructing the patients' vision."

The mission was fulfilling for all involved because the fruits of their labor were immediately apparent, according to Petty Officer 3rd Class Christopher Barrett, a hospital corpsman with 3rd Med. Bn.

"I know we are taking out teeth, but I can see their happiness because they are out of pain. Pain that they have been in for a long time," said U.S. Navy Lt. Thomas Stinchfield, a dentist with 3rd Med. Bn.

In addition to pulling out infected teeth, the dental section of the project provided oral hygiene instruction to the Cambodians so they could take proper care of their remaining teeth.

Many of the people who received care had never seen a doctor, according to U.S. Navy Petty Officer 3rd Class Bunthoeun Ham, the translator for 3rd Med. Bn.

"Most of the Cambodians treat their conditions and symptoms with medicinal plants that they grow," Ham said.

The medical and dental care offered by the service members was limited, but patients were referred to local free medical services.

"One of the things we have been doing is introducing a lot of the patients to some of the services available to them. These include malaria care, pregnancy care, and tuberculosis care that is available to them free of charge," said U.S. Navy Lt. Ryan Brown, a medical officer with 3rd Med. Bn. "Many of the Cambodians were unaware of the existence of these programs."

"We treat what we can here, and really, it's just a lot of smiling faces," said Brown.

Meanwhile, personnel from 3rd Med. Bn. are scheduled to deploy to Bangladesh this summer for another medical and dental civil action project.

Additionally, the government of Cambodia is expecting the return of U.S. Marines and sailors when combat engineers from Marine Wing Support Squadron 172 arrive for an engineering civil action project with the RCAF.

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S-21 photographer ditches KR museum

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Monday, 18 May 2009
Written by Sam Rith
The Phnom Penh Post

$1m to buy all of the exhibits, says Nhem En.

FORMER Tuol Sleng photographer Nhem En is putting all of his Khmer Rouge-era possessions - once destined for a museum in Anlong Veng - up for sale for US$1 million, saying that the global economic crisis is to blame for scuppering his monument to the regime whose most brutal moments he helped to document.
"I am calling on all interested individuals and companies, both inside and outside the country, to bid on more than 10 varieties of Khmer Rouge materials. The starting price is US$1 million," said Nhem En, who is deputy governor of Anlong Veng district in Oddar Meanchey province.

The items on offer include two cameras purportedly used to photograph prisoners at Tuol Sleng; 2,000 photographs of Pol Pot and other Khmer Rouge leaders; what he claims are Pol Pot's sandals, toilet, clothes and hat; a piece of car tyre that was used in Pol Pot's 1998 cremation; videos of military commander Ta Mok and other top regime cadre; and 1,000 songs on original tapes and pirated CDs.

"I spent all my spare cash trying to build the museum and I can't borrow from the bank because they are suffering from the global economic crisis," he said.

Nhem En said he had spent more than US$200,000 buying and clearing 50 hectares of land in Anlong Veng, but had garnered no support. He said the museum would cost $1 million to complete.

The announcement follows his April offer to sell what he said were Pol Pot's sandals and his cameras for US$500,000. But early interest faded after provincial officials reacted negatively.

Oddar Meanchey provincial Governor Pich Sokhin declined Sunday to comment on the revised offer, but added that he also had no objection to the museum being built.

But S-21 survivor Chhum Mey said people who might consider buying the items should instead give that money to the cash-strapped Khmer Rouge tribunal.

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Hor 5 Hong lambastes Dey Krahorm evictees ... while keeping silence on the illegal land-grabber: Hun Sen's no rights-no law rule?

Minister Lambastes ‘Professional Squatters’

By Taing Sarada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
18 May 2009

While rights groups seek to find fair deals for families displaced in Phnom Penh developments, the foreign minister says many of the capital’s squatters are “professionals,” moving from place to place to demand money when they are expelled.
In remarks at the opening ceremony of a consulate in Lowell, Mass., last month, Foreign Minister Hor Namhong said residents of the Dey Krahorm community, who were evicted earlier this year, were squatters living on state land that had been granted to a private company for development.

