Showing posts with label Khmer. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Khmer. Show all posts
Chea Mony maintains his accusation against the government
21 August 2009
Everyday.com.kh
Translated from Khmer by Socheata
In spite of the lawsuit threat leveled by government official against Chea Mony, President of the Free Trade Union of Workers in the Kingdom of Cambodia (FTUWKC), for his comment accusing the government of involvement in the 2004 murder of Chea Vichea, Chea Mony’s older brother, Chea Mony still maintains his stance. Speaking to The Phnom Penh Post on Thursday, Chea Mony said that what he raised was not exaggeration, it was the truth. He said: “The Cambodian government has the duty to find the killers. If the government does not look for the killers, it means that the government is truly behind this murder.” Chea Mony repeated that he does not fear the lawsuit threat against him. He said that he is already prepared to accept the responsibility and he is willing to face jail over the presumption on the murder of his brother, i.e. that the government was behind Chea Vichea’s murder.
Maritime border: Thailand’s major naval exercise that include an aircraft carrier seen as a show of force to Cambodia
21 August 2009
Rasmei Kampuchea newspaper
Translated from Khmer by Socheata
The Thai Royal Navy conducted a major naval exercise which included an aircraft carrier and several battleships near Koh Kut Island. The naval exercise was conducted as a show of force to Cambodia after the Cambodian government authorized the Total oil company to explore for oil in the nearby waters.
Chhum Socheat, spokesman for the Cambodian ministry of Defense, told Rasmei Kampuchea over the phone in the afternoon of 20 August that Thailand conducted its naval exercise in the Koh Kut region for more than one week already, starting from Sunday 09 August to 17 August. The exercise included 10 ships: standard ships, an aircraft carrier and several battleships.
Chhum Socheat indicated that, following the naval exercise, Thailand left behind 3 ships in the region. Thailand undertook the exercise after it protested Cambodia’s agreement to allow to the French Total company to explore for oil.
ANNE MUGISHA: Horror in the Room of Faces
I asked [our guide] if she had forgiven these brutal animals who had done this, and she said: "What can we do? Some of them are still living and working in this government, what can we do? Only the government knows." ... The people who were responsible for these atrocities are not only living among the people, but some are also highly placed members of the current Cambodian government.
Wednesday, 12 August 2009
Written by Anne Mugisha
Columnists
The Observer (Uganda)
Our next stop in the tour of Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum (S21) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia took us to a room filled with photographs of the victims who were tortured and killed there.
The Khmer Rouge executed their brutality with clinical detachment and professionalism that still sends a chill down the spines of visitors here. What happened here was methodical extermination of anyone considered a threat to the regime.
The systematic documentation of their deeds speaks of the complete belief in the legitimacy of their orders to capture, torture and kill.
The prisoners in S21 had a special chair made for them where they sat to pose for their final photograph. In a perfectly silent room I stared at the mug-shots of the victims.
Cambodia: Miss Landmine Pageant Raises Questions
Wednesday, August 12th, 2009
By Chhunny Chhean
Global Voices Online
“Everybody has the right to be beautiful!” so starts the manifesto of the Miss Landmine pageant, started by Morten Traavik of Norway. According to the pageant site, the competition is intended to empower landmine victims and challenge traditional notions of beauty. The winner receives a high-tech prosthetic limb. Traavik has already organized a Miss Landmine pageant in Angola and was in the process of launching the event in Cambodia this month when the Cambodian government pulled its support and canceled the pageant.
The Mirror reports that other organizations, including the Cambodian Disabled People's Organization, declined to support the pageant after the Ministry of Social Affairs Veteran and Youth Rehabilitation expressed its displeasure with the pageant, citing the event could lead to misunderstandings about disabled people.
Not surprisingly, there have been varied reactions to the landmine pageant.
A gathering of the displaced
ABOUT 300 Cambodians from 19 different provinces converged on the capital Tuesday to lodge complaints with a variety of government institutions in the hope of securing official intervention in land disputes across the country.
Several villagers told the Post on Tuesday that they had travelled to Phnom Penh because they want the government to cancel economic land concessions that they claim have stolen community land and sapped local resources.
Villagers emphasised that the purpose of their visit was to seek a solution, not to vent anger. "We are not here to protest - we have come to ask for government help," said 51-year-old Mom Sakim from Kratie province.
