The Legend of Naga and Dragon

We cannot overstate on the possible engagement and marriage between Naga and Dragon. Naga in Khmer belief is female and Dragon in Chinese belief is male. If Yin and Yang was important for Chinese philosophy, Yin is not someone else but princes Naga and Yang is not someone else but Chinese prince. Whenever, Yin and Yang are two inseparable elements on earth, Cambodia and China are undividable.

According to the archeological records, Khmer and Chinese has bonded relationship since the birth of Kingdom of Cambodia. This historical claim is not merely speaking if we looked at the accounts of archeological sites, historical manuscripts and folklore narrations. Thus the word "Funan" which was misspelled by Chinese traders of "Pchnom" has been a key account for historians to study about the birth of Cambodia. The caving pictures depicting on the walls of all Khmer ancient temples have attractively illustrated the commercial trading between Khmer and Chinese, for instance, the depicting stories on the wall of Bayon temple. Not only that reflecting economic and social relationship, many historical accounts indicated political involvements between Khmer and Chinese. For instance, the exchange of ambassadors between Khmer and China in the reign of Bhavavarman in the pre-Angkorian period, the Chinese troops depicting on the wall of Angkor Watt during the ascending to throne of Suriyavarman II, and the arrival of Ghou Daghoun who was the ambassador of China to visit Cambodia during the post-Angkorian period.

But what is impressed me to writing this article this moment is the legend of Naga and Dragon. If we asked Chinese people on what is their national animal, they will simultaneously respond us that "Dragon". And if we looked at Cambodian culture, architectures, arts and belief, Naga serpent is omnipresently everywhere and this mythical serpent is historically reflecting the birth of Cambodia and the wedding ceremony of all Khmer couples. It has started with Khmer princes whose name was Soma (or Naga princes or Lie Yi in Chinese) was the first Khmer princes who governed Cambodia. We can see that Chinese politicians and traders primarily contacted with princes Naga before the coming of Preah Thong from India according to some sources. Princes Naga is considered as a connector between China and India in that time. It has also reflected the strategic zone of ASEAN in ancient time. In that time, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia and Malaysia were not yet born. Princes Naga was more important than ancient states of Java, Champa and Mon in partnering with China and India.

An exchange between Thanh and Sokhom

This is very good exchanging of idea...yes, many hidden things have been revealed by a Vietnamese national. I think Thanh should not use that justification to bully Cambodia at all.

Posted as comments on KI-Media

I am a Vietnamese/Nguoi Viet or what you all refer to as "Yuon", I would like to share a heart to heart with Khmer readers .

I understand Khmer's animosity against Vietnam. The Viet nation expanded and took over your former lands. You have the Right to Hate Me and my people.

But I just want you all to understand a few things about Vietnam:

We are not bad people. We are people like you. We breathe air, we eat food, we have blood that runs red like every human being in this world. When a normal Viet individual sees a Khmer person suffer in pain, we sympathize and we feel and share the pain that you feel. We don't you to go hungry nor do we want you to get sick. A Khmer who comes to a Viet for help - will always be given assistance. In the past hundreds of years of history, often times Viet and Khmer have been good to each other. Making love, fighting wars together, exchanging cultural practices like food and music (many similarities, e.g., Samlar machu-Khmer & Canh chua-Viet, the Viet Folk Songs of the Mekong Delta has the same musical rhythm).

When Siam invaded Cambodia, Khmers asked for Viet help and the Viets always did provide assistance. When the French ruled and abused Viets and Khmers, we joined together to oust the foreign White Man. When Pol Pot committed genocide, Viets removed him from power. Pol Pot had killed all the intellectuals and about 90% Buddhist monks. Vietnam allowed your cousins - Khmer Krom Buddhist monks to go to Cambodia to REVIVE your religion. YES, that's true! Communist Vietnam helped to foster a new generation of your Buddhist clergy.

I DO NOT support Vietnam swallowing and erasing Cambodia from the map. Cambodia is a beautiful country with a wonderful culture, marvelous architecture and a beautiful and charming people. I wish for its preservation and longevity. Long Live Cambodia and the Khmer Nation!

But I as a sole individual, I am powerless to stop my country and people from trying to swallow Cambodia (& Laos).

Post-War Politics of Cambodia on "Facing Soft Power Politics"

Soft power politics seems don’t come along with co-operative plan and mutual assistance in rhetoric only, but by enforcing through memorandums, treaties or agreements.

Cambodia has empirically derailed from the wave of “soft power politics” of the world. She is likely lacking ability in responding to current flow of soft power which comes along with international relations, foreign trade, the guarding of its citizens, conflict resolution with its neighbors and proper reaction to foreign consistent cooporative policy.

