Cambodian opposition lawmakers lead supporters to revisit disputed border with Vietnam

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SVAY RIENG, Cambodia, July 19 (Xinhua) -- Cambodian opposition lawmakers Real Camerin and Um Sam An led over 1,000 supporters Sunday to revisit disputed Cambodia-Vietnam border in Svay Rieng province, where they had scuffled with Vietnamese villagers last month.

Camerin said his Cambodia National Rescue Party arranged over 100 minibuses to take the activists from the capital Phnom Penh to re-visit border markers No. 202 and 203 in the province's Kampong Ro district.

Hundreds of security personnel from the two countries were deployed along the border line in the area and worked together to avert any confrontation between the civilians of the two countries.

Only 100 activists were allowed to reach the border markers while the rest saw the markers in the distance. There was no report of clashes on Sunday.

It was the second time that the two lawmakers took supporters to the site. Their first attempt to reach the markers on June 28 was blocked by Vietnamese villagers, triggering a violent clash that left 10 Cambodians and 8 Vietnamese injured.

Cambodia-Vietnam border issues have become a hot topic in Cambodia in recent months after the opposition party accused the Prime Minister Hun Sen-led government of using wrong maps to demarcate border line with Vietnam.

However, Hun Sen defended that the maps his government is using to demarcate border line with Vietnam are authentic ones, which were deposited at the United Nations in 1964.

Cambodia shares a 1,270-km border in the east with Vietnam. To date, about 83 percent of the border demarcation between the two countries has been completed.

source: http://www.shanghaidaily.com/article/article_xinhua.aspx?id=293340

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PPP: Point of no resolution

Mon, 20 July 2015

Meas Sokchea and Charles Parkinson

After weeks of fiery rhetoric, more than a thousand opposition supporters led by four parliamentarians streamed towards a remote stretch of Vietnamese border in Svay Rieng province yesterday, ostensibly with the goal of examining the placement of a border marker there.

However, after a highly unscientific inspection – conducted without so much as a map – the situation along the still-disputed border remained virtually unchanged, despite exhortations from lawmakers leading the cavalcade that the marker was misplaced.

Convening close to Border Post 203 in Kompong Ro district’s Tnort commune, Cambodian National Rescue Party supporters cheered wildly as lawmakers Real Camerin, Um Sam An, Nuth Rumduol and Cheam Channy passed first through a line of police and then through a line of what appeared to be irregular security personnel armed with sticks standing between them and the contested marker.

read more: http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/point-no-resolution

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Border Committee Visits Northern Border Posts

Khmer Times/Pav Suy

Tuesday, 21 July 2015

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PHNOM PENH (Khmer Times) – Secretary of state of the Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Long Visalo led a working group to a disputed area of the border with Vietnam in Tbong Khmum province yesterday, officials said.

They declined, however, to provide details of the visit. However, Var Kim Hong – chairman of the Border Committee – discussed the border in the northern province in a July 14 meeting on demarcation.

He told the 400 government officials who attended the meeting that Cambodian farmers along the border in the province were “technically encroaching” on Vietnamese territory.

read more: http://www.khmertimeskh.com/news/13549/border-committee-visits-northern-border-posts/

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Gov’t promises border action

Wed, 22 July 2015

Vong Sokheng and Shaun Turton

A government delegation yesterday told Tbong Khmum provincial and local officials it would resolve a border dispute with Vietnam in Memot district “very soon”, as villagers blocked from their farms in the contested area by Vietnamese authorities say they fear looming food shortages.

The comments were made during a visit to the province by members of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Cambodia’s Border Committee to discuss the ongoing demarcation process.

Addressing some 100 police, officials and journalists at Tbong Khmum Provincial Hall, Foreign Ministry Secretary of State Long Visalo, also on the Cambodia-Vietnam Joint Border Committee, called on people to “calm down and trust” the government as it worked to delineate the shared border.

read more: http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national