Cambodia: Details are Sketchy

Signs of things to come.

Cambodian garment exports plummeted 46 percent in the fourth quarter of 2007, capping off a dismal year in one of the impoverished country’s key sectors, industry officials say, warning of future factory closures and job cuts.

An economic downturn in the United States, which buys 70 percent of all Cambodian textiles, and continuing domestic labour disputes contributed to the plunge, said Van Sou Ieng, chairman of the Garment Manufacturers’ Association of Cambodia (GMAC).

Until last year, the sector had enjoyed annual growth of up to 20 percent, he added.

Those poor factory owners.

UPDATE: Eric weighs in.

VIA VOA: An Adhoc report released this week confirms the obvious.

The government has tightened its control over civil society in the past year, while the number of rights abuses has remained high, a group said Wednesday.

The freedom to organize and demonstrate has diminished, as has the right to life and security, the well-respected group, Adhoc, said in an annual report. In 2007, the group documented 574 personal or political rights abuses.

VOA doesn’t say it — and the Adhoc report doesn’t appear to be online — but this muffling of society is not without context. National elections are in July and the CPP has no plans on losing. If that means putting the jackboots of suppression to the gut of freedom then so be it.

Such dictatorial behavior hardly seems necessary, though. Even independent observers predict a CPP victory in July.

Necessity, however, is not what compels the ruling party’s death grip on power; it’s instinct. And while it’s likely the ruling party will relax that grip once the ballots are counted, such heavy handed electoral tactics are hardly the mark of a flourishing democracy, to say nothing of its commentary on “free and fair” elections.

Cambodian conservation work – not just a man’s world
Women are working as hard and sweating as much as the men in WWF conservation programs in remote areas of Kampuchea.

More than 150 Cambodian turtles rescued from becoming dinner
Scores of Cambodian turtles described as “endangered” have been rescued from the near-certain fate of a dinner plate and released back into the wild, local media reported Wednesday.i firms to invest in Cambodia power plant

Local Engineering Firm Extends Its Reach To Asean
Kejuruteraan DCT (M) Sdn Bhd (DCT), the sole local producer and supplier of food processing machinery in Malaysia, has appointed three agents in Indonesia, Thailand and Cambodia in efforts to expand its reach to Asean.

FBI director to visit Cambodia for further legal cooperation
Robert Mueller, Director of Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), will start a two-day official visit to Cambodia on Wednesday to meet with the Prime Minister Hun Sen and government officials, according to the U.S. Embassy in Cambodia

Cambodia, US to increase anti crime cooperation
Director Muller will preside over the official opening of the bureau’s permanent office in Cambodia’s Phnom Penh capital the same day, said sources from the US embassy in Cambodia was cited by the media as saying.

Three Thai firms to invest in Cambodia power plant
Three leading Thai companies said on Wednesday they were studying plans to build a 3,660-megawatt coal-fired power plant in Cambodia to supply electricity to Thailand.

VIA KI: In a story about Sam Rainsy and striking factory workers, a story translated from Kampuchea Thmei says this about factory workers demands.

In the morning of 28 January 2008, opposition leader Sam Rainsy, accompanied by Phnom Penh SRP MPs Ho Vann and Nou Sovath, visited the Phnom Penh Garment City Ltd. where 400 striking workers were demanding (1) for a $6.83 monthly food supplement, and (2) that they be paid in cash salary rather than factory tickets.

Paid in factory tickets? What? More details, please.

If this is just a bad translation for “checks,” then it’s a really, really bad translation. But that seems unlikely. Nobody complains about getting a check as long as it doesn’t bounce. The chances seem much greater that this is some half-clever racket to gyp factory workers out of their monthly pay packets.

Or not. Who knows? Maybe in a subsequent issue the Kampuchea Thmei might be kind enough to let the rest of the world in on their little secret.

The Los Angeles Times last week reported on a series of high-profile raids on U.S. museums believed to be involved in the global antiquities smuggling trade. Specifically, investigators were searching for antiquities from Thailand, Myanmar and China. Rather conspicuously, the story made no mention of Cambodia.