Politically speaking, soft power politics refers to the politics of cooporation, not confrontation as modern nation-states seek to put aside all violent means by adopting peaceful diplomacy and mutual interests through economic, cultural and social cooporation. The procedures have practically done through the platform of dialogue regionally and globally. Michael Hsiao and Alan Yang posited in the Asia-Pacific Journal focusing on Japan that China has been more practical in spreading “soft power politics” to its neighbors and regions particularly the Southeast Asian nations. As this policy has tremendously renovated after the cold war, China has physically strengthened its relations with ASEAN states since the 1990s within all fields including foreign aid, trade, infrastructure, politics, culture, tourism and environment.

Geopolitically, Cambodia is a member among regional associations such as the ASEAN which has extended to ASEAN Plus Three (APT) when China, Japan and Korea are included and the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) etc. But in its sub-regional cooporation, it appears intricate for Cambodia to be a member of the Mekong River Commission (MRC) and the Cambodia-Laos-Vietnam Development Triangle. Cambodia is obligated to all procedures and co-operative frameworks to these sub-regional embodiments. Noticeably, many Cambodians are skeptical about Cambodia’s strength and intelligence to smoothly operate this unavoidable cooporative policy as well as the soft power innovation foreigners exposed.

Not many scholars or academic papers have deliberately detailed the “deficit” of Cambodia in handling with this impromptu skeptic. This article will singly look into the relationship Cambodia must undertake with its neighbors: Thailand and Vietnam.

Our children profit from our actions

November 3, 2010
By A. Gaffar Peang-Meth
PACIFIC DAILY NEWS (Guam)

"People power" is not beyond reach in Cambodia. Skeptics misunderstand people power and equate it with bloody rebellion. Khmers are Buddhists -- gentle and placid, who don't rise against a ruthless dictatorship.

The Albert Einstein Institution, committed to the defense of freedom, says: "Nonviolent action (also sometimes referred to as people power, political defiance and nonviolent struggle) is a technique of action for applying power in a conflict by using symbolic protests, noncooperation and defiance, but not physical violence."

My nine years (1980-1989) in the Khmer resistance against Vietnam's military invasion and occupation took me near death's door many times, but I never believed we could defeat the Hanoi armies that brought the Americans to a negotiations table earlier. But we did believe that an effective Khmer resistance would bring Hanoi to the negotiations table. That, in fact, happened.

Except, the Khmer nationalists never prepared themselves for post-1991 Paris Peace Accords.

Adding to the detrimental lack of careful strategic planning with necessary "next steps," they were trapped in denial, blaming, as many simply realigned themselves for political positions.

The game of "svar pa'at bai loeu mo'at po-pe" (monkey smears rice on a goat's mouth) continued until today: The monkey ate the farmer's rice and smeared rice on a goat's mouth so the goat would be blamed for eating the rice; the farmer didn't know better and took out his anger on the goat, forgetting that goats don't eat rice.

Population has power

I stood before my introduction to political science classes for 13 years, driving home the same point every semester, that a government's "right to rule" is based on the people putting it in power.

The Truth of Paris Peace Accord

With more than 17 countries, they simultaneously signed the treaty to end war and foreign occupation in Cambodia. The treaty was empowered by five annexes focused on a comprehensive political settlement of the Cambodia conflict; the agreement concerning the sovereignty, independence, territorial integrity and inviolability, neutrality, national unity of Cambodia; and the declaration on the rehabilitation and reconstruction of Cambodia. Noticeably, all annexes, concerning and declaration has been existing and slightly existing nowadays in Cambodia. However, existence without proper and effective implementation is a matter of regress, not progress.

Introduction

I was invited by the Cambodian Canadian Community of Canada to give a talk about the importance of Paris Peace Accord at their gathering to commemorate/observe the 19th anniversary of Paris Peace Accord. I also got invitation from the University of Calgary to be a guest speaker at their weekly "Movies that Matters" program organized by undergraduate students. Movie was "Enemies of the People" filmed and documented by the effort of a Phnom Penh Post reporter, Theth Sambath, which has been worldwide screened and granted many distinctive prizes. The audience of these two events were astonished and stimulated by my talk. I was asked several questions from the audience, and my talk was broader and in details more than on what I am going to specifically describe here. Exactly, the Paris Peace Accord is very crucial for both talks. 

Paris Peace Agreement in a Nutshell
As one of the younger generations of Cambodia, I couldn’t abstain from sharing idea about the 19th anniversary of Paris Peace Accord. Today is Saturday, October 23, 2010 is the 19th years of the international effort under the United Nations mediating to signing this very important chapter for Cambodia history, the Paris Peace Accord. This treaty is not solely important for Cambodia but for the international organization like the UNs to take further step in demonstrating a better world for all beings.