She claimed that 110 families in her district were involved in a dispute with a private company over a 1,000-hectare land concession.
"We stopped believing that local authorities would help us, so we decided to come to Phnom Penh, and we hope that the government will not ignore this matter," she said.
Villagers separated into several groups of about 40 to 50, then went off to file thumbprint petitions with the National Assembly, Prime Minister Hun Sen's Cabinet, the Council of Ministers, the Ministry of Interior, the National Authority for Resolving Land Disputes, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, and the Ministry of Environment.
Groups Lodge Massive Land Complaint [-Getting closer to Hun Xen's predicted "farmers' revolution"?]
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By Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
12 August 2009
More than 300 representatives from 19 provinces urged government agencies and offices to resolve disputes in more than 700,000 hectares of land, complaining their daily existence was threatened by their displacement.
“We are losing land, forests and fisheries that are important sources of our daily livelihoods, because of some private companies and powerful officials,” said Hor Sam Art, a representative of family in Battambang province.
The group, from 29 different communities, filed a joint complaint to the offices of the prime minister, the Council of Ministers, the National Authority for Land Dispute Resolution, and the Ministry of Land Management on Tuesday.
Int'l conference held for conservation of Cambodian Prasat Banteay Chmar
PHNOM PENH, Aug. 12 (Xinhua) -- The Second Conference on Conservation Project of Prasat Banteay Chmar was jointly organized in Cambodia's Banteay Meanchey province by the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, the provincial authority, and the UNESCO, the official news agency AKP reported on Wednesday.
The three-day conference ended Monday was attended by Khim Sarith, secretary of state to the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, Banteay Meanchey Governor Ung Oeurn, and the representatives of the British and U.S. embassies, and a number of national and foreign historians.
"The entire people in the province, especially those living in the vicinity, supported the conservation project of Prasat Banteay Chmar," said Banteay Meanchey Governor Ung Oeurn, underlining that people are prepared to participate in the conservation activities with a view to list it as one of the World Heritage.
Experts say World Heritage listing for Banteay Chmar will take years
Banteay Meanchey Province
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Photo by: Roger Mitton
The Angkorian Banteay Chmar temple in Banteay Meanchey province.
THE listing of Banteay Chmar temple as a UN World Heritage Site will take at least two to three years, say government officials and scholars who met at a conference on the issue in Sisophon over the weekend.
Banteay Chmar is one of Cambodia's most neglected but most spectacular temple sites. There is a concerted effort to help the site win a coveted World Heritage listing, but the process will not be easy, and there are many hurdles to overcome, officials said.
Currently, not even the preliminary submission of an application for a listing to the National Commission for UNESCO in Phnom Penh has been completed.
"We are not ready to submit the application yet," said Chuch Phoeurn, secretary of state at the Ministry of Culture, who visited Banteay Chmar on Saturday with provincial governor Oung Oeun and other dignitaries and international experts.
More data still needs to be collected to establish that Banteay Chmar possesses "outstanding universal values" that make it a site of great historical and architectural distinction.
Chuch Phoeurn said Banteay Chmar will be able to meet the requirements because it is unique and its architecture differs from the famous Bayon temple in the Angkor complex.
Banteay Chmar is well known for its intricate carvings and long walls of bas-relief. Vast and ruinous, it is one of the few temples to feature the enigmatic Bayon-style giant faces with their mysterious smiles.
It was built by King Jayavarman II on the site of an old Hindu temple in the late 12th or early 13th century. In its original state, a 9-kilometre-long wall enclosed the temple, which was one of the largest Buddhist monasteries of the Angkor era.
Most of the more than 100 scholars attending the three-day Sisophon conference agreed that Banteay Chmar has the credentials to be listed, but they concurred that it is likely to be a long, slow process.
Governor Oung Oeun said: "I will be very happy if this temple can be listed as a World Heritage Site, but before we can achieve that goal a lot of work needs to be done."
Once the initial submission is made and approved, it must then go to the president of UNESCO to confirm, and then it must receive the nod from Prime Minister Hun Sen. Only then will it be submitted to UNESCO in Paris.
