Wed, 28 Oct 2009
DPA
Seoul - Foreign brides are replacing local women as a major source of vitality in South Korea's greying rural communities, helping to rebuild rural family bonds by providing babies and farm labour and participating in community activities. Lured by the prospect of a higher standard of living, brides recruited from other Asian countries are becoming commonplace in the South Korean countryside.
In rural communities, which once prided themselves on their homogeneity, four in every 10 women married in 2008 were foreign-born, according to data from the Ministry of Public Administration and Security.
In small towns with average ages in the 50s or above, many old farm houses are abandoned or under-utilized by elderly residents after their adult children have left for jobs in the cities.
The farm house of Han Jun-Hee, 44, is a good example. Han said the house used to be a place of "sighs and silence" before his Thai bride arrived in 2002.
Now, the couple's three daughters play in the garden, and wife Onnoi, 36, helps work the family rice paddy. She even takes care of Han's aging parents and works as an English interpreter at a local community centre.
"I cannot imagine our family without her," Han said. "She gave us a new family. She helps me with the rice harvest. She is a good mother. She is a good daughter-in-law."
Onnoi had to work hard to fit in.
"You have no idea how lonely and hard it was when I first started my life here," she said. "I didn't understand what the other family members were saying. I was scared about everything that is different here."
Cultural differences often deepen the homesickness felt by the foreign brides.
"I weep secretly when I think of my parents at home and miss them," said a 25-year-old Vietnamese bride who married a South Korean farmer last year.
The passage of time may ease the homesickness as the young women adapt to their roles as wife and mother.
But some of the marriages, especially those undertaken out of necessity rather of romance, can end with runaway brides after the women discover a huge gap between their fantasies and the reality of life on South Korean farms.
A 2008 survey by the Korea Institute of Health and Society showed that 28 per cent of foreign brides experience verbal abuse from their Korean spouses. Twenty-five per cent feel physically threatened by spouses.
Some foreign brides have even been locked into their houses to keep them from running away. Suicides among foreign brides have been reported.
Divorces among these mixed-marriage couples increased from 4,171 in 2003 to 11,225 in 2008. In 2008 there were 36,204 marriages registered between South Koreans and foreign-born spouses, according to South Korea's Statistics Office.
The offspring of mixed marriages often suffer for being different. Many of these children have a harder time with the Korean language and are subjected to teasing or bullying by peers.
As of the end of 2008, there were 167,090 marriages between South Korean and foreign-born spouses, and those unions have produced more than 100,000 babies over the years, according to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology. At least 25,000 of those children have reached school age.
Foreign wives are emerging from the pain of loneliness and prejudice by forging networks among themselves. Across the country are dozens of inter-cultural family centres, where foreign brides get counseling on family welfare, learn about Korean culture and take part in community services.
At the centres, the foreign brides work as interpreters to help recent arrivals adapt to their own new lives.
Some of the foreign mothers are preparing to teach English at community centres or schools.
A 35-year-old Philippine-born woman, mother of a 10-year-old son, is one of 13 foreign brides attending classes to become English teachers at primary school in the Korea Arts and Culture Education Service.
"I want to teach English at primary school, where my son is learning," said the woman, who asked not to be named. "I'd like my son to be proud of his mom when I teach his class."
The state-run Korean National Tourism Organization provides a medical tourism class for 18 brides from China, Japan, Thailand and the Philippines so they can work for local government or medical clinics or travel agents.
"If we have more Asian brides, we may have more of an international mix, or third culture, that is partly Korean and partly Thai or Vietnam or Philippine," said Park Dae-Sik, a researcher for the Korea Rural Economic Institute.
Foreign brides rejuvenate South Korea's aging society
Wednesday, October 28, 2009Dong Thap boosts trade cooperation with Cambodia
10/28/2009
VNA/VOVNews
At a workshop on trade and investment promotion held in Phnom Penh on October 27, participants introduced each other to areas of potential and opportunity for cooperation, and ask questions on legal issues, customs, finance and banking.
Sharing a common borderline with Cambodia, Dong Thap province is ideally suited to boost trade promotion, expand into the market and consume products in Cambodia, said the Chairman of the Dong Thap Provincial People’s Committee, Truong Ngoc Han, at the workshop, which was held by the Cambodian Chamber of Commerce and the Dong Thap Provincial Trade and Investment Promotion Centre.
A memorandum of understanding on enhancement of investment and trade was signed right after the workshop by senior officials of Dong Thap province and the Cambodian Chamber of Commerce.
