ASEAN Summit Looms, Sugar Giant Hit With Class-Action Claim, Vanity Plates Earn $82 Million
Good morning, Cambodia. It's Friday, October 28, and this is your Weekly Dispatch.
QUICK CLEAN: Is President Biden coming? How about Xi Jinping? Nothing is set in stone for the ASEAN Summit — but streets and sidewalks are torn up across town and bad traffic is certain.
STERN TALK: Opposition leaders threw Sam Rainsy under the bus after he criticized King Norodom Sihamoni over a land deal. They didn’t have much choice: Hun Sen threatened prison time.
CAR CODES: Vanity license plates have brought the government $82 million since 2016, roughly $14 million each year, and well over $1 million per month. Can you spell 2RICH2CARE?
THE LEDE
Bloc Party
The Strongman is preparing to step out on his grandest global stage yet — the star-studded 2022 ASEAN Summit in Phnom Penh, which kicks off November 8.
Delegations from more than a dozen countries — including the U.S., China and Japan — are expected. Along with ASEAN heads of state, reports suggest global leaders such as Joe Biden, Xi Jinping and Fumio Kishida might attend, as countries jockey for influence across the increasingly important region.
Hun Sen must navigate tricky diplomatic waters and an agenda stacked with combustible issues: war in Ukraine, disputes in the South China Sea, tensions in the Taiwan Strait and escalating bloodshed in Myanmar.
Flickering Flame
Opposition leaders bowed to Hun Sen’s demand to denounce Sam Rainsy over his criticism of King Norodom Sihamoni.
Leaders of the Candlelight Party issued a statement condemning any person who “insults or abuses” the king, but failed to identify the opposition leader by name. In online comments, Sam Rainsy said the king had “betrayed” the nation by signing a land treaty with Vietnam on Hun Sen’s orders.
The prime minister blasted the comments and called for Sam Rainsy to be prosecuted. He repeated threats to ban the Candlelight Party and jail its supporters.
Treasure Hunt
A team of experts is searching the world’s museums for looted Cambodian antiquities — and they’re now looking close to home.
The Asian Civilisations Museum in Singapore holds nearly 150 Khmer relics. The experts doubt these artifacts have proper documentation. In fact, they believe the artworks were probably stolen.
Researchers estimate more than 2,000 known antiquities remain outside the Kingdom, and they’re working to locate each one. About 100 pieces are registered on an international UNESCO watchlist.
The team will soon visit museums in Japan, Korea and Taiwan.
TALKING POINTS
Company Coming
Phnom Penh is cleaning house — and the streets, sidewalks and promenades — to tidy up for the 2022 ASEAN Summit. Officials have asked residents to beautify homes and fly the flag to promote national pride. Officials warned of blocked roads and snarled traffic.
Dirt Cheap
The government quietly rescinded a 2017 ban on sand exports more than a year ago, and no one noticed until now. An industry insider said minimum orders were 1 million tons, and dozens of barges were floating to Vietnam every day.
Dark Money
Investigators from the Financial Action Task Force, the global money-laundering watchdog, will visit Cambodia to assess its performance tackling illegal financial flows. The Kingdom is currently listed on the FATF’s “gray list,” and a downgrade could bring sanctions with “devastating” effects on the economy.
Digging It
It’s a last-ditch effort — literally. Environmentalists in the Kingdom’s remote north are digging trenches that are 5.5m wide, 2.5m deep, and 15km long to keep wildlife from wandering outside a protected area — and keep poachers from wandering in
Landmark Case
In a legal first for the region, 711 Cambodian families have sued the Thai sugar giant Mitr Phol in a class-action lawsuit alleging forced displacement, land grabbing and destruction of property. Families said the company burned homes and destroyed rice fields in the process. A decision is expected late next year.
Rough Roads
The roads in Siem Reap province are the deadliest in the country. Officials recorded 116 deaths and more than 100 injuries through September. Speeding, reckless driving and driving under the influence were among the chief causes. More than 1,000 motorists died in accidents nationwide over the same period.
Lucky Numbers
The government pockets more than $1 million per month in fees from personalized license plates. Since 2016, it has earned more than $82 million, with much of that coming after it moved to an online auctioning system in 2020. Bidding starts at 2 million riel and is capped at 3.5 trillion — about $840 million.
Boning Up
Archeologists in Koh Kong discovered a fossilized dinosaur bone at least 65 million years old. In Battambang province, explorers found “excellent” specimens of snails, coral and insects from the Permian Period, which ended 250 million years ago. Archeologists hadn't studied the area since the French colonial era.
BACKPAGES: From The Cambodia Daily Vault
Stung Treng Said to be Busiest Transit Point for Golden Triangle Heroin
October 26, 2002
The fog-covered mountains, steamy jungles and island-dotted waterways of the Lao-Cambodian border amount to some of the most isolated and inaccessible parts of Cambodia.
Sorcery Cited in Slaying of CPP Activist, Wife
October 24, 2002
Kompong Cham province police are blaming black magic for the shooting deaths of a CPP activist and his wife as they slept in their beds Sunday.
Experts: Poor Being Pushed to Unusable Land
October 24, 2002
In the aftermath of this year’s twin scourges of flood and drought that have left some 1 million people facing the worst food shortage in years, officials are beginning to acknowledge that a land crisis is the underlying cause of Cambodia’s losing battle with nature.
Kompong Cham Child Workers Smoking More
October 22, 2002
Children working illegally in Kompong Cham province’s seven rubber plantations face greater health problems this year due to increased cigarette use, a habit thought to keep mosquitoes at bay, aid officials say.
Photos: Hun Sen, courtesy MFA. Wat Ounalom, Göran Höglund via Flickr.