If Paris judges it to be a worthwhile bid, a team will be sent to Banteay Chmar to verify the submission - and if they tick it off and UNESCO approves, it will be listed. "It is a long two- to three-year process," said Chuch Phoeurn.
As well as these bureaucratic and cultural hurdles, there are major infrastructure and access problems to sort out, officials warned. The road leading to the site is in poor condition and is often washed out in the rainy season.
John Sandey, Asia Pacific field director of the Global Heritage Fund, which is helping Cambodia restore the temple, said at the conference:
"There are major deficiencies like a lack of water and electricity at the site that must receive attention. No water, no tourists." And no World Heritage listing - for the moment.
David Chandler: “Obedience plays into the horror of it all”
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10-08-2009
By Stéphanie Gée
Ka-set
Thursday August 6th saw the highly anticipated hearing of U.S. professor David Chandler, one of the leading experts on Cambodia’s recent history and author, among others, of “Brother Number One” (1992) and “Voices from S-21” (1999). In addition to highlighting the characteristics of S-21, the “anteroom to death” where prisoners were all bound to be executed, the 76-year-old expert shed a bold light on the human dimension of the accused, by choosing to stress the vulnerability of the man who may be led to commit “crimes of obedience” rather than giving any credit to the idea of absolute evil. He thus agreed with the thesis defended by Duch, who says he was an “actor and hostage of this criminal regime.” However, there was a huge regret mixed with an incomprehension: why did the judges decide to hear this important witness over one day only, when the analysis of the heart of the case neared its end, while other witnesses with less significance were summoned over one or two days of trial?
Hang Chakra’s appeal hearing is held this Tuesday
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11 August 2009
Everyday.com.kh
Translated from Khmer by Socheata
The appeal made by Hang Chakra, the editor-in-chief of the Khmer Machas Srok newspaper, against the 1-year jail sentence and 9 million riels ($2,250) fine handed to him by the Phnom Penh municipal court for defamation will be heard by the Appeal Court this Tuesday. Chuong Chou-ngy, Hang Chakra’s defense lawyer, said that he will go to the court to defend Hang Chakra. He said that his client’s case would improve and be fair if the court is not subjected to political pressure.
300,000 youths completing their "high school and bachelor degrees" face joblessness each year in Cambodia: NGO survey
11 August 2009
By Ratana
Khmer Sthabna news
Translated from Khmer by Socheata
On Wednesday 12 August 2009 which is celebrated as the International Youth Day, Ban Ki-Moon, the UN Secretary-general, sent a message on this special occasion stating:
“The theme of this year’s International Youth Day -– “Sustainability: Our Challenge. Our Future” –- is a global call to action for young men and women. Our world faces multiple interconnected crises with severe and far-reaching impacts that fall disproportionately on the young.
In 2007, for example, youth comprised 25 per cent of the world’s working age population yet accounted for 40 per cent of the unemployed. The global economic downturn means that, in the near term, youth unemployment will continue to climb. Unemployment rates tell only part of the story, especially for the vast majority of youth who live in developing countries. For them, informal, insecure and low-wage employment is the norm, not the exception.
Visa exemptions costly but worth it: officials
Tourism officials last week announced the loss of more US$14 million in revenue generated by tourists from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations since January 2008, when the government adopted a visa-exemption agreement with five member-states.
According to a report by the Ministry of Tourism, Cambodia honoured 278,842 visa exemptions in the first half of this year from travellers from Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, Vietnam and Laos, which resulted in a loss of $5.5 million in revenues.
The report added that last year revenues declined by $8.6 million after visa exemptions totaling 431,426 were issued to tourists from the same countries.
Minister of Tourism Thong Khon said Sunday that Cambodia would extend the visa-exemption programme to four additional ASEAN member-states despite the loss of revenue.
"We realise that our visa-exemption programme for travellers from ASEAN countries results in lower national revenues, but we will continue it because increased arrivals can boost economic growth Kingdom-wide and will create many jobs for Cambodians," Thong Khon said.
He added that visa exemptions would be extended to all ASEAN countries by 2015.
"Next year, we will implement visa exemptions for Thailand, followed later by Indonesia, Brunei and Myanmar," Thong Khon said.
