Russia has agreed to mark off 70 percent of the debt that Cambodia owed in the past years. “I would like to inform you that Russia has canceled 70 percent of the debt that the kingdom owed,” said the chairman of the National Assembly’s committee of finance, banking and audition. Cambodia borrowed about US$1.5 billion from Russia through its previous governments.
Category: Cambodia & Laos
The Laotian government has allowed an independent contracting firm to conduct a feasibility study for a new international airport to replace Vientiane’s Wattay airport as flights into the small Asia nation increase.
“That is why the government is seriously thinking of building a new one in a more suitable location. We studied all the options and concluded that Wattay cannot cater adequately to the long term economic growth of Vientiane,” he was quoted by the Lao news agency (KPL) as saying.
from the guardian
The Khmer Rouge leaders were obsessed with canals, embankments and dams. They presided over hundreds of irrigation projects to revive the country’s glorious but perhaps mythical past of an agrarian wonderland.
The Khmer Rouge built around 70 percent of Cambodia’s more than 800 canal networks according to a survey commissioned by the United Nations in the 1990s.
Now, across this impoverished nation of 14 million people, the canals are being rebuilt by a government hoping to take advantage of the world’s increasing demand for rice.
according to Xinhua:
The World Bank Group Wednesday approved a 20 million dollar grant for the Demand for Good Governance (DFGG) Project in Cambodia to help enhance citizens’ engagement in development and governance processes, and government responsiveness to their demands.
Cambodia’s tourism sector is set to form a task force next week to address the Thai political crisis that has caused foreign arrivals in the Kingdom to plummet, national media reported Wednesday.
Cambodia stands to lose more than US$100 million in tourism-related revenue if the political deadlock gripping Thailand’s capital – a major transit point for visitors to the Kingdom – does not ease in the next three months, Minister of Tourism Thong Khon told the Post Sunday.
The minister estimated that 1,500 tourists arrive daily by air and land from Bangkok, accounting for nearly 30 percent of total travellers, and that foreign visitors spend $770 on average per trip.
A major South Korean developer will dramatically reduce the scale of its proposed one billion U.S. dollars 7-skyscraper complex along the Tonle Bassac River to just three buildings at half the original price, national media said.
Cambodia is urging ASEAN member states to postpone a schedule meeting next month in Thailand as protests in nation’s capital of Bangkok have turned violent in the past week.
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Cambodian PM visits Laos
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has arrived in Laos ahead of a planned meeting of the leaders of former French Indochina: Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam.
China and Laos continue to build closer ties.
Russia is discussing with the Cambodian leadership the possibility of writing off most of Cambodia’s debt, which stands at around US$1.5 billion, a senior Russian lawmaker said on Monday.
“Russia and Cambodia are holding talks to write off Cambodia’s debt of around $1.5 billion. The principal sum (about 70%) of the debt could be written off as part of Russia’s participation in the Paris Club of Creditor Nations,” said Valery Yazev, deputy speaker of the lower house of Russia’s parliament