The Phnom Penh Post - ENGLISH: “Garbage city” plus 9 more

If we leave the garbage like this any more, Phnom Penh will become a garbage city — that we cannot accept at all.

The National Olympic Committee of Cambodia will host a four-day Sport Media Seminar for 25 journalists from local media organisations from February 18 at the NOCC headquarters.

Dr Chan Samnob, a Cambodian literature expert from the Phnom Penh Academy, will give lessons in grammatical rules, writing styles for accuracy as well as some insight into the history of Cambodian literature.

Dem Sovannarom of the Royal University of Phnom Penh will then instruct attendees in how to obtain and research news. Finally, NOCC secretary-general Vath Chamroeun will talk about sport history, structure, athlete management and how transfers work.

The Cambodian Federation of Rugby will hold the third round of its sevens league competition at Old Stadium this Sunday.

From 8am to noon, junior sides split into categories of Boys U11, U13, U15 and U18 as well as a Girls section will contest matches. The teams hail from local charity organisations such as PES, ASPECA and Taramana, French school Rene Descartes and Stade Khmer rugby club.

An NGO called Kampuchea Balopp (meaning "Cambodian rugby") has been helping train the majority of youngsters for the past year. It aims to use rugby as a tool for the education and inclusion of disadvantaged children who don't have the chance to practice sport on a weekly basis.

The afternoon session from noon to 5pm sees six teams battle for sevens supremacy. The Stade Khmer 1s are reigning champions, although Khmer Rugby Club currently top the standings this season.

Other squads include Sisowath Knights, Siem Reap Rugby Club, Garudas and Stade Khemr 2s.

"Through this tournament, all these young Cambodian and foreign players learn the values of sport – solidarity, team spirit, courage and respect," CFR communications officer Florent Montmeat told the Post.

"The atmosphere is very good and the viewers are excited to see the sport being practiced in Cambodia."

Golf's global appeal as a tourist draw will come into play at two exciting events in Siem Reap next month, getting the season off to a rousing start.

Malaysia's leading golf travel specialists, Liberty Golf Services, roll out the second edition of the Liberty Cup – which is to be held at both the Sir Nick Faldo-designed Angkor Golf Resort and nearby Phokeethra Country Club on March 9 and 12. Participants will play a round at each of the two courses.

Two weeks later, the Foreign Correspondents Club of Cambodia will launch the FCC Nations Cup at Angkor Golf Resort.

The Liberty Cup is part of a series that runs across Southeast Asia at least three times a year, bringing together enthusiastic golfers, local tourism boards and top-notch sponsors.

While golfing pleasure and competitive drive is at the heart of this annual venture, it also serves as a great platform for business networking and tourism promotion between Malaysia and Cambodia.

"We have always been at the forefront of golf tourism and what it can lead to," Liberty Golf Services general manager Eu Shen Ng told the Post from Kuala Lumpur.

"Our objective is very clear. Promote great golf destinations and showcase our hospitality, brand visibility for our sponsors, inculcate bilateral business opportunities and respond to local charity," added Ng, who is also the founder and president of the Malaysia Golf Tourism Association.

What makes the Liberty Cup a hit with the participants is the wide ranging variety of prizes, ranging from complimentary hotel stays, golf games, Japanese golf equipment, bags, accessories, air tickets and a shot at the Grand Lucky Draw that offers a Swiss-made Titoni watch worth $2,000.

No participant will leave empty-handed, and the welcome goodie bag that is given away has a retail value of $150.

The responsible tourism element that has been so emphatically brought out by this event has gone very well with corporate companies and the cup will soon have a presenting sponsor for the next two years.

The event sponsors this year include Titoni, Carlsberg, RHB Bank, Malaysian Airlines, Transview Golf, PG Apparels, Fourteen Golf and Partners, PSD Travel, Angkor Golf Resort and Phokeethra Country Club.

Pride at stake in Nations Cup
Come March 22, golfers of varying skill levels young and old will get a chance to play under the flag of their native country in the two-day FCC Nations Cup.

First held in 2008 with a moderate turnout to promote Siem Reap as a golf destination, this event is now a truly international affair with no fewer than a dozen nationalities represented.

While the theme is fun on the links, national pride will be at stake since players represent their home countries in a format that loosely replicates the Ryder Cup.

Fundraiser for local cause
While golfing fun, food and beverages keep the players on their pegs, they will also be involved in promoting a charitable cause. The money raised from a hole-in-one challenge will go to a local foundation created in 2007, Kampuchea House, which supports education and opportunities for underprivileged children.

Insurance providers sold far fewer motor vehicle and personal accident policies in 2013 than in the previous year, sparking concern among some in the industry that the importance of being covered in case of a road accident isn't getting through to drivers.