Ho Vandy, co-chair of the Government-Private Sector Tourism Working Group, said Sunday that the visa-exemption programme could help woo more tourists from
ASEAN nations, adding that the number of Vietnamese tourists rose 40 percent last year following the establishment of the visa exemption.
"I think the [programme] provides a positive sign for tourism providers to increase their service competitiveness in order to lure more tourists [to Cambodia]," Ho Vandy said.Some 552,461 tourists from nine ASEAN countries visited Cambodia, according to Ministry of Tourism data.
Cambodia agreed to its first visa-exemption programme with Malaysia in the late 1990s, adding the Philippines, Singapore, Laos and Vietnam in subsequent years.
The Ministry of Tourism estimates that under the visa-exemption programme, at least 1 million tourists from nine ASEAN countries will travel to Cambodia between 2010 and 2011.
Prime Minister Hun Sen said last week that the Kingdom could expect to lose as much as $20 million in revenue each year if the country implemented visa exemptions with all ASEAN member-states.
HIV/AIDS crisis looming among gay men: report
Bali, Indonesia
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Photo by: Sovan Philong
Transgender sex workers wait for customers near Wat Phnom.
THE government's failure to provide adequate HIV/AIDS prevention for men who have sex with men (MSM) could plunge Cambodia's gay community into an epidemic tantamount to "genocide", experts have warned.
Out of almost US$4 billion invested in Asia over the past five years, less than $100 million has been allocated to the MSM community, according to Dr Sawarup Sarkar of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. "There's a whole political and social bias against this population," he told the Post.
The Commission on AIDS in Asia has estimated that Cambodia needs to spend $500,000 per year on prevention efforts in order to reach 80 percent of the most at-risk portion of its gay community, but the country spent nothing last year, Sarkar said.
"Cambodia is the highest-invested country in the region, with almost $5 per capita [allocated by donors for HIV-prevention efforts], but there is zero allocation to the MSM population," he said. "We are not funding enough the
most at-risk communities."
090810_02
Photo by: Sovan Philong
Bin Samnang speaks about efforts to educate gay men in Battambang province about the risks of HIV/AIDS.
Teaching MSM about AIDS in Battambang
IN SEVEN years as an outreach coordinator for the Battambang-based NGO Men's Health Social Services (MHSS), Bin Samnang has met eight gay men who later died from AIDS.
"Everybody is afraid of AIDS, and so am I," said the 30-year-old, who is gay himself. "That is why we are trying to educate people about it."
Bin Samnang said he began wearing women's clothes as a teenager in 1996. Shortly thereafter, he decided to leave home to live in an apartment with a group of gay friends, all of whom, he said, were attempting to escape derision from their families and neighbours.
He became sexually active after he started dancing for street bands in 1997.
"I was happy when I could go out dancing," he said. "I started to go out a lot with my group, and we started to have lots of sexual partners."
But he did not learn about the importance of wearing condoms to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS until he took the job with MHSS in 2002.
As a result of his experiences in the field, Bin Samnang has committed himself to educating other gay men in Battambang about the threat of HIV/AIDS.
He said recently that he believed outreach efforts to gay men in the province had been effective.
"Almost all gays use a condom when they have sex," he said.
"They know now about the threats because they have been educated by other gays. Only very few gays now say they do not use condoms."
He acknowledged, though, that some men still do not believe they can contract HIV/AIDS by having sex with other men.
"Education about reproductive health has been scattered in Battambang, so we don't know for sure how many gays have been educated in the province," he said.
KHUON LEAKHANA
Shivananda Khan, chairman of the Asia Pacific Coalition on Male Sexual Health (APCOM), said the failure of national governments to allocate resources to their MSM and transgender communities constitutes "a crime against humanity".
Addressing a forum on HIV in gay communities in Bali, Indonesia, at the International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, Khan said: "194 MSM and transgender people are getting infected with HIV every day. With the level of services and with the level of coverage, what hope do they have in terms of accessing treatment, care, support or even prevention? That is not only shocking, it is shameful: It is a form almost of genocide. It is a crime against humanity.
"The only way we can win this battle is if we work together and stand shoulder to shoulder to address the crisis so this genocide stops. We have the technology and the evidence to stop it, and enough is enough. What we are dealing with is a crisis in human lives."
