Phnom Penh Post
Letters to the Editor
Friday, 08 April 1994
Outrage over report
Dear Sir
A fter having read Nate Thayer's reports for several years now, I suppose I should not have been as surprised and outraged as I was on reading his latest pieces "Army blank check undermines budget" printed as the lead story in the Post dated March 11-24.
The notion that the fight against the Khmer Rouge would undermine Cambodia's budget and jeopardize aid is breathtaking. May we ask what humanitarian projects the budget and aid would be devoted to if the Khmer Rouge were able to regain power in Cambodia?
Thayer goes on to blame the victim for the "failure by the government to win new international military assistance". Why not speak of the failure of the international community to support the new government of Cambodia? Why not criticize the Thai government for its continuing sanctuaries and trade with the KR, and China and the Western powers for supplying the arms that are today being employed by the KR? Thayer's own companion story shows a German anti-tank missile supplied through Singapore in 1989 being used against government troops.
The same accusation is put by "KR Ambassador" In Sopheap in an interview by Thayer published on the following page: "There is no money to increase the salary of teachers, they say themselves that 20 percent of the people have no housing, but they spend money on fighting". This must taken some gall to report straight-faced considering the KR's record on education and housing, leaving aside civil servants' salaries!
- Helen Jarvis, Sydney, Australia ■