“Nowadays, there are many squatters in Phnom Penh, and these squatters always grab people’s land,” he said. “When they push them out, the squatters always demand money. When they get the money, they go build another hut to live in, then demand money again. They are professional squatters.”

In fact, the situation is more complicated, and, critics say, indicative of the abuses suffered by many of the displaced.

Rights and opposition officials objected to the minister’s portrayal of the displaced.

The Dey Krahorm community was a cluster of shacks on 4 hectares of land in Phnom Penh’s Tonle Basaac commune, Chamkarmon district. Around 6,000 people had lived in the neighborhood before they were gradually pushed out, starting from 2003 and ending in January 2009.

Residents, many of whom were resettled on 3 hectares of land outside the city, claimed they had lived in the area since the 1980s.

Land was granted to development company 7NG as a social land concession, a move opposed by Dey Krahorm residents.

In July 2003, ahead of national elections, Prime Minister Hun Sen granted rights to some families in the neighborhood to live on the land. 7NG, however, continued with evictions, and many families were forced to settle in Choam Chao commune, in remote Dangkor district.

Residents complained they were being compensated below market price for their land. Protesters were evicted by Phnom Penh security forces, military police and soldiers, armed with electric batons, rifles and bulldozers, tractors and water trucks. Several were injured.

Meanchey District Governor Kouch Chamroeun told VOA Khmer he has never experienced forcible evictions and prefers peaceful negotiations.

Rights groups claim the evictions were a contradiction of a 2001 land law and blamed the government for a lack of responsibility.

Lao Monghay, a senior researcher at the Asian Human Rights Commission, in Hong Kong, questioned Hor Nahmong’s accusations.

The authorities had been careless, and the ownership of the land was questionable, he said.

“Whose land is this?” he said. “How did they grant the land to the company? Was there any transparency? Any bid? How much did the company pay to the government? So the top government officials who have big houses and land in Phnom Penh, did they really build them by themselves? Don’t you think they also took someone’s house and someone’s land after the Khmer Rouge regime?”

If the people of Dey Krahorm were illegal, under which law was it, he asked. When people began to return to the city following the Khmer Rouge, no one in the country possessed a thing, he said.

“The Khmer Rouge revoked all land and house possession,” he said. The people of Dey Krahorm lived freely after into the 1990s under the State of Cambodia.

“If they first moved to live in that area, why didn’t the government immediately prohibit this?” he said. “So this is the authority’s mistake, not the people’s mistake. The people did nothing wrong.”

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy said Hor Namhong’s remarks “are to protect the big, evil companies and businessmen who depend on the dictator leader in order to steal and rob the Khmer people of their property.”

“The people can’t accept such language, because the people are the owners of the country,” he said.

Thun Saray, president of the rights group Adhoc, told VOA Khmer the people in Dey Krahorm were not to blame, but the company had taken their land away.

“People lived there for a long time before the company existed,” he said. “When the people oppose the company’s policy, it is their right to do so because they have their own plot of land in the Dey Krahorm community. They should respect their land rights.”

Resources watchdog Global Witness has reported that 45 percent of Cambodian land belongs to private companies or powerful individuals, while millions of dollars from land concessions disappear from national coffers.

The UN, meanwhile, has urged Cambodia to cease forced evictions across the country, warning that such policies do not meet international rights standards and are against UN conventions.

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Nhem En intends to become a millionaire: More Pol Pot's memorabilia put on sale ... including Pol Pot's toilet

Khmer Rouge photographer wants to sell Pol Pot's sandals, toilet

Mon, 18 May 2009
DPA

Phnom Penh - A former Khmer Rouge official photographer has put on sale for 1.5 million dollars what he claims to be Pol Pot's clothes, sandals and toilet, along with thousands of photographs and other artifacts he collected during the genocidal regime's 1975-79 rule. "I will sell Pol Pot's sandals, toilet, his uniform and cap, thousands of photographs and the two cameras I used during the Khmer Rouge period," said Nhem En, who was recruited to take photographs of detainees when they arrived at Tuol Sleng torture prison in Phnom Penh.