Although the HIV prevalence rate among MSM in Cambodia is lower than in neighbouring Thailand and Myanmar, the country is nearing a crucial tipping point, the UN has warned.
New infections could rapidly spiral out of control unless the government does more to educate the community about how to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, according to UNAIDS, the UN's joint programme on AIDS and HIV.
"Asia and the Pacific is on the brink of a large increase in new infections among MSMs if risk behaviours of low condom use and many concurrent male partners stay at current levels," JVR Prasada Rao, Asia and the Pacific regional director for UNAIDS, told the forum.
"The [Commission on AIDS in Asia] has predicted that if business as usual continues, by 2020, men who have sex with men and transgenders will be the largest segment of infected people in Asia."
Frits Van Griensven, chief of behavioural research at the US Centre for Disease Control, said the Cambodian government must "act now" to avert catastrophe. "If you are late acting, it will be too late, and the prevalence will be too difficult to bring down," he told the forum.
Prevention efforts should also address the social challenges facing MSM and transgender people, said Griensven, citing links between binge drinking, drug use, a history of coercive sex, suicidal thoughts and social isolation with failure to use condoms during sex.
"We shouldn't be targeting HIV in isolation, but in the context of the social conditions people live in," he said.
Funding should be allocated to peer education, treatment of non-HIV sexually transmitted infections, distribution of condoms and lubricants, and advocacy to decriminalise the community and remove the stigma surrounding MSM, said Global Fund's Sarkar.
He said the people most at risk, which represent up to 25 percent of the MSM community, are male sex workers and transgender people, who are most likely to have receptive sex. People who frequent cruising spots are also considered high-risk.
The latest statistics suggest that 8.7 percent of MSM in Phnom Penh are HIV-positive. The study, which dates from 2007, estimates prevalence among the transgender community to be as high as 17 percent. HIV prevalence among people ages 15-49 in Cambodia stood at 0.9 percent, or 67,200 people, in 2007. This was down from 1.2 percent in 2003, UNAIDS figures show.
One of the most alarming trends in the epidemiological data is the high rate of infection among the youngest segments of the MSM and
transgender communities. A recent study in Thailand followed 1,000 HIV-negative MSM for three years. During that time, 20 percent contracted
HIV. Among those aged between 18 and 22, the infection rate was 30 percent.
The Commission on AIDS in Asia estimated that $3 billion was needed every year in Asia to reach 80 percent of positive people, 80 percent of people at high risk of contracting HIV and 80 percent of affected families. However, just $1 billion was available last year from major public sources, leaving a $2 billion shortfall.
Programmes targeting MSM required $300 million per year, it said, but only $20 million to $40 million was spent, mostly from the Global Fund.
The government could not be reached for comment on Sunday.
Nathan Green, who has been reporting from Bali since last Monday, travelled to Indonesia on a UNAIDS-funded trip.
Photo by: Sovan Philong
Transgender sex workers wait for customers near Wat Phnom.
THE government's failure to provide adequate HIV/AIDS prevention for men who have sex with men (MSM) could plunge Cambodia's gay community into an epidemic tantamount to "genocide", experts have warned.
Out of almost US$4 billion invested in Asia over the past five years, less than $100 million has been allocated to the MSM community, according to Dr Sawarup Sarkar of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. "There's a whole political and social bias against this population," he told the Post.
The Commission on AIDS in Asia has estimated that Cambodia needs to spend $500,000 per year on prevention efforts in order to reach 80 percent of the most at-risk portion of its gay community, but the country spent nothing last year, Sarkar said.
"Cambodia is the highest-invested country in the region, with almost $5 per capita [allocated by donors for HIV-prevention efforts], but there is zero allocation to the MSM population," he said. "We are not funding enough the
most at-risk communities."
090810_02
Photo by: Sovan Philong
Bin Samnang speaks about efforts to educate gay men in Battambang province about the risks of HIV/AIDS.
Teaching MSM about AIDS in Battambang
IN SEVEN years as an outreach coordinator for the Battambang-based NGO Men's Health Social Services (MHSS), Bin Samnang has met eight gay men who later died from AIDS.
"Everybody is afraid of AIDS, and so am I," said the 30-year-old, who is gay himself. "That is why we are trying to educate people about it."