Stories yesterday in the L.A. Times and today in the New York Times add Cambodia to the list. As the NYT explains:

[U.S.] Federal agents have also focused on Barry L. MacLean, an art collector and industrialist who is a vice chairman of the Art Institute of Chicago and who maintains a museum, known as the MacLean Collection, in Libertyville, Ill., north of Chicago. Mr. MacLean is chief executive of the MacLean-Fogg Company, a manufacturer of industrial parts in nearby Mundelein, Ill.

According to the federal documents, Mr. MacLean bought artifacts looted in Cambodia, Thailand, Myanmar and Vietnam. They were sold to Mr. MacLean by Mr. [Robert] Olson, who the court papers say described Mr. MacLean as one of his best clients.

Among the items in Mr. MacLean’s collection said to have been illegally taken from foreign sites were bronze caldrons and ivory and gold earrings from Cambodia, and bronze combs, bracelets and spears from Thailand.

So do you think that means Cambodia will get her stuff back? Unfortunately, that’s not at all clear.

Nuon Chea has asked that judge Ney Thol be removed from the court.

The lawyer of jailed Khmer Rouge leader Nuon Chea has called for the removal from the proceedings of judge Ney Thol, who is also the chief of Cambodia’s military courts.

Lawyer Victor Koppe confirmed Tuesday he had filed a motion to disqualify Ney Thol, but Koppe declined to elaborate.

[...]

Legal experts said Ney Thol’s dual positions could constitute a conflict of interest, but Ney Thol said Tuesday the motion was “inappropriate.”

Considering that it is a lawyer’s duty to vigorously defend his client, it’s unclear what about the motion would make it “inappropriate.” More likely, the motion points to inappropriate behavior on the part on Ney Thol. Ney Thol was, after all, the judge that found Prince Ranariddh guilty of weapons smuggling in 1998 and the man that put Cheam Channy behind bars in 2005. Both trials were widely regarded as frauds.

But beyond this specific case, Koppe’s motion to disqualify raises some very tricky questions for the court at large. Every local judge of the ECCC is compromised. Should the presiding judges sustain Koppe’s motion, it would immediately through throw into question the eligibility of virtually every local judge on the court. At the same time, denying the motion — which for obvious reasons seems incredibly likely — has to be done with at least a semblance of legal propriety, lest the entire bench be revealed as hopelessly in the pocket of their political masters.

It’s quite the dilemma. And considering the muddy legal history of so many on the court, unlikely to be the last.

In other KRT news from VOA:

• Former S-21 Photographer Plans Display
• Tribunal Takes Ieng Sary for Check-Up
• Judges Meet to Iron Out Tribunal Rules

UPDATE: Stan Starygin at ECCC Reparations offers this analysis:

Under normal circumstances lawyers in this country defense lawyers would bury arguments which could potentially help their clients if those documents had a tint of a possibility of invoking the anger of the presiding judge. Regardless of the outcome of this affair, ECCC lawyers’ courageous act will establish a precedent and send a signal that things which are completely off-limits in ordinary Cambodians courts do fly at the ECCC.

LATER UPDATE: Motion denied.

“I can only say that the motion was not upheld,” [Tribunal spokesperson Reach] Sambath said, but declined to comment further.

VIA Eric: Noel over at the Southeast Asian Archeology Blog weighs in on the recent discovery of a “water channel” at Phum Snay.

You’ll probably have to sift through some hype here - it may be a bit of a stretch to say that the Khmer civilization, and by inference Angkor, was 800 years older than originally expected. For one, we can’t say if the ritual water channel found in this discovery was used the same way as the water channels in Angkor - in fact, we can’t say for sure if the builders of the 1st century mounds were the same ‘civilisation’ as Angkor.

Obviously, not everybody agrees.

Andy gives a rundown of every last border crossing in the Kingdom, in case you were interested.

Last week Prime Minister Hun Sen threatened to boot the United Nations from Cambodian soil if it couldn’t learn to mind its manners. Keeping with the trend, today the Prime Minister chastised the U.N.’s human rights office for gratuitous spending on such unnecessary items as human rights in Cambodia.

Prime Minister Hun Sen continued a public campaign against the UN’s human rights office Monday, saying the international body should stop spending money in Cambodia.

“The UN should take all this budget to victims in areas such as Kenya, Sudan, Somalia, Iraq, Afghanistan, or other countries facing crises, rather than wasting money in Cambodia,” Hun Sen said.

[...]