"I am asking for 1.5 million dollars, but the price is negotiable," he added.

Nhem En said he would use the money to establish a Khmer Rouge museum in Anlong Veng, a small town near the Thai border where the Maoist group hid in a jungle fortress until it disbanded in 1998.

"I am selling these items, but I have others that will be housed in the museum," he said. "I have already asked for donations for this museum from the US, France, Germany, Canada, Australia, Vietnam, South Korea and Thailand, but none have provided funding."

His appeal came as the trial of the former head of Tuol Sleng prison resumed before Cambodia's UN-backed war crimes tribunal.

Kaing Guek Euv, known by his revolutionary alias Duch, faces charges of crimes against humanity, torture, premeditated murder and breaches of the Geneva Conventions, allegedly committed at the school-turned-prison, where at least 15,000 men, women and children were imprisoned and tortured before being murdered in the "killing fields" on the outskirts of the capital.

Nhem En said the millions of dollars in international donor funding spent on bringing Duch and four other Khmer Rouge leaders to trial would be better invested in his museum.

"Nobody in the Cambodian government supports my museum plan, so it will need a great deal of international funding to be established," he said.

In April, Nhem En offered to sell Pol Pot's shoes and toilet for 500,000 dollars and said he would keep the other items to be housed in the museum.

Up to 2 million people died during through execution, starvation or overwork during the Khmer Rouge's rule.

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CAMBODIA: Mine accident survivor becomes deminer

"[My work] has a lot of benefits. One, we receive salary from MAG to feed ourselves and families and two, we can rid our villages of landmines." - Chea Sia

18 May 2009
Source: MAG (Mines Advisory Group)
Website: http://www.maginternational.org

MAG Cambodia Chea Sia, a 48-year-old amputee, has worked for MAG for 14 years as a deminer. He lost his right leg to a landmine explosion in 1982, when he served a soldier for the Khmer People's National Liberation Front, led by the late former Prime Minister Son Sann.
The accident took place in Batttambang province whilst patrolling the area around his camp.

"I stepped on a landmine laid by the Khmer Rouge. We didn't realise [they] had laid mines in the area," he says.

His fellow soldiers fired a few times into the air as a distress signal, and other soldiers came to assist them.

"They arrived and sent me to the camp where I received first aid from the paramedics," he recalls.

After receiving first aid, Chea Sia was put on a tractor and sent to a French hospital in Thailand near the Cambodian border, and was then transferred to a hospital in Khao-I-Dang refugee camp run by the International Committee of the Red Cross.

He stayed at the hospital for about three months and was then sent to a refugee camp in Thailand, where he lived for the next decade.

Along with many other refugees, he was repatriated to Cambodia in 1992.

"During the first four or five months [back] in Cambodia, I didn't do anything but depended on some money I had left from the camp," he says. "When I returned to Cambodia, we had big problems....we needed everything, unlike life in the camp where we were given food."

Chea Sia and his wife struggled to survive and eked out a living by buying and selling small items and farming. Then he heard about MAG.

"Initially, I wasn't aware that MAG recruited amputee deminers. My friend asked me to join. Frankly speaking, at that time I knew nothing about demining. While I was a soldier, I only knew that mines are dangerous. But I was assured that I would be sent to be trained."

Currently, Chea Sia carries out demining tasks in Pailin province, the former stronghold of the Khmer Rouge.

He says that it is difficult for disabled people with little education to find good jobs, and that he is lucky to work for MAG.

"I don't have any knowledge or education, so I depend on my physical strength to get a job. It would be difficult for me to find a better-paid job than the job I have with MAG."

As a deminer, Chea Sia has to wear a special prosthetic leg, which will not affect or disrupt a metal detector.

