In US-Cambodia Relationship, Bad Blood Rises Along with China’s Influence, as US-ASEAN Summit Nears

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The U.S. Embassy in Cambodia has not been biting its tongue since President Joe Biden took office. Speaking on the first day of Chinese New Year in February, Jonathan Turley, the embassy’s political chief, said the U.S. sought a “peaceful, prosperous, and independent” Cambodia — and then blasted the sad state of democracy and ever-closer ties with China.

 

“As a friend and a partner to Cambodia, we naturally have concerns when we see Cambodia moving away from that, when we see a government at every level is dominated by just one party, when peaceful citizens are arrested and imprisoned just for expressing their views, when corruption is unchecked and the powerful act with impunity, and when the Kingdom’s hard-won independence and sovereignty are being eroded,” Turley told VOA Khmer.

 

In a thinly veiled reference to China, Turley said: “I would note as well that we are very committed to the Kingdom’s sovereignty. So we are naturally concerned when we see Cambodian sovereignty being eroded, when we see a growing foreign military presence, and when foreign companies contribute to or are involved in corruption violating lands, laborers, and environmental regulations.”

 

Sixteen months since Biden took office, rancor has defined the US-Cambodia relationship. And yet Prime Minister Hun Sen, along with leaders from nine other Southeast Asian nations, will likely be standing next to Biden and smiling for photographs later this week for the U.S.-ASEAN summit in the White House.

 

While the U.S. continues to regularly criticize Cambodia’s backsliding on human rights and democracy, analysts said it’s China’s influence that is driving U.S. strategy in the region, and causing the Biden administration to take such a frank approach to Phnom Penh, perhaps Beijing’s closest ally in the region.

 

“Because the US continues to rigidly view Cambodia through the lens of its intensifying competition with China, the mood among the US foreign policy community has been consistently negative, leading to a deeply entrenched misunderstanding about the nature of Cambodia’s foreign policy and its position vis-à-vis China and the US,” said Royal University of Phnom Penh’s lecturer Bong Chansambath.

FILE - Cambodia’s Prime Minister Hun Sen shakes hands with China's President Xi Jinping before their meeting at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, China April 29, 2019.

He added that Cambodia was fully aware of the political and security risks that come with overt alignment with geopolitical superpowers — with the U.S. backing the corrupt Lon Nol regime in the early 1970s, China supporting the murderous Khmer Rouge that came next, and Vietnam occupying Cambodia for years after that.

 

“The misguided belief that Cambodia is China’s proxy is counterproductive and detrimental to the foreign policy interests of Cambodia, the US, and their shared ties,” Chansambath said.

 

Though Biden has promised to double down on U.S. ties with Southeast Asia, Chansambath noted that U.S. policy on Cambodia is essentially a continuation of the Trump administration, which spoke out about the decline of democracy across Cambodia and sanctioned key Hun Sen allies.

 

From 2018 to 2020, the Trump Administration slapped sanctions on Hun Sen’s bodyguard chief Gen. Hing Bunheag (for leading an entity involved in serious human rights abuses), retired former military chief of staff Gen. Kun Kim (for his role in a massive Chinese-funded development that uprooted coastal communities) and Try Pheap (among Cambodia’s most notorious timber barons, with alleged links to the ruling family).

 

The Biden administration has sanctioned two more senior Cambodian generals – including navy chief Adm. Tea Vinh – over their role in China’s development in and around the key naval base in Sihanoukville, which the U.S. worries is part of a longer-term plan for a Chinese military presence on Cambodia’s coast. The U.S. has also imposed an arms embargo on Phnom Penh, and terminated military scholarship programs for Cambodian officers, again over concerns related to ties with China.

 

It’s not just the U.S. that believes Phnom Penh is increasingly moving into China’s corner. In April, Cambodia was ranked the “most exposed” country to Chinese influence in an index from the Taipei-based group Doublethink Lab, which looked at levels of Chinese influence in 36 countries worldwide, from military to politics and from academia to technology.

 

https://www.voacambodia.com/a/in-us-cambodia-relationship-bad-blood-rises-along-with-china-s-influence-as-us-asean-summit-nears/6563709.html