“He rides in airplanes and stays at hotels; where does the money come from?” Hun Sen said. “This money is more than a salary. This money is still the UN’s money, and we are also a member of the UN that must also pay membership dues to the UN. We have a duty to appeal for saving the budget, to be spent in other areas, rather than having Yash Ghai traveling to Cambodia.”

It warms the cockles to know that Hun Sen respects Cambodia’s duty as a U.N. signatory to “save the budget.” It would be a lot better, though, if the prime minister had the same amount of concern for Cambodia’s growing legion of dispossessed. After all, that’s why the U.N. is complaining.

Ed Cropley at Reuters writes the definitive “Bubble” piece, putting some figures and expert opinions to recent speculation.

Figures from Bonna Realty, a leading estate agent, suggest the price of prime Phnom Penh land doubled last year to $3,000/sq m — compared to less than $500 in 2000.

By contrast, land in Bangkok’s downtown Silom district is $5,000/sq m, while Ho Chi Minh City, the hub of neighboring Vietnam’s red-hot economy, prices can be as high as $15,000.  [...]

At the top of the market, prices are being driven by huge foreign-funded ventures such as “Gold Tower 42,” a $300 million South Korean apartment block which, at 42 storeys, will be three times higher than Phnom Penh’s current tallest building. [...]

But such prestige projects are the tip of the iceberg, and foreign funding accounts for only a fraction of the boom, analysts say.

Read the whole thing.

Thailand’s top brass today began trying to salvage the diplomatic snafu that erupted last week over Preah Vihear.

The Defence Ministry yesterday rushed to retract statements made by a spokesman that Cambodia had “made up” history in a bid to claim the Hindu temple of Preah Vihear for Phnom Penh’s unilateral benefit.

Top brass were urgently calling counterparts across the border yesterday to clarify statements made on Thursday by ministry spokesman Lt-General Pichsanu Puchakarn.

[...]

The military statement on Thursday was a surprise. Pichsanu said Cambodia had created a new boundary in order to claim sovereignty of the entire area and was campaigning for international support for this.

He condemned Cambodia and demanded diplomats lodge an official protest with Phnom Penh.

Yesterday the ministry changed its tune. Supreme Command civil-affairs chief Lt-General Plangkul Klahan and Foreign Ministry spokesman Tharit Charungvat said the previous day’s statement was incorrect.

Incorrect, indeed.

Drug use is surging among fishermen in the northwest.

Fishermen in north-western Banteay Meanchey province on the Thai border, around 450 kilometres from the capital, were luring their prey with fermented fish paste laced with drugs, but their more ethical colleagues were crying foul, the Khmer-language daily Kampuchea Thmey reported.

The bait, which is made in neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam, instantly turned popular table species such as elephant fish from fighters into ecstatic love junkies that practically jumped into the boat, the paper said.

Banteay Meanchey provincial governor Orn Sum said by telephone that he doubted the veracity of the reports, but if true, anglers caught dealing drugs to the province’s fish population could face legal consequences.

So that explains why prahok is so expensive this year.

This story keeps getting weirder and weirder.

At 12:05 PM, on 25 January 2008, the Bavet commune police, located in Chantrea district, Svay Rieng province, arrested and brought in Mr. Sok Sam Ean, a Sam Rainsy Party activist and Bavet commune councilor, to ask for clarification to the Bavet commune police station about the case of sandals bearing the picture of Angkor Wat. The Bavet commune police, under the direction of Mr. Leouk Chamroeun, the deputy police commissioner of the province of Svay Rieng, arrested and threatened Mr. Sok Sam Ean to provide clarifications on the case of sandals bearing the picture of Angkor Wat Temple, in a more than 2-hour questioning session, and the police also confiscated two of his hand phones for searching and checking without court warrant and without authorization from the phones owner.

It’s easy to see how some Cambodians might find these sandals — with outlines of Angkor Wat on the insoles –  offensive. People can be quite sensitive about their culture. Cambodians are no exception. But to the average foreigner — and it seems likely to many Cambodians as well — the randomness with which the Angkor-Wat-is-holy edict gets enforced makes following the rules ridiculously difficult.