Additionally, companies from both sides agreed trade contracts worth US$1 million at the workshop.
Earlier, at a meeting with Cambodian Vice Prime Minster Men Sam On, Chairman of the Dong Thap Provincial People’s Committee Truong Ngoc Han pledged to push up activities at gates along the borderline between Dong Thap province and Cambodia’s Prey Veng province.
Dong Thap province has helped build infrastructure for provincial road 102 in Cambodia, linking from the Dinh Ba-Bontea Chak Krey border gate to the trans-Asia highway.
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Ancient [Baphuon] temple nearly restored
Oct 28, 2009
AFP
Walled-off from camera-toting tourists, they are finally close to completing an astonishing reconstruction of the fabled 11th century Baphuon Temple.
'This is not easy to plan like a construction project is,' says architect Pascal Royere from the French School of Asian Studies, who is leading the rebuilding team.
Restorers dismantled Baphuon in the 1960s when it was falling apart, laying some 300,000 of its stone blocks in the grass and jungle around the site.
But before the French-led team of archaeologists could reassemble the 34-metre tall temple, the hardline communist Khmer Rouge swept to power in 1975.
Up to two million people died from overwork, starvation and torture as the regime tried to re-set Cambodia to 'Year Zero' by eliminating reminders of its past - including the records to put Baphuon back together.
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Elder Monk Beats 68-Year-old Nun to Death
10/28/2009
ShortNews.com
Two days earlier, two monks beat a fourth-year medical student to death because he had chastised the monks for drinking palm wine (a strong wine made from palm trees).
Chhith Sophay, the chief monk, expressed alarm at the most recent killing, as well as the potential damage such violence could cause to the Buddhist faith.
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Thailand's fugitive former premier to visit Cambodia "soon"
Oct 28, 2009
DPA
Thaksin said he would be paying a visit to Thailand's neighbour 'soon to thank Hun Sen,' the Bangkok Post reported, citing an unnamed source in the Puea Thai opposition party, which has the financial backing of the former prime minister.
Hun Sen last week threw a monkey wrench in Thai-Cambodian relations by claiming that Thaksin, who faces a two-year jail sentence in Thailand and is living in self-imposed exile, was his good friend and would be granted refuge and a job as an economic adviser should be come to Cambodia.
He added that Cambodia would not extradite Thaksin to Thailand, even though the neighbouring countries have signed an extradition agreement.
The former Khmer Rouge cadre went on to compare Thaksin with Myanmar pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi.
Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, has spent 14 of the past 20 years under house detention and was recently sentenced to another 18 months of house arrest.
Thaksin, a former telecommunications tycoon turned populist politician, was sentenced last year for abuse of power for allowing his wife in 2003 to bid on a plot of land at a public auction when he was still prime minister.
Thaksin was premier from 2001 to 2006 before being toppled in a bloodless military coup on charges of corruption, dividing the nation and undermining democratic institutions.
Thaksin's close ties to Hun Sen date back to when he was still the chairman of the Shinawatra Corp, which won several telecommunications concessions in neighbouring Cambodia.
Hun Sen's open support of Thaksin, made upon his arrival in Thailand Friday to attend a summit of the Association of South-East Asian Nations, was seen as a diplomatic slap in the face to current Thai Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva, who came to power in December after the downfall of the previous pro-Thaksin coalition government.
Thailand and Cambodia have a long history of animosity and border spats, the latest one being over joint claims to land adjacent to the 11th-century Preah Vihear temple on their border.
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All in the "Hor" family: A Baby Hor will sit at the UN World Heritage Committee
Second Thai candidate makes it to UN Heritage panel
October 28, 2009
The Nation
Twentynine countries had put forward names for the new panel, which will be replacing the current one later this year, and will be in office until 2013.
According to Culture Minister Teera Slukpetch, the UN World Heritage agency reportedly had problems deciding on the new panel because both Thailand and Cambodia - currently in a dispute over the Preah Vihear temple - had put forward candidates.
Eventually, though, the UN agency decided to select candidates from both countries as a way to help solve the conflicts. The son of Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Nam Hong will represent Cambodia.
Somsuda is the second Thai candidate selected to the UN panel, following Adul Wichiencharoen who had served in the panel for two terms.
"From now on, Thailand will play a bigger role in the world stage. More importantly, Somsuda's selection will help push Thai sites to be included in the UN World Heritage listing," Teera said yesterday.