Bin Samnang said he began wearing women's clothes as a teenager in 1996. Shortly thereafter, he decided to leave home to live in an apartment with a group of gay friends, all of whom, he said, were attempting to escape derision from their families and neighbours.
He became sexually active after he started dancing for street bands in 1997.
"I was happy when I could go out dancing," he said. "I started to go out a lot with my group, and we started to have lots of sexual partners."
But he did not learn about the importance of wearing condoms to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS until he took the job with MHSS in 2002.
As a result of his experiences in the field, Bin Samnang has committed himself to educating other gay men in Battambang about the threat of HIV/AIDS.
He said recently that he believed outreach efforts to gay men in the province had been effective.
"Almost all gays use a condom when they have sex," he said.
"They know now about the threats because they have been educated by other gays. Only very few gays now say they do not use condoms."
He acknowledged, though, that some men still do not believe they can contract HIV/AIDS by having sex with other men.
"Education about reproductive health has been scattered in Battambang, so we don't know for sure how many gays have been educated in the province," he said.
KHUON LEAKHANA
Shivananda Khan, chairman of the Asia Pacific Coalition on Male Sexual Health (APCOM), said the failure of national governments to allocate resources to their MSM and transgender communities constitutes "a crime against humanity".
Addressing a forum on HIV in gay communities in Bali, Indonesia, at the International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific, Khan said: "194 MSM and transgender people are getting infected with HIV every day. With the level of services and with the level of coverage, what hope do they have in terms of accessing treatment, care, support or even prevention? That is not only shocking, it is shameful: It is a form almost of genocide. It is a crime against humanity.
"The only way we can win this battle is if we work together and stand shoulder to shoulder to address the crisis so this genocide stops. We have the technology and the evidence to stop it, and enough is enough. What we are dealing with is a crisis in human lives."
Although the HIV prevalence rate among MSM in Cambodia is lower than in neighbouring Thailand and Myanmar, the country is nearing a crucial tipping point, the UN has warned.
New infections could rapidly spiral out of control unless the government does more to educate the community about how to prevent the spread of HIV/AIDS, according to UNAIDS, the UN's joint programme on AIDS and HIV.
"Asia and the Pacific is on the brink of a large increase in new infections among MSMs if risk behaviours of low condom use and many concurrent male partners stay at current levels," JVR Prasada Rao, Asia and the Pacific regional director for UNAIDS, told the forum.
"The [Commission on AIDS in Asia] has predicted that if business as usual continues, by 2020, men who have sex with men and transgenders will be the largest segment of infected people in Asia."
Frits Van Griensven, chief of behavioural research at the US Centre for Disease Control, said the Cambodian government must "act now" to avert catastrophe. "If you are late acting, it will be too late, and the prevalence will be too difficult to bring down," he told the forum.
Prevention efforts should also address the social challenges facing MSM and transgender people, said Griensven, citing links between binge drinking, drug use, a history of coercive sex, suicidal thoughts and social isolation with failure to use condoms during sex.
"We shouldn't be targeting HIV in isolation, but in the context of the social conditions people live in," he said.
Funding should be allocated to peer education, treatment of non-HIV sexually transmitted infections, distribution of condoms and lubricants, and advocacy to decriminalise the community and remove the stigma surrounding MSM, said Global Fund's Sarkar.
He said the people most at risk, which represent up to 25 percent of the MSM community, are male sex workers and transgender people, who are most likely to have receptive sex. People who frequent cruising spots are also considered high-risk.
The latest statistics suggest that 8.7 percent of MSM in Phnom Penh are HIV-positive. The study, which dates from 2007, estimates prevalence among the transgender community to be as high as 17 percent. HIV prevalence among people ages 15-49 in Cambodia stood at 0.9 percent, or 67,200 people, in 2007. This was down from 1.2 percent in 2003, UNAIDS figures show.
One of the most alarming trends in the epidemiological data is the high rate of infection among the youngest segments of the MSM and
transgender communities. A recent study in Thailand followed 1,000 HIV-negative MSM for three years. During that time, 20 percent contracted
HIV. Among those aged between 18 and 22, the infection rate was 30 percent.
The Commission on AIDS in Asia estimated that $3 billion was needed every year in Asia to reach 80 percent of positive people, 80 percent of people at high risk of contracting HIV and 80 percent of affected families. However, just $1 billion was available last year from major public sources, leaving a $2 billion shortfall.