Beer and cigarettes and t-shirts seem okay. Food blogs not so much. Playing cards with images of Angkor Wat will get you arrested. The latest sandal scandal does nothing to help clear the confusion: Walking on Angkor Wat in your sandals is not only allowed, but requires a $20 ticket. Walking in sandals with a mere outline of Angkor Wat, however, prompts the outrage of the khlogosphere and a visit from the local coppers. Somebody please explain.

Prompted by the recent assault of a CPP lawmaker by his security guard, IPS resurveys the country’s eviction problem and notes the growing frustration of those newly landless.

At the beginning of January, Ros Sovann was just another private security guard one sees standing outside fancy restaurants and the homes of the rich in Phnom Penh. By month end, the 28-year-old had catapulted from obscurity to become the symbol of rage spreading through Cambodia over land grabbing.

Ros’ transformation took place shortly before midnight on Jan. 13 in front of a house in the Cambodian capital, owned by Chin Kim Sreng, a 70-year-old parliamentarian from the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP). Sometime close to 11:30 p.m., Ros brutally attacked Chin with a steel pipe as the latter had got out of his luxury car to open the gate of his house, say reports in the local press.

But Ros was not finished, despite his beatings leaving Chin bleeding and with open head wounds, added an account in the Khmer language ‘Rasmei Kampuchea’ newspaper. He had then got into Chin’s car and crashed it into the gate.

This wasn’t a crime of opportunity. After his arrest, Ros Sovann admitted to police that he took a job as a security guard with the sole intention of getting next to rich and powerful parliamentarians in order to exact his revenge. Nor is it likely that Ros Sovann is an isolated case. Over the last few years, the government has evicted tens of thousands of urban and rural poor. Ros Sovann is simply the first who unleashed his anger on the leaders of the country. He is unlikely to be the last.

The truly sad part is that Ros Sovann probably could have been placated with what the average law maker spends on karaoke in a month, if not less.

An 11-person delegation is headed to China for the Olympics. Only four of them are actual athletes.

Cambodia will send almost three times more officials than athletes to this year’s Olympics — including the families of the country’s sports chiefs.

The impoverished nation, which has never won an Olympic medal, will send 11 officials to Beijing to accompany just four athletes, Cambodia’s Olympic committee chief said on Friday.

“We will have a team of two athletes and two swimmers,” Meas Sarin told Reuters. “For the chef de mission and Olympic committee president and secretary general, guests such as wives or children can accompany us.”

[ ... ]

“We don’t have a hope of winning anything (in Beijing),” he said. “We have no qualified coaches, how can we get medals, it is impossible.

“At least we will be there, to show our faces to the world that we are there joining the Games.”

How depressing.

These statistics are admittedly a bit old, but nothing significant has changed in the last six months. The overall picture is still incredibly maddening.

CAMBODIA - 44,000 Internet users as of April/07, 0.3% penetration. 1,000 broadband Internet connections as of Sept.30/07.

THAILAND - 8,465,800 Internet users as of Sept/07, 13.0% penetration. 105,000 broadband subscribers as of Sept.30/07.

LAOS - 25,000 Internet users as of Sept/06, 0.4% penetration. 100 broadband subscribers as of Sept.30/07.

VIETNAM - 18,226,701 Internet users as of Nov./07, 21.4% penetration. 1,205,262 broadband Internet connections as of Nov.30/07.

MYANMAR - 300,000 Internet users as of Oct/06, 0.6% penetration. 800 broadband subscribers as of Sept.30/07.

Bloody Laos and Myanmar have better Internet penetration than Cambodia. That’s a disgrace.

Two stories out of Thailand this morning give reason for pause: “Army warns dispute could have repercussions” in the Bangkok Post and “Relations sour over Preah Vihear claim” in The Nation. This gist is that Thailand thinks the application for World Heritage Status for Preah Vihear should be submitted jointly, with Thailand and Cambodia equal parties. Cambodia, the undisputed owner of the temple, thinks not.

The border around the temple is hotly disputed, and Thai military leaders have professed a fear that World Heritage Status awarded solely to Cambodia could result in the loss of Thai land. But that’s just a pretense. What Thailand really fears is that, World Heritage Status in hand, Cambodia will close the border and shut Thailand out of the lucrative temple business.