Somsuda will be proposing historical sites to the UN, including the Sriwichai Chaiya - Nakhon Si Thammarat - Sating Phra - Yarang cultural route, Kedah of Malaysia, as well as the Lanna culture.
Initial reports mentioned that the new panel will check out Thai heritage sites in March. It might also visit Preah Vihear.
Thailand is hoping to host the 2011 UN World Heritage Committee meeting, once the summit next year has been hosted by Brazil.
Somsuda, meanwhile, said that she was glad she had been selected and thanked everyone for supporting her. "I will be neutral and work for the benefit of all countries. Sites in many countries have not yet been included in the UN list and I will push for them to be made part of the list," she said.
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Cambodia's killing fields 30 years on: 'They will kill our parents tonight... we must escape'
Orphaned Cambodian children in refugee camp in 1979
Young Somaly Lun
Somaly as she is today
With her daughters (All pics: Harry Page, Getty)27/10/2009
By Ros Wynne-Jones
Mirror.co.uk
It is 30 years since John Pilger revealed the existence of the Cambodian Killing Fields in the Daily Mirror. For Somaly Lun, the anniversary is bittersweet.
Today, customers at the Oxfordshire supermarket checkout where she works have no idea of her extraordinary story.
How she escaped US B-52 bombers as a child, a Khmer Rouge concentration camp as a teenager, and Vietnamese soldiers as a young woman. How she lost her father and six brothers to the Khmer Rouge.
Somaly owes her life in the UK to Oxfam's Marcus Thompson, then a young humanitarian worker who had become friends with Somaly and her husband Borithy.
"England gave me the first safe place I had ever lived," Somaly says.
By the time she was 10, her home town of Kratie was under attack, even though Cambodia was neutral. Kratie was close to the border with Vietnam which was at war with the States, and US President Richard Nixon ordered 100,000 tonnes of secret bombings.
"The B-52s came every day," Somaly recalls. "Every day, shooting and bombing and running." One day a man grabbed her as an F-11 US fighter jet swept low and held her in front of him as a shield. "The plane was so low I could almost see the pilot's face," she says. It permanently damaged her hearing.
Somaly's family fled to Phnom Penh, but by 1975 it had fallen to Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge. Backed by the US against the Vietnamese communists, the Khmer Rouge were determined to return Cambodia to Year Zero, to a time before industrialisation.
"My father, a doctor, was in the middle of an operation the day the Khmer Rouge came," Somaly says. "He said, 'What about the patient?' They pointed a gun at him and asked, 'Do you want to die?'"
Somaly's family were herded out at gunpoint with two million other people. The family was taken to Pursat, a concentration camp in the remote countryside. Then the Khmer Rouge came for Somaly's father.
"They said, 'We know you are a doctor'." The first time, they wanted him to treat one of the leaders. But the second time, "they took him away and he never came back". Somaly was forced to spend 20 hours a day as a slave doing hard labour in the rice fields despite starvation, exhaustion and malaria.
Her older brother was caught saving his food rations for her. "They made him confess he was a US spy," she says. "They kept beating him until he died. Then my younger brother was taken. They put him in a prison with other children, and burned it to the ground. The screams have haunted me ever since.
"One day, they came and took 2,000 people. One of the girls came back like a zombie with blood all over her. She said, 'They killed everyone'." Then, one day a pal whispered: "They are killing our parents and we have to escape now, tonight." Somaly says: "After dark we went to where people were gathered with three big boats."
The Khmer Rouge chased them along the river, firing at the boats. She says: "We hid in the mangrove and caught fish and ate it raw as we didn't dare to make a fire. We drank muddy water. We all became sick - just skin and bones."
Everyone on Somaly's boat was drifting in and out of consciousness. "But somehow it arrived by itself at Kampong Chhnang, where the Khmer Rouge was driven out," she says. "They gave us food, water, shelter."
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New escapees from Pursat told Somaly that thousands had been taken to a cliff and forced off at gunpoint. Yet, somehow her mother, sister and brother had escaped. "The day I saw them again was the happiest day of my life," Somaly says.
When they returned to Phnom Penh in 1979 they found a ghost city occupied by the Vietnamese liberators.
Somaly took a job at the hotel Samaki - now Le Royale - as a receptionist, where she met Borithy, who was working for the Cambodian foreign office as a translator.
She also met Marcus Thompson, a 34-year-old British aid worker sent by Oxfam to set up a humanitarian programme. "We became friends," he remembers. "We were all stuck together at the hotel."
