PHNOM PENH (AFP)--Germany will give another EUR3 million ($4.3 million) to Cambodia's U.N.-backed Khmer Rouge war crimes tribunal, the country announced in a statement Friday.
The money comes as international backers have shown an increased willingness to fund the tribunal, following the appointment of an ethics monitor to grapple with ongoing corruption claims within the court.
This month, the U.S. made its first donation to the court with a pledge of $ 1.8 million. Japan, Germany, France and Australia made pledges earlier this year.
The German embassy said its most recent donation will be used for court operations over the next two years.
The tribunal recently announced a budget shortfall of more than $40 million.
The war crimes court has twice been hit by allegations that Cambodian staff paid kickbacks for their jobs, leading international donors to withhold funding in July.
The tribunal, which began work in 2006, originally was budgeted at $56.3 million over three years, but cost estimates quickly rose to more than $100 million.
Tribunal staff expect the first Khmer Rouge war crimes trial to begin by early 2009.
Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed, as the communist Khmer Rouge dismantled modern Cambodian society in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia during its 1975-79 rule.
The money comes as international backers have shown an increased willingness to fund the tribunal, following the appointment of an ethics monitor to grapple with ongoing corruption claims within the court.
This month, the U.S. made its first donation to the court with a pledge of $ 1.8 million. Japan, Germany, France and Australia made pledges earlier this year.
The German embassy said its most recent donation will be used for court operations over the next two years.
The tribunal recently announced a budget shortfall of more than $40 million.
The war crimes court has twice been hit by allegations that Cambodian staff paid kickbacks for their jobs, leading international donors to withhold funding in July.
The tribunal, which began work in 2006, originally was budgeted at $56.3 million over three years, but cost estimates quickly rose to more than $100 million.
Tribunal staff expect the first Khmer Rouge war crimes trial to begin by early 2009.
Up to two million people died of starvation and overwork, or were executed, as the communist Khmer Rouge dismantled modern Cambodian society in a bid to forge an agrarian utopia during its 1975-79 rule.
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Bird flu reappears in Vietnam
Hanoi (dpa) - Vietnamese authorities have detected the H5N1 avian flu virus in a flock of ducks on a farm in the southern province of Ca Mau, a government official said Friday.
Hoang Van Nam, deputy director of Vietnam's Animal Health Department, said inspectors had found on September 22 that bird flu had killed more than 50 of 500 ducks on a Ca Mau farm.
All the ducks at the farm were ducklings under 45 days old, and had thus not been vaccinated yet, Nam said.
Authorities have culled all the ducks at the farm.
"Bird flu occurs occasionally in Vietnam," Nam said. "We cannot extinguish it, but only limit its spread."
On September 7, the Animal Health Department announced it had detected bird flu in a flock of 600 ducks on a farm in the southern province of Ben Tre, adjacent to Ho Chi Minh City.
According to Nam, bird flu outbreaks have been detected in 26 Vietnamese provinces since the beginning of 2008, killing 5 people and forcing authorities to cull more than 60,000 ducks.
H5N1 mainly affects poultry and wild birds, but can infect humans who have close contact with sick fowl. Scientists fear that if it spreads unchecked, the disease could mutate into a form which could be transmitted between humans, leading to a worldwide pandemic that could kill millions.
Bird flu has infected 105 people in Vietnam and killed at least 51 of them since it first appeared in the country in late 2003.
Be careful folks don't buy any poultry or ducks from Vietnam. If you want to see tomorrow.
I love to eat ducks and the ducks from Vietnam taste very well.
So this are good news for me.
Ducks will become cheaper because people who not understand that eating ducks is not dangerous will not buy it.
"Close contact" to ducks do not mean you cannot eat them. Hehehehhe
I love duck too, especially duck soup and duck wrap.
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