According to the General Insurance Association of Cambodia (GIAC), market statistics show that vehicle insurance – which includes cars, motorbikes and commercial transport – grew 20 per cent in 2012. Last year, that acceleration slowed to 4.3 per cent.

Growth in personal accident policies, which cover injuries as opposed to vehicle damage, also slowed, with its 12.7 per cent rise being three percentage points less than in 2012.

GIAC president Chhay Rattanak said there is a severe lack of public information about the advantages provided by insurance and that this has hampered the young industry's potential.

"Some people, even commercial vehicle drivers, who have previously bought insurance, do not fully understand how insurance works," Rattanak said. "We need to help people to understand the benefits of having insurance, especially motor and personal accident coverage," he said.

Rattanak called on the National Assembly to fast-track the approval of a law that would make it compulsory to buy private vehicle insurance, the norm in many countries around the world.

As it stands, only commercial vehicles such as buses are required to have coverage.

According to the Ministry of Public Works and Transport, 1,727 people died in road accidents in the first 10 months of last year, eight fewer than the same period in 2012. However the overall number of road accidents increased slightly, from 3,905 to 3,934.

Overall, the insurance industry recorded a 15 per cent premium revenue increase in the 2013 fiscal year, totaling $42 million. Across all policy types, engineering insurance premiums saw the largest year-on-year gain of 25.3 per cent.

Rattanak attributed the spike to development in the manufacturing and construction sectors.

Fire insurance premiums maintained a year-on-year growth of 30 per cent over the last fiscal year, while marine cargo insurance premiums increased 1.5 percentage points to more than 8.1 per cent.

Local insurers paid out a total of $3 million in claims, which was lower than 2012, according to Rattanak.

Following a request from Prime Minister Hun Sen, King Norodom Sihamoni has approved the promotion of six high-ranking police officials to the rank of four-star general in the National Police, according to a Royal decree from late last month.

The National Police officials tapped for promotion include Ministry of Interior secretary of state Ouk Kimlek, deputy commissioner Sok Phal, deputy commissioner Moa Chandara, deputy commissioner Chan Ean, three-star general Mao Bunnarin and Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak.

Phal yesterday expressed happiness over the news, but downplayed its significance. "I want to confirm that I have been in the police for 34 years," he said. "This is not any special case."

However, Yem Ponharith, spokesman for the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party, said the Cambodian military and police forces have too many generals as it is.

"Compared to the number of soldiers and police, it's not proportional," he said.

The defence team for ex-Brother No 2 Nuon Chea has said it will likely move to disqualify the Khmer Rouge tribunal's current trial chamber judges from hearing the upcoming Case 002/02, citing the possibility of bias stemming from judges' work on the court's previous cases.

The chamber has already ruled that the same judges will hear the second segment of Case 002, but in a filing dated January 31, the defence argues that the trial chamber, which rendered a judgement against S-21 prison chief Duch in Case 001, would be tasked with adjudicating similar facts in Case 002/02, of which S-21 will be a component.

Given that the same chamber will also soon render a verdict in Case 002/01, which dealt with the roles of senior leaders like Chea, the defence maintains that the chamber's position on Case 002/02 may be a foregone conclusion.

"The Defence notes, in response to an oral inquiry from the Chamber, that there is a strong likelihood that it will seek disqualification from Case 002/02 of any member of the Trial Chamber to have adjudicated Case 002/01," the filing reads.

The court's Supreme Court Chamber (SCC) raised the same issue in its decision on the appeals against the trial chamber's decision to sever Case 002.

Though it overturned the appeals, the SCC nonetheless allowed that the trial chamber did not examine "the potential prejudice to the rights of the Co-Accused caused by real or perceived judicial bias".

Open Society Justice Initiative tribunal monitor Heather Ryan said it was "interesting" that the SCC had raised the issue of bias without being prompted.

If Cases 002/02 were considered to simply be an extension of 002/01, she added, the defence's claims of bias were weakened, but judges' involvement in Case 001 still raises questions.

"The issue is different with the judge having sat on 001 and now judging similar facts and issues in 002," Ryan said. "If you look at [002/02] as a separate trial from [002/01], [then] the argument seems a little stronger.

"Nonetheless, I am not sure that the argument of a conflict wins," she continued. "I have not looked into it deeply, but I can easily see a court ruling on the issue and talking about the ability of professional judges to not be unduly biased. But [if] the question gets to the SCC – it seems that they have given strong hints about how they think about it."

International co-prosecutor Nicholas Koumjian said that he would wait until the defence had made their motion before responding to their argument, but reiterated the prosecution's position that it would not be taking any similar action.

"It is the judges' job to make decisions, and the fact that they rule against a party does not of itself mean that a reasonably informed observer would consider them biased," he said in an email. "Making decisions based on law and evidence does not constitute bias."