But Cambodia was still dangerous - and Borithy was warned to leave Phnom Penh. "He said he was in love with me and refused to leave without me," Somaly says.
On March 16, 1980, the couple married in secret inside a destroyed pagoda. The next day, they escaped. Passing through fields of landmines, they made it through Vietnamese, then Khmer Rouge territory and even past the Thai border guards to Khao I Dang, a squalid refugee camp on the border. Somaly wrote to her family and to Marcus to tell them they were alive.
"I needed to go to those camps as part of my work," Marcus says. Somaly says she will never forget seeing Marcus walking through the camp. "I cried out 'Marcus!' and just hung on to his neck," she says.
Marcus was shocked by their plight. "They couldn't go back to Cambodia," he says. "The Thais wouldn't accept them. We had to do something."
Back in England, Marcus and his Oxfam colleagues went through official channels to ask whether Britain would accept the family as refugees.
"We had no expectation anything would happen," Marcus says. "But then we got a letter saying 'Yes'."
Somaly, 22 and pregnant, arrived in the UK on May 12, 1981, with Borithy, Somaly's mother Moeun, brother Rithy and sister Virak - and settled close to Marcus and his family in Witney, Oxfordshire.
"People at the Oxfam offices donated all kinds of furniture, saucepans, an old TV, carpets," Somaly remembers.
Today, the couple's daughters are success stories in their own right. The youngest, 23-year-old Bophanie, is a teacher in Brighton, while her sister, Mary Thida Lun, 27, is Assistant Private Secretary to the Minister of State for International Development, Gareth Thomas.
At 64, Marcus still works as an adviser to Oxfam, and the charity remains working in Cambodia, still tackling the legacy of the dark days of the Khmer Rouge and facing new challenges from climate change, typhoons and flooding.
Today, 30 years on, when she goes to and from work at the local supermarket, living her British life, Somaly sometimes remembers the words her father said to her before they took him away.
"He said, 'You are going to survive. You are going to go places'." She shakes her head slowly. "I think that was what gave me the strength to survive."
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Second Thai candidate makes it to UN Heritage panel
Tuesday, October 27, 2009By The Nation
Published on October 28, 2009
Somsuda Leeyavanich, deputy permanent secretary for Culture Ministry, has been chosen to represent Thailand at the 12member World Heritage Committee. She will be joining other new members from Switzerland, Cambodia, South Africa, France, Ethiopia, Mexico, Estonia, Iraq and Mali.
According to Culture Minister Teera Slukpetch, the UN World Heritage agency reportedly had problems deciding on the new panel because both Thailand and Cambodia - currently in a dispute over the Preah Vihear temple - had put forward candidates.
Eventually, though, the UN agency decided to select candidates from both countries as a way to help solve the conflicts. The son of Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Nam Hong will represent Cambodia.
Somsuda is the second Thai candidate selected to the UN panel, following Adul Wichiencharoen who had served in the panel for two terms.
"From now on, Thailand will play a bigger role in the world stage. More importantly, Somsuda's selection will help push Thai sites to be included in the UN World Heritage listing," Teera said yesterday.
Somsuda will be proposing historical sites to the UN, including the Sriwichai Chaiya - Nakhon Si Thammarat - Sating Phra - Yarang cultural route, Kedah of Malaysia, as well as the Lanna culture.
Initial reports mentioned that the new panel will check out Thai heritage sites in March. It might also visit Preah Vihear.
Thailand is hoping to host the 2011 UN World Heritage Committee meeting, once the summit next year has been hosted by Brazil.
Somsuda, meanwhile, said that she was glad she had been selected and thanked everyone for supporting her. "I will be neutral and work for the benefit of all countries. Sites in many countries have not yet been included in the UN list and I will push for them to be made part of the list," she said.
Read more!
Suu Kyi counterpart gets 'offer' from Rangoon
By Tulsathit Taptim
The Nation
Published on October 28, 2009
Disclaimer: The following e-mail was intercepted on its way from Rangoon to Thaksin Shinawatra. Though unsigned, it seems to have been written by someone in the top echelons of power. It could be a fake, but it sounds as sincere as Chavalit Yongchaiyudh and Hun Sen put together.
WE NEVER thought of doing this, but since our pal Hun Sen can give an international lecture on humanitarianism and political persecution, it makes us believe that we, too, should be in with a shout. Dear friend Thaksin Shinawatra, what has happened to you is horrible, and if you think Phnom Penh is too risky a place, please consider a warm exile in Rangoon.