"Prosthetic limbs usually have a metal bar inside but those provided for amputee deminers contain no metal," he explains.

Chea Sia says that amputee deminers sometimes find it difficult when they have to walk up or downhill to get to a minefield, and said that they may work marginally slower than able-bodied persons.

"But it's not a big deal at all. We can perform our job. We are not asked to work where disabled people find it difficult to perform their tasks."

Chea Sia says that he is very happy to work with MAG, an organisation which has benefited people from the communities affected by landmine contamination.

"It has a lot of benefits. One, we receive salary from MAG to feed ourselves and families and two, we can rid our villages of landmines."

For more information on MAG's work in Cambodia, please visit
www.maginternational.org/cambodia

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Doubts cast over veracity of ECCC personnel audits, observers say

Monday, 18 May 2009
Written by Robbie Corey Boulet
The Phnom Penh Post

US ENVOY to arrive in Cambodia for tribunal talks

ATOP US war crimes representative will meet with government and Khmer Rouge tribunal officials this week to discuss the UN-backed court, an embassy spokesperson confirmed Sunday. Clint Williamson, the US ambassador-at-large for war crimes issues, is to arrive in Cambodia today, however a schedule for meetings with senior government officials, including Cabinet Minister Sok An, could not be confirmed. "We don't have a schedule confirmed yet," US embassy spokesperson John Johnson told the Post, adding that he could not specify what would be on the agenda for the talks. This week's visit will mark Williamson's second since he took office in 2006, and he is expected to also hold talks with NGO representatives and embassy personnel amid growing concern over allegations of graft at the court that have resulted in a UN review and the freezing of donor funding. Negotiations between the UN and Cambodia over an anti-corruption mechanism at the hybrid court were abandoned last month, with the UN saying Thursday it had "no more meetings scheduled" - Georgia Wilkins

Lawyers and court monitors maintain that reviews of UN-backed tribunal's human resources practices ‘not designed' to unearth evidence of kickback scheme at the centre of graft row.
ON FEBRUARY 4, Andrew Ianuzzi, a legal consultant for the defence team of former Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea, visited Phnom Penh Municipal Court for his third meeting in less than three weeks with Deputy Prosecutor Sok Kaliyan.

The topic of the meeting was a criminal complaint - filed in January by Ianuzzi and two other international lawyers for Nuon Chea - accusing officials, including then-director of administration Sean Visoth, of "perpetrating, facilitating, aiding and/or abetting" a kickback scheme in which Cambodian employees were forced to hand over portions of their salaries to top tribunal officials.

Government officials have repeatedly claimed that no evidence of such a scheme has ever surfaced, citing a series of international audits assessing, among other things, the court's human resources and management practices.

But lawyers and tribunal observers have dismissed this argument as disingenuous, saying that the audits were not designed to assess kickback allegations in the first place.

During the February 4 meeting, Ianuzzi recalled in an interview last week, Sok Kaliyan indicated - not for the first time - that the complaint would be thoroughly investigated.

But one week later, while at Phnom Penh International Airport to catch a flight to Bangkok, Ianuzzi saw a front page newspaper article reporting that the Municipal Court had abruptly ended the investigation on February 5.

When Ianuzzi returned to Phnom Penh and reviewed the case file, he noticed documents that weren't there when he checked the file on February 4: reports on the audits, which he and others insist don't actually clear the accused officials of anything.

"The audits ... were never intended to detect the type of corruption that has been alleged," John Hall, an associate professor at Chapman University School of Law in California who has written extensively about the tribunal, said via email.

"It is misleading to claim otherwise."

Court spokeswoman Helen Jarvis declined to answer questions for this article.

All reports indicate that staff were paid their full salaries on the books and that it was only after ... that they made a kickback payment.

"I think we have canvassed this issue extensively, and there are reports on our website about all this, so I would refer you to that," she said.

Clean review

The website includes the 25-page Human Resources Management Review, an independent review released in April 2008.

