PHNOM PENH, May 17 (Xinhua) — The U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday invited Cambodia's Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Hor Namhong to make an official visit to Washington D.C. on June 12, according to her invitation letter released by Cambodia's Foreign Ministry.

"Your visit would be an important opportunity to identify ways in which we can work together to broaden our bilateral relationship and advance common regional goals during your leadership of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations," she said in the letter.

She said that the United States values the growing partnership with Cambodia, a partnership that has benefited the two countries' peoples over the years.

"I welcome a chance to deepen our mutual understanding and identify ways to promote regional stability and ensure shared prosperity for our countries and the wider Asia Pacific region," she said. 

Date: Thu, 17 May 2012 08:57:54 -0700Subject: Hillary invites Cambodia's FM to visit in Washington next month – Xinhua | English.news.cn

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2012-05/17/c_131594686.htm

Kith Chamroeun, London May 17, 2012

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The death of the teenage girl, Heng Chantha, who is only 14 years, again killed by armed force of the Phnom Penh regime, is again a real tragedy and especially revealing the totalitarian nature of the regime in power.

As we could observe, this regime, in power for more than 30 years, ruled the country with terror, embodied under various forms. It is carried out by different actors to strengthen the power of the totalitarian state and to control people.

In the totalitarian regimes, terror takes form with:

1 - Threats and demagogic speeches. During the spring Arab revolt, we saw that Hun Sen has threatened Khmer people if they dares to rebel against his rule. Even worse he has said he would “close the doors of Cambodia and beat them like dogs”. This form of terror is what we call a psychological terror.

2 – Use of violence, expressed as assassinations, mass killing attack, and imprisonment. We have plenty of examples for this case of terror. We can cite the assassination especially of Oum Raddsady, Chea Vichea, and Chut Wutty without forgetting that of who have been quietly and silently perpetrated without reaching the awareness of the public.

3 – Arbitrary and inhumane justice. The culture of impunity has been able to take place due to an unfair justice in service of the political party in power. The killing of people mentioned above has never been elucidated precisely to protect the real responsible persons behind.

ARTSBEAT; Judge Says Cambodian Statue Will Stay With Sotheby's for Now

By RALPH BLUMENTHAL

Published: April 7, 2012

Ruling against the immediate seizure of a 1,000-year-old Cambodian statue the United States and Cambodian governments say was looted from its temple site, a federal judge in Manhattan on Thursday gave Sotheby's continued custody of the antiquity and called a conference on the case for April 12.

The judge, George B. Daniels, signed a restraining order directing Sotheby's not to dispose of the sandstone statue, which the auction house had planned to sell for an unidentified Belgian client for up to $3 million last year, and to make it available for inspection by the Department of Homeland Security, which had sought its forfeiture as stolen property.

Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, filed a civil complaint on Wednesday against Sotheby's, alleging that the auction house knew that the statue had been stolen when it offered it for auction on March 24, 2011.

The government then planned to impound the sculpture this week for return to Cambodia.

But Sotheby's on Thursday asked Judge Daniels to bar the government from seizing the relic. A lawyer for Sotheby's, Peter G. Neiman, said in court papers that the company's bid to sell the antiquity on behalf of its owner was legal under its interpretation of American and Cambodian cultural property laws.