Such fears were probably unfounded, until today, when Thai military leaders began making threats and accusations in the Thai press designed to inflame tensions and derail Cambodia’s application. Such mendacity ranks well below that of fit leadership. The temple of Preah Vihear belongs to Cambodia. It is 100 percent inside her territory. No amount of threats or lies will change that. Thailand needs to stop trying.

UPDATE: In an editorial tomorrow, The Nation scolds the Defence Ministry for such ham-fisted diplomacy.

Such dramatic posturing by the military comes across as ludicrous and bordering on hysterical. There have been no signs of any possibility of armed confrontation between the two countries over Preah Vihear. The dispute over the site was supposed to have been settled more than four decades ago.

Sure enough, Thai military leaders yesterday backtracked, dismissing what the Defence Ministry’s spokesman, Lt-General Pichsanu Puchakarn, said at a press conference was an inaccurate representation of the situation.

VIA KI: According to the great bastion of Cambodian journalism www.everyday.com.kh, Prime Minister Hun Sen recently accused the United Nations Transitional Authority in Cambodia of bringing HIV/AIDS to the country.

During a speech given at an inauguration of a building in Battambang province, on Monday, Hun Sen said: “The most UNTAC left in the Cambodia was the AIDS disease. They spent $2 billion, but when they left, the Cambodian factions were still fighting each others,” and Cambodia had to resolve the peace issue on her own.

According to the United Nations:

UNTAC  was established to ensure implementation of the Agreements on the Comprehensive Political Settlement of the Cambodia Conflict, signed in Paris on 23 October 1991.

Medicam says:

The first reported cases of HIV infection were in mid 1991 with unreported cases suggested to have begun in the late 1980s.

The World Bank says:

The first HIV positive was detected in 1991 at the National Blood Bank in Phnom Penh and the first AIDS case was diagnosed at Calmette Hospital in 1993.

USAID says:

The first case of HIV/AIDS in Cambodia was officially identified in 1991 through screening of blood donors, although HIV had been detected in Cambodian refugees in Thailand two years earlier.

James Welsh interviews Mia Farrow in The Cambodia Daily today.

Q: There was a report Monday that you and your supporters attempted to break in to Tuol Sleng on Saturday evening. What actually happened?

A: My visit to Tuol Sleng on Saturday morning was deeply, profoundly upsetting; I think I will forever be haunted–especially by the faces of the children.

Our visit was scrutinized by undercover police as well as swarms of reporters and photographers. I was and am still struggling to compute what happened there.

So, later in the day, I asked to pay my respects quietly, privately, in the company of [artist and Tuol Sleng survivor] Mr Vann Nath and a translator. And so it was a shock when we three approached the guards and the venerable and gracious Mr Vann Nath was denied access to the site where he was tortured and where his agonizingly graphic paintings–depictions of human cruelty–are displayed. We left immediately and in silence. Dream for Darfur is writing a formal complaint to the news agency that picked [the story] up since it is completely inaccurate.

UPDATE: Michael Hayes interviews Mia Farrow.

On January 22 Dengue Fever released their third album, titled Venus on Earth. The LA Weekly takes a look.

On their third album, Venus on Earth, Dengue pull off the sincere-but-shticky trick with righteous aplomb by expanding the music’s lyrical subject matter, focusing on melody, not groove, and sprucing up the recorded sound just a tad. Whereas the music that first inspired founders Ethan and Zac Holtzman was found on cruddy old cassettes unearthed in the dusty back corners of fish markets in Phnom Penh, on Dengue’s albums the band gives it a clean, new documenting that highlights the basics of the ’70s sound — Farfisa organ or cheapo synth, greasy Strats, hammily honking sax, and especially the vocalists’ enchanting, birdlike warbles, so high-pitched and echo-drenched as to sound like the CD’s playing on the wrong speed.

More from Pop Matters and Spin (here, too) and the LA Times, which offers a download of Sober Driver, the fifth song on Venus on Earth. (If you are in the U.S., Rhapsody offers the whole album.)

UPDATE: Download 05_Sober_Driver.mp3

Andy, typically as placid and good-natured as anyone, is spitting mad.

This story turns my stomach. Anyone found recruiting children into Christianity, either with animation, free gifts, other tricks of the trade or by word of mouth, should be deported. Full stop.

The title of his post is “God-botherers” — that’s what polite people from the U.K. call Jesus freaks, apparently — and the story he is referring to is this chest-thumping garbage about saving Cambodia’s heathen children. It is exactly what Andy says: stomach-turning.

