Govt angry at rivals' calls to halt loans to Cambodia
Govt angry at rivals' calls to halt loans to Cambodia
PHNOM PENH (Agencies): The government accused opposition
leaders on Tuesday of risking the Cambodian people's survival by
calling for international lenders to stop providing loans to the
kingdom.
Opposition chiefs Prince Norodom Ranariddh and Sam Rainsy
asked the Asian Development Bank, in a letter sent to the bank's
president on Monday, to withhold further loans to Cambodia until
a new coalition government is in place.
"They are destroying the rice pot, depriving the people who
voted for them during elections of their food," government
spokesman Sieng Lapresse said at a news briefing on Tuesday.
The national treasury is in dire need of the foreign
investment and assistance lost after Hun Sen ousted Ranariddh in
a coup d'etat in July of last year. The potential for problems
has been highlighted by the recent arrival in the capital of many
farmers from the countryside seeking food.
In their letter to the ADB, Ranariddh and Sam Rainsy, who have
been abroad since just after the ceremonial opening of the new
national assembly session on Sept. 24, warned that any loans
given by the Manila-based bank to the present regime would be
considered illegal.
In another development, the CPP published a staunch defense of
premier Hun Sen's record on Tuesday and called on the U.S. Senate
to reject a resolution seeking to put him on trial for alleged
human rights crimes.
U.S. Senator Jesse Helms, chairman of the Senate Foreign
Relations Committee, has submitted a resolution calling for steps
to be taken to support a possible indictment and trial of Hun Sen
for alleged violations of international humanitarian law.
The draft U.S. resolution attacks Hun Sen for his role in the
Phnom Penh government set up in 1979 by invading Vietnamese
forces, who drove the notorious Khmer Rouge government led by Pol
Pot from power, according to a copy obtained by Reuters.
The resolution also blames Hun Sen for political turmoil after
a UN-organized election in 1993 in which the CPP came second, and
for political violence since July last year when Hun Sen ousted
his then senior co-premier Ranariddh.