Of course, we are totally aware of the irony. How can a foreign version of Aung San Suu Kyi seek refuge in a country where she is under house arrest and her political party is denied a role? We would like you to put that aside for a minute and hear us out.
This whole exile thing is benefiting both of us. Thanks to Hun Sen, the world - which has been shedding crocodile tears for its "Lady" Suu Kyi - is starting to know the truth. The sincerest tears we've soon belonged to his wife who cried over you. And the man himself was spot on when he said that if international babbling about our country is not considered nosy or inappropriate, why should his comments on your plight be?
We don't mind you comparing yourself to Suu Kyi. You were in need of something catchy, and we don't blame you. But most of all, your actions spoke louder than words. The Exim bank loan was the true reflection of our friendship. You can call us dogs for all we care.
This offer is being made out of concern for your well-being. No offence to Hun Sen, but Phnom Penh isn't the safest place in the world. How could you do your second favourite thing after fighting for democracy - shopping - when you wouldn't be able to tell innocent Cambodian pedestrians from Thai agents sent by your enemies?
And not all Cambodians will be friendly. Your telecom endeavour there, while it brought everlasting friendship with many, left several others with a bad taste in their mouth. Not to mention the silly rumours about you and a power play there in the past. Yes, any political victim can go to Dubai, but it takes a real man to go and live in Cambodia. What we are saying is, why take unnecessary chances?
We also want to take some heat off our good friend Hun Sen, who we know is sincere but was naive enough to wait exactly one year since the Ratchada land ruling to come out and decry the verdict. And he did that just hours before the Thai government was about to host the Asean Summit, too. Whereas Hun Sen can be wrongly accused of being political, we can't be.
So please consider our offer. We can build you a home near Aung San Suu Kyi's, and everyone will win. We will have repaid you the Exim loan favour, you will be near your real-life heroine, safe and sound, and she will enjoy the company of a great admirer. Cambodia will be spared the heavy political baggage your exile there could entail, while Thailand will be able to quit thinking about seeking extradition, and concentrate on things more plausible.
Last but not least, although accommodating you won't get the human-rights fanatics off our back, hopefully it will confuse the daylights out of them. It will also give the otherwise pretentious and ambiguous "constructive engagement" policy of Asean a solid platform. Anwar Ibrahim, if he faces new persecution, can now flee to Phnom Penh, while defanged Cambodian princes - if somehow they need sanctuary in the future - can go to Manila.
What an intriguing web that would be. You can be the catalyst for it. And don't worry about your phone-ins. Whatever Hun Sen has promised you, you will get from us - and more.
We are terribly sorry if the Hun Sen saga was just supposed to be a tactic to steal the media spotlight and you didn't really mean to come back to this region. If that was the plan, bravo. You have caused quite a stir, and this must rank in the top five of the world's much-ado-about-nothing diplomatic issues.
But if Hun Sen is dead serious and so are you, give our offer a little thought. At least think about the publicity you'll get. Of course, "Thaksin begins Cambodia exile" is a sexy headline, but nothing would beat "Aung San Suu Kyi counterpart given asylum in Rangoon".
Sincerely,
Another true friend of yours.
The Financial Sector in Cambodia Employs 14,698 People – Tuesday, 27.10.2009
http://cambodiamirror.wordpress.com/
Posted on 28 October 2009
The Mirror, Vol. 13, No. 636
“The report of the National Bank issued recently said that banks and micro-credit institutions provide jobs for 14,698 people.
“The report shows that all commercial and other special banks create jobs for 9,550 citizens in total, while micro-finance institutions employ 5,148 people.
“According to this report, all banks in Cambodia recognized by the National Bank provide a variety of numbers of jobs. The banks employ between 13 to 6,128 persons, while the micro-finance institutions employ freom 6 to 1,024 persons.
“Based on the report, the job market in the banking and micro-finance sectors has achieved a moderate growth rate. In 2007, all commercial and other special banks provided 6,869 jobs, while in 2006, they could employ only 4,624 persons. Micro-finance institutions employed just 3,511 persons in 2007, and only 2,503 persons in 2006.
“By now, there are 24 commercial banks, 6 specialized banks, 18 micro-finance institutions, 26 rural credit operators, and about 60 organizations handling credits.”
Rasmei Kampuchea, Vol.17, #5031, 27.10.2009
Newspapers Appearing on the Newsstand:
Tuesday, 27 October 2009
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