The GodMan film debuted in Cambodia last November. It is an animated story of Jesus Christ. Book of Hope is showing the film in schools and churches.  In the Buddhist nation, public showings would likely have adverse effects. “Inside church facilities, they are free to invite anybody who wants to come. And people are able to come without hesitation,” said Ty Silva with Book of Hope.

The truth is, throughout history Christians have had a pretty tough time converting Cambodia’s Buddhists. While the poor, hungry heathens are often receptive to gifts of money and rice, and will politely listen to hours of God smack, they remain steadfast in their unwillingness to deliver their souls to the white man’s savior.

So what’s a door-knocking Jesus freak to do?

Go for the kids. And let’s be clear, this cartoon movie is aimed directly at Cambodian children. It has but one purpose: to manipulate children into renouncing their religion. To call it stomach-turning is putting it mildly. It’s predatory. And this modus operandi is frighteningly similar to that used by human traffickers and pedophiles. Distributing religious material outside of official churches is also illegal.

That’s not to say that all Christians in Cambodia are dishonest criminals preying on the Kingdom’s children. Of course. There are surely decent Christians out there doing honest work with no intention of converting anyone. But because they’re not incessantly trying to shove their religion down your throat, these people are hard to identify. To these Christians we say: Thank you for keeping you religious ideas to yourself. And not preying on the weak. Especially the little kids. Because that’s really not cool.

Petroleum giant plans to develop prime Cambodian beach resort
An offshoot of the company in control of Cambodia’s most powerful petroleum group, Sokimex, plans to develop a top-end resort on a beach in the coastal province of Sihanoukville, the area’s deputy governor confirmed Wednesday.

Cambodia, Viet Nam target $2.3 billion in bilateral trade by 2010
Cambodia and Viet Nam are expected to achieve bilateral trade worth US$2.3 billion annually by 2010, according to reports released at the border-trade meeting held in An Giang Province last week.

Roadblocks on the Great Asian Highway
The North-South Corridor of the Asian Development Bank-funded (ADB) Great Asian Highway is nearly fully paved. But as the last kilometers are completed, questions are arising about the future social, economic and even geopolitical costs of the new roadway, and with them new hitches are emerging.

Cambodian road network gets 40.8 mln usd in funding for maintenance
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said it will provide 40.8 mln usd along with its development partners to help Cambodia maintain roads managed by the Ministry of Public Works and Transport and improve the capability of the ministry in managing and maintaining its road network.

Cambodian Bourse Planned For 2009
South Korea’s stock exchange and the Cambodian government have agreed to set up a stock exchange in Phnom Penh in 2009, the latest signal of the optimism sweeping the fast growing but deeply impoverished country.

Remember this? So what happened?

In an essay on the Cambodian Information Center web site last week Kenneth So posed the question “Is Using the Word ‘Yuon’ Justified and Beneficial for Khmer?” A few days later, author Navy Phim followed up with an essay of her own, “The Word Yuon.“

In those articles, both authors seem to agree that using the word “Yuon” is not beneficial to the people of Cambodia. Both authors also take great pains to point out that the word “Yuon” is not, in fact, a racial epithet. The Khmer word for French people is “Barang.” The Khmer word for Chinese people is “Chun.” The Khmer word for Vietnamese people is “Yuon.” It’s that simple. The Khmer word “Yuon” is no more derogatory than the English word “Mexican.” Or so the logic goes.

And who knows? This might even be true. But that’s hardly the point. Foreign people who accuse Cambodian people of being racist toward the Vietnamese do not do so because Cambodian people sometimes use the word “Yuon.” They do so because some Cambodian people clearly hold racist views.

As an encore to stage-diving into the racial morass of Southeast Asian politics, KJE puts a finger to the economic winds of Cambodia and, after a fair bit of navel gazing, concludes that Cambodia’s current housing bubble will not last forever, maybe not even through the year.

[E]ventually, builders will find out, as others in different markets before them have, that supply outstrips demand. This will lead to a leveling-off of prices and finally, once the full scope of the problem has been recognized, to rapidly falling prices of both land and houses. It is a safe bet that this would happen in late 2008 or early 2009, most likely sooner if the fall-out from the impending [U.S.] recession makes itself felt in Cambodia in about 3 to 4 months. The real estate market will simply collapse. … The question is not if but when.

