International assistance cut as Cambodia works to prevent HIV-AIDS disease

HIV/AIDS risk awareness training for sex-workers in Cambodia April 2008. Image: Masaru Goto/World Bank

(WNN/VOA) CAMBODIA: Cambodian health officials will travel to Washington in July to share their experiences and ideas at the 19th International AIDS Conference. Health officials now say they are worried a decrease in aid funding to fight the disease could hurt their efforts to stop it.

“After checking the annual rate of HIV patients, we could see a big decrease in the HIV rate,” Mean Chivun, director of the Center Against HIV, Skin Disease, and Venereal Disease at the Ministry of Health, told VOA Khmer. “In 1998 there were 100 new HIV patients a day. From 2010 to 2012, that daily rate is approximately 2.”

It took more than decade for HIV/AIDS to reach Cambodia after the lethal viral illness saw its first documented case in the United States in1981.

But in the 21 years since, Cambodia has made strides in reducing the prevalence of the disease—far below 1 percent.

NGOs Call on Donors To Strengthen Conditions

Cambodian Non Governmental Organizations workers shout slogans during a demonstration in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. (Photo: AP)

Chun Sakada, VOA Khmer