"Robust [human resources] systems have been developed and implemented to address previous shortcomings, to give effective support to the judicial process and to minimize the risk of questionable HR practices occurring in the future," the review said in its conclusion.

"Zero tolerance for non-compliance with HR systems and the Code of Conduct will also support ongoing improvement in the performance of the ECCC."

Sean Visoth said during the press conference announcing the review's release that it was designed "to recap all the separate audits and reviews carried out during the past year, and to assess whether HR management policies and practices of the Cambodian side of the ECCC are transparent, accountable, meet international standards and provide consistent and effective measures against any mismanagement".

At the same press conference, Jo Scheuer, then the country director for the UN Development Program, said, "Based on audits conducted from 2006 to present, there have been no questionable financial transactions, no misallocated resources and no incomplete or missing documentation in support of disbursements made by [the tribunal]. All of their financial transactions have passed audit scrutiny."

But Scheuer said in an interview last month that any kickback scheme would have been "off the books", meaning "there are no figures" that would surface in an audit.

"All the audits are clean because the books are clean," Scheuer said.

Heather Ryan, who has been monitoring the tribunal for the Open Society Justice Initiative, also said it would be impossible to assess kickback allegations with an audit of financial records.

"All reports indicate that staff were paid their full salaries on the books and that it was only after they received them that they made a kickback payment," she said in a May 10 email.

"If this is in fact the case, an audit of the books would not reveal anything about the practice."

Scheuer argued that the only way to investigate the alleged kickbacks would be to interview those making the allegations.

Ianuzzi also said investigators looking to effectively assess the kickback allegations would need to "interview witnesses and try to obtain" all relevant documents.

Several lawyers and observers said the nature of the audits - which they described as inadequate - underscored the need for the government to release the results of a UN review of the most recent kickback allegations, which surfaced last June.

The review was given to government officials last September but has not been made public.

Civil party lawyer Alain Werner said the government's refusal thus far to release the review results was fuelling "the constant speculation, the allegations and the rumours that are going on".

"Let's just disclose this report," he said.

Phay Siphan said in an interview Tuesday that he did not know which government officials had seen the UN review, but argued that its release could sour relations between UN and Cambodian officials.

"We respect each other, as a husband a wife, to create a new baby: the ECCC," he said.

He also reiterated the government's position that there is no need for further investigations into the kickback allegations.

"There have already been audits," he said, "and the findings showed that not a penny has been lost."

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Cambodian ruling party wins majority in local election

PHNOM PENH, May 17 (Xinhua) -- The ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP) won majority in local election held on Sunday to select the members of the new provincial, municipal and district councils, according to preliminary result announced by the National Committee of Election (NEC) on Monday.
CPP won over 75 percent of members of councils of provinces and municipality, and has also won over 74 percent of members of councils of district and cities, Im Suosdey, chairman of NEC, announced at the press conference.

The largest opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) won over 20.49 percent of members of councils for provinces and municipality, while over 20.58 percent in districts and cities, he said.

Meanwhile, co-ruling Funcinpec party won over 2 percent in provinces and municipality, and over 2.36 percent in districts and cities, while Norodom Ranaridhh Party (NRP) won over 1.85 percent and 2.33 percent respectively for the members of the new provincial, municipal and district councils.

The local election, lasted only one day, were carried out smoothly and peacefully, Tep Nytha, secretary general of NEC, told news conference Sunday. Final official results could be made public on May 29, according to the NEC.

There are only 11,353 members of commune councils have rights to vote for, while most of them from the CPP. Altogether four parties participated in the election, namely the major ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP), the major opposition Sam Rainsy Party (SRP), the co-ruling Funcinpec Party and the opposition Norodom Ranariddh Party (NRP).

Tep Nytha said that the election was very important because the new provincial, district and municipal councils would govern within their territory according to the government's policy of promoting democratic development.

The Interior Ministry has arranged more than 13,000 police and military police force to ensure peaceful balloting.

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