Quite simply: no way. For starters, using past U.S. housing market data as a crystal ball in which to divine the future of Cambodia’s soaring property market is unwise. The U.S. housing market and the economy that supports it are both mature. By contrast, Cambodia’s housing market and economy are still in their infancy. That difference alone is massive.

Remember, 30 years ago Cambodia literally had no money. Not until about 15 years ago did a real economy begin to emerge. Previous to that land and homes had no value because there was nobody around with any money to buy them. That’s not the case anymore — and barring Pol Pot returning from the grave, unlikely to change.

What we are seeing now is the emergence of a land and real estate market, and with it, the appropriate valuation of property that until now held little or no value. When you start from zero, the only available direction to go is up.

Still, the question remains: Is the property market in Phnom Penh overvalued? The answer is likely yes. But that hardly means a collapse of the market is inevitable. A cooling of the market? Guaranteed. A correction in the market? Perhaps. But a wholesale collapse of the Phnom Penh property market?

No way.

Bourse scheduled to open next year.

PHNOM PENH (Thomson Financial) - Cambodia Tuesday signed an agreement with representatives from South Korea’s stock exchange operator to establish Cambodia’s first stock market in 2009, officials said.

The memorandum of understanding makes formal the planned joint venture between Cambodia and the Korea Exchange (KRX), Asia’s fourth-largest bourse operator.

The Cambodian government will own a 51 percent share in the new exchange, with KRX holding 49 percent, said Aun Pon Monirath, secretary of state with Cambodia’s finance ministry.

Inflationary pressures are being felt in the unlikeliest places.

The rocketing price of more conventional meats due to bird flu quarantines and world oil prices has doubled the market price of rat meat in Cambodia, local media reported Tuesday. Rat meat has become so valuable that rice farmers “in their hundreds” had set up sideline businesses catching rats and making them table-ready, reported the Khmer-language daily Kampuchea Thmey.

Whereas a kilo of the best quality rat meat went for around 50 cents two years ago, it now fetches up to 1.50 dollars, the paper reported.

Mmmmmm, rat. Yummy.

Today marks the four-year anniversary of the murder of Free Trade Union leader Chea Vichea, who was shot three times — twice in the body, once in the head — on the morning of January 22, 2004, as he read the Cambodia Daily.

At the time, human rights groups called the assassination politically motivated. The U.S. embassy called it “cowardly. Tens of thousands of mourners marched through the streets of Phnom Penh in a somber farewell parade.

The two men convicted for the murder, Born Samnang and Sok Sam Oeun, are widely believed to be innocent, framed by the Cambodian authorities. The trial of the two men was the subject of a 2007 video documentary by American filmmaker Bradley Cox titled The Plastic Killers. The murder and trial is also the subject of a forthcoming film by Cox and former Cambodia Daily reporter Rich Garella, titled Who Killed Chea Vichea?

Japanese researchers in Cambodia have discovered a man-made water site believed to date to the first century.

Japanese archaeologists said Monday they have found an ancient water site in northwest Cambodia which dates back to the first century.

The archaeologists said they discovered sacred mounds of water or altars at the ruins in Snay village in Banteay Meanchey province under a two-year project which began in January last year.

“Before, it was said that Khmer civilization started from seventh to ninth century AD, but based on our research here, Khmer civilization went back to the first century AD,” said Yoshinori Yasuda, a professor of the International Research Center for Japanese Studies.

If the dating is accurate, the Cambodian water site would be the world’s oldest, predating the Tikal ruins in Guatemala by some 600 years. Phum Snay has been under excavation since 2001, and the latest find comes after a series of other significant discoveries. Most notably, researchers at Phum Snay recently uncovered five female skeletons buried with helmets and metal swords, suggesting a female warrior class.

VIA KI: In other “news” from the voice of the opposition, Moneakseka Khmer passes on the latest chatter from the fish isle at Psah Thmey.

There is a ridiculous story emanating from the armed forces. It is about the sale of military ranks to make money for the chiefs to finance their electoral campaigns. We are not sure whether this story is a joke made up by some officers or it is a true story.

But that’s not going to stop us from printing it!