This short essay will elaborate some plights of Cambodia in engaging with the international recognizable treaties to survive itself from foreign domination as well as to maintain its status as a sovereign state on this planet. Furthermore, the author would like to argue some important issues needing to clarify of having yearly commemoration and observation of this very important day for all Cambodian people and their government.

Snapshot of History
At least, two academic writers such as Stephen Morris and Chan Dara who have argued that Cambodia will loss its status as a sovereign state if this country has not been guaranteed by at least two important international treaties: the Geneva Treaty and Paris Peace Accord. The past tumultuous political movements including the legacy of French colony and the cold-war have imposed on some countries to become greater dominant state and some countries to become satellite state. As the matter of fact, Lao and Cambodia who were destined by both French colony and the cold war have emerged in different outcomes: Lao and Cambodia were wholeheartedly supported by Chinese prolific leader Chou En Lai in assuring its sovereignty from the French colony as well as from Vietnamese attempt to dominate at the Geneva Conference in 1954.

However, Lao has not been internationally recognized after waking up from the cold war which Lao and Cambodia is considered as the hot-spot of political players during this era. In contrast, Cambodia has endorsed from that hot-spot of domino effect by the Paris Peace Accord.

Kampuchea Krom - The Battles and Bargains That Left a People Behind

 

By Michelle Vachon
The Cambodia daily

    In his 1966 book "Les frontières du Cambodge," political scientist Sarin Chhak introduces his section on Kampuchea Krom by saying that this region of the Mekong delta was Cambodian territory until the middle of the 17th Century, when Vietnam took advantage of Cambodia's internal struggles to take it over.

    As to how this occurred, Sarin Chhak, who served on Cambodia's negotiating team in border talks with South Vietnam in the mid-1960s, sidesteps the issue: "We don't claim to go back in history. It seems of little use to repeat what numerous authors have reported on the topic."

    By the late 1800s, southern Vietnam had become the French territory of Cochin-China and Cambodia's King Norodom had sought and signed the Protectorate Treaty with France. In his book, Sarin Chhak argued that France's 1860s annexations of large portions of Kampuchea Krom to Cochin-China was an administrative decision that did not legally set borders.

    And though Sarin Chhak asserted that "numerous authors" had written on the history of Kampuchea Krom, no historian has yet produced a full account of the events which led to today's situation: a population of Cambodians estimated at more than 1 million in Vietnam's 1999 census, but believed considerably larger, living among a population of some 83 million Vietnamese.

    Ros Chantrabot, vice president of the Royal Academy of Cambodia and an associate researcher at France's Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris, said that the ranks of Cambodian historians, as in other fields, were depleted by decades of conflict and that among the very few remaining, none has concentrated on Kampuchea Krom.

Defining Cambodia

By Michelle Vachon
The Cambodia Daily

Sixty-five years ago, a French colonial administrator made a decision on maritime borders between Cambodia and Cochin-China, as the southern part of Vietnam was then called.

Jules Brevie hoped his decision would resolve, once and for all, a long dispute.

Meant to clarify which islands in the Gulf of Thailand fell under the jurisdiction of either Cambodia or Cochin-China, Jules Brevie's administrative notice of Jan 31, 1939, has been at the heart of all maritime border quarrels between Cambodia and Vietnam ever since.

Every political regime in Cambodia has raised the issue, which still triggers heated debates and often puts the two countries at odds with each other.

In the 1960s, then-Prince Norodom Sihanouk requested an international conference to settle the matter once and for all, and to protect Cambodia's territory through peaceful means.

No such approach suited the Khmer Rouge, who bombarded the Vietnamese island of Phu Quoc (Koh Trac in Khmer) and exterminated the 515 Vietnamese residents of Poulo Panjang (Tho Chu island) in May 1975, said Raoul Marc Jennar in his 1997 doctorate thesis, "Contemporary Cambodian Borders." 

The only agreements on maritime borders between Cambodia and Vietnam were signed in July 1982. They were part of a series of pacts that were based on the Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation signed on Feb 18, 1979 shortly after Vietnam had ousted the Khmer Rouge regime, taken over the country and installed a Hanoi-friendly government.

Valid for 25 years, terms of the agreement indicate that the 1979 treaty will be automatically renewed for periods of 10 years, unless revoked the year before renewal by either country, said Var Kim Hong, chairman of Cambodia's Border Committees.

As far as he knows, no measure has been taken to annul the agreement, and it should get renewed on Wednesday, he said.