Programmes targeting MSM required $300 million per year, it said, but only $20 million to $40 million was spent, mostly from the Global Fund.
The government could not be reached for comment on Sunday.
Nathan Green, who has been reporting from Bali since last Monday, travelled to Indonesia on a UNAIDS-funded trip.
Former Khmer Rouge guard describes dumping corpses at Cambodia's Killing Fields
Monday, August 10, 2009
By Sopheng Cheang
Canadian Press
PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — A former Khmer Rouge prison guard told a court Monday he was taken to Cambodia's notorious Killing Fields one afternoon 30 years ago and ordered to dump corpses into a mass grave.
Chhun Phal, 47, said he did not count how many dead bodies he handled, but it took him and 11 other guards two hours to dispose of them.
"I was asked to bury the bodies," he said softly. "I managed to only fill one pit with dead bodies."
The guards then dug two more pits to add to the hundreds of mass graves at Choeung Ek, more commonly known as the Killing Fields, on the outskirts of the capital, Phnom Penh, where thousands of the Khmer Rouge's victims were killed and their bodies dumped.
Thai Arrested for Insulting Angkor Wat
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By Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
10 August 2009
A Thai citizen was arrested in Poipet Monday for allegedly insulting Angkor Wat.
Banteay Meanchey provincial police arrested the man after he carved the shape of Angkor Wat in the concrete in front of a public toilet in the border town.
His act constituted “looking down” on Angkor Wat and was “against the will of Cambodian people,” a police official said, a penal crime under Cambodian law.
Experts Urge More Natural Fertilizer Use
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By Taing Sarada, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
10 August 2009
While most Cambodian farmers prefer to use chemical fertilizers on their crops, hoping to boost the yield of their rice, fruit and vegetables, agricultural experts warn that the use of such chemicals can damage health, soil quality and natural diversity.
Not only can it be harmful to humans, they say, but it can hurt biodiversity, damaging populations of fish, frogs and crabs that farmers depend on to supplement their diets.
Instead, farmers should try to maintain the nutrients in their soil for long-term farming of quality agricultural products, according to Yang Saing Koma, president of the Cambodian Center for Study and Development in Agriculture, or Cedac.
Vann Molyvann calls on Cambodian engineers abroad to return home to help improve engrg. education and development: Are you ready to return?
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Monday, 10 August 2009
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
The Phnom Penh Post
Veteran architect Vann Molyvann says Cambodian engineers working abroad should return home to help improve engineering education and development.
Though Cambodia has 180 engineers who have been certified by the ASEAN Federation of Engineering Organisations (AFEO), Vann Molyvann, the Kingdom's most famous architect, says there is much to be done to bring Cambodian engineering up to international standards.
"The shortage of facilities, materials, and especially well-experienced professors are the main problem for Cambodian students who want to become engineers," he told the Post on Sunday.
Vann Molyvann was at the forefront of the New Khmer Architecture movement that flourished under the patronage of then-Prince Norodom Sihanouk in the 1950s and 1960s.
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Typhoon Morakot slams into eastern China; 1 reported killed
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August 9th, 2009
BEIJING, China (CNN) -- At least one person was killed Sunday as Typhoon Morakot slammed into eastern China, packing high winds and torrential rain.
Nearly a million people had been evacuated from Fujian and Zhejiang provinces as Morakot approached.
The storm made landfall in the coastal area of Beibi Town, Xiapu County in Fujian province at about 4:20 p.m. Sunday (0820 GMT), according to China's state-run Xinhua news agency.
Sex slavery victim visits Central New York, speaks out against child sex trafficking
Friday August 07, 2009
By Nina Wegner
The Post-Standard (New York, USA)
Somaly Mam, an international spokeswoman for ending child sex trafficking, paid a visit to the Carousel Center on this week to help promote an anti-trafficking campaign launched by The Body Shop.
More than 1.8 million children and young people are trafficked in the global sex trade each year, even within the United States, according to a 2002 report by the International Labor Organization.
Human trafficking is the globe's second largest organized crime, generating $9.5 billion a year, according to the U.S. State Department. However, sex trafficking remains an underexposed issue in America
