DAP: The breaking news in Cambodia: “Cambodia's cassava exports increase 87 pct in first half” plus 9 more

PHNOM PENH, July 26 (Xinhua) -- Cambodia has seen a sharp rise in cassava exports in the first half of this year, compared with the same period last year, according to the statistics from the Commerce Ministry's Camcontrol Department on Tuesday.

The data showed that from January to June this year, the country had exported 212,018 tons of fresh and dry chip cassava, represented 87 percent rise from 113,068 tons in the same period last year.

The country earned the total revenues of 8.7 million U.S. dollars during the six months of this year, up 200 percent from only 2.9 million U.S. dollars at the same period last year, showed the data.

According to the report from the Ministry of Agriculture, the country grew 194,000 hectares of cassava crop and yielded 3.78 million tons in 2010-2011 harvest season.

HANOI, July 27 (Xinhua) -- The 5th ASEAN Naval Chiefs'Meeting (ANCM-5), themed "ASEAN naval cooperation for maritime peace and security", opened here on Wednesday, with participation of naval chiefs from nine ASEAN member countries of Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam, and Laos'acting defense attache in Vietnam.

According to Vietnam News Agency, the meeting was chaired by Vietnamese Vice Admiral Nguyen Van Hien, Deputy Minister of Defense and Commander of Vietnam People's Navy.

ANCM-5 provided opportunities for ASEAN navy forces to strengthen mutual confidence, share experience and information of the regional security situation, said Hien.

During the 3-day meeting, participants also discuss two initiatives raised by the host Vietnam, including a roadmap for cooperation among ASEAN navy forces and exchange among ASEAN young navy officers.

ANCM-5 will adopt an official agenda to become an annual event, the report said.

BEIJING, July 28 (Xinhua) -- Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao arrived in Wenzhou of east China's Zhejiang Province Thursday morning to mourn victims of a fatal train collision.

Wen will visit the injured and extend his condolence to families of the dead. He will also inspect the train crash scene.

The accident on Saturday evening caused at least 39 people dead and 192 others injured.

JAKARTA, July 28 (Xinhua) -- Indonesian Education Ministry has allocated 762.2 billion rupiah (about 89.9 million U.S. dollars) this year for scholarship for about 2.04 million poor elementary school students (BSM-SD), local media reported on Thursday.

Students from the first to fifth grade will be entitled to the scholarships, which are worth 360,000 rupiah (about 42 US dollars) per student and will be disbursed between July and December.

Ministry director for elementary schools, Ibrahim Bafadal, said the scholarships were meant to help low-income parents purchase stationery, uniforms and other school-related items for their children.

School operating costs, meanwhile, are covered by the School Operational Assistance (BOS) funding program, Ibrahim said recently.

The number of students to be granted scholarships in each municipality/regency has been determined according to several indicators, such as poverty levels and geographical conditions, he was quoted by the Jakarta Post as saying.

MANILA, July 28 (Xinhua) -- Tropical storm Nock-Ten (local name: Juaning) is leaving the Philippines Thursday with 31 people dead, 36 injured, 27 missing and more than 600,000 people displaced.

The National Disaster Risk Reduction Management Council (NDRRMC) reported 23 of the 31 casualties are in the Bicol region located some 500 kilometers south of Manila.

Nock-Ten brought heavy rains triggering landslides in several areas in northern Philippines. In Bicol, most of the casualties were buried alive due to landslides.

Social welfare officials have extended 9.22 million pesos (218. 95 million U.S. dollars) worth food, clothing and relief items to Bicol region alone. They also allocated nearly 60 million pesos (1. 42 million U.S. dollars) worth of funds to distribute relief supplies to provinces battered by Nock-Tenm.

In its latest weather bulletin issued 11 a.m., local time, the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, Astronomical, Services Administration (PAGASA) said Nock-Ten, packing maximum winds of 95 kilometers per hour, is located west northwest of Laoag city in the northern Philippine province of Ilocos Norte.

PAGASA forecasts Nock-Ten to move 270 km southwest of Hong Kong by Friday morning. The state weather forecasting firm did not raise public storm warning signals, but it noted that the southwest monsoon will continue to bring rains over the western sections of Luzon and Visayas islands.

DHAKA, July 28 (Xinhua) -- At least 17 people were killed and about 30 others injured as a goods laden truck and a night passenger bus collided head on in Bangladesh's Shajahanpur sub- district of Bogra district, 197 km northwest of the capital Dhaka, on Thursday morning.

Police was quoted by private news agency UNB as saying that the Dhaka bound truck collided head on with the passenger bus, leaving 11 passengers dead on the spot and over 30 injured at about 6 a.m. local time. Six of the injured died on the way to local hospitals.

All the victims were passengers of the night bus which was over loaded.

Police said the drivers of both the vehicles were driving recklessly and lost control while taking a turn.

Bangladesh has one of the highest fatality rates for road accidents in the world due mainly to shoddy highways, poorly maintained vehicles, violation of traffic rules by inept drivers and lack of monitoring of the traffic department.

According to a recent study of Accident Research Center of Bangladesh University of Engineering Technology, some 10,000 to 12, 000 people are killed in road accident in Bangladesh every year, of which about 75 percent fatalities occur in rural areas.

MUMBAI, July 28 (Xinhua) -- An Indian economist says the U.S. dollar would lose its shine as an anchor currency should the United States go into a debt default.

Madan Sabnavis, in an interview with Xinhua on Wednesday, said it is too dangerous to let the U.S. default on its debt, given the precarious global economic situation.

Sabnavis, chief economist with the CARE credit rating agency, said that Europe is already in the throes of a debt crisis, Japan has been affected by an earthquake, tsunami and subsequent nuclear disaster, and emerging economies like China and India are grappling with high inflation.

"Now the U.S. debt crisis is more of a political issue and it could carry on until Aug. 2," Sabnavis said. "There's 10 percent of a possibility for the U.S. to really see the default since the U.S. president could bypass the congress under constitutional rights."

Some has argued that President Barack Obama, by citing the 14th Amendment which states the "validity" of government debt "shall not be questioned", can simply bypass the Congress and continue borrowing if the Congress fails to raise the debt ceiling in time and a government default is imminent.

But the Obama team has said the president does not want to go alone on the issue. A unilateral move by the White House will surely anger the Republicans and further poison the political atmosphere in Washington.

Speaking about the impact of a U.S debt default, Sabnavis said the trouble would be mainly in the financial sector.

"With funds flowing out of the U.S., monetary supply will contract and interest rates will go up plus depreciation of the U.S. dollars," he said. "Capital will not go to the U.S. and will go to emerging markets to find new growth with the latter as a gainer in the short term."

India, as a minor holder of U.S. bonds, could be a gainer from the repercussions with more capital inflows, which would support local markets, Sabnavis said.

The reason behind the U.S. debt crisis is that the U.S. is living beyond its means and cannot cut expenditures or increase taxes to narrow the deficit, Sabnavis said.

"The U.S. has to go back to the budget and cut expenditures and raise tax rates," Sabnavis said. "It's common sense that government should control deficit and debt levels and no country shall be exempted from fiscal disciplines. I think no country could spend all the way to solve their problems."