Thanks to a crowd-sourcing campaign spearheaded by grassroots map developers Urban Voice Cambodia, residents of Phnom Penh can now access a map pinpointing flood-prone areas in the capital during rainy season.

Updated online yesterday, the map was generated by citizens, who contributed 119 reports of flooding over a three-month period, said Ny Sovann, a media project manager for the organisation.

"We gathered reports from August through October last year and then used our online mapping software to illustrate where residents should be careful next year," Sovann said, adding the map is available in both Khmer and English.

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Chamkarmon, Prampi Makara, Toul Kork, Daun Penh and Sen Sok are all highlighted as districts that are particularly prone to flooding.

Urban Voice uses mapping technology from Kenyan company Ushahidi, which drew inspiration from US-based urban mapping site SeeClickFix, which provides a platform for citizens to report urban issues directly to their government, said Sovann.

"We started working on the flooding map so people can self-organise in this city.… We want to help develop this place," he said.

Efforts to expand the project in collaboration with city officials this year are in the early planning stages, Sovann added.

The organisation aspires in the future to design a similar platform connecting residents to their elected representatives.

Togo Uchida, a project formulation adviser in charge of environment and climate change at the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA), which has worked with City Hall since 1999 to repair and expand the city's drainage system, said he welcomed any new information on flooding in the capital.

He added that JICA and City Hall had completed just over 50 per cent of new pipe installations in Phnom Penh as part of the third phase of the city's Flood Protection and Drainage Improvement Project.

Seng Solady, a program assistant at JICA's infrastructure division, said that ongoing repairs to the drainage system were "right on target".

ADDITIONAL REPORTING BY CHHAY CHANNYDA

Beginning this year, all public schools will be required to conduct regularly scheduled forums designed to function as a sounding board between teachers, parents and students, officials said yesterday.

The meetings will encourage dialogue about what is and isn't working in Cambodian schools, Education Minister Hang Chuon Narong said.

"These working groups will allow a public forum for parents and students to talk about what they want to correct in schools," Narong said, adding that the number of meetings that schools will be required to conduct would be determined by their individual schedules.

In an announcement made on Tuesday following an annual ministry meeting in the capital, Phnom Penh municipal governor Pa Socheatvong said the forums could begin as soon as this month.

"The public forums will help find the negative points in the education sector with the help of parents and students," he said.

Chhum Sarom, director of Wat Koh High School in Phnom Penh's Daun Penh district, commended efforts to create an environment in which educators, students and parents could work together.

"And the school can also explain the progress [being made by] their children or tell parents if a student has been absent," he said.

The idea of regular updates on her daughter's progress at school was warmly welcomed by Sin Sitha, the mother of a student at Wat Koh.

"Parents don't dare to correct teachers or school programs and these forums will let me know about my daughter's studies and what's going on," Sitha said.

This is the second reform being championed this year by newly appointed Chuon Narong, who is charged with improving a frequently criticised education system.

In early January, in an attempt to crack down on rampant cheating on nationwide testing, the ministry announced that teachers will begin individually writing final exams on the white board.

A senior US diplomat has reiterated that direct negotiations between the ruling party and the opposition is the only way to break the political deadlock that has gripped the Kingdom since July's national election, reporters were told yesterday.

Following a closed-door meeting between Scot Marciel, principal deputy assistant secretary at the US State Department's Bureau of East Asian and Pacific Affairs, and foreign affairs minister Hor Namhong, US embassy spokesman Sean McIntosh told reporters that Marciel had restated Washington's position.

"As the [US] has said time and time again, we encourage both parties to return to the negotiating table such as to de-escalate the current situation," he said.

"It is very important that the Cambodian People's Party and the Cambodia National Rescue Party sit together and talk about how they want to move forward and begin implementing reforms … necessary for the benefit of the Cambodian people."

Foreign Ministry spokesman Koy Koung said that Marciel had stressed that the US government was taking no sides in the political face-off between the two parties.

"The US stressed a clear position that [it will] not take sides with any political party and encourages the [CPP and CNRP] to sit together for peaceful talks, meaning that Khmers and Khmers have to resolve [this] problem by themselves, that was the key point," he said.

"The deputy prime minister [Namhong] has insisted that the CNRP [must] return to the negotiating table and sit in the National Assembly to debate its demands for overall election reform or a re-election. But not [remain] in the streets."

CNRP vice-president Kem Sokha said he had informed the US diplomat in a private meeting that the opposition would not resume talks while the current environment of political pressure and intimidation prevails.

Recent opposition meets in Kandal and Kampong Cham have been called off after the deployment of security forces, along with intimidating plain-clothes ruling party supporters, to the vicinity.

"When we feel that the political environment has returned to normal [and there is] no longer pressure and intimidation, then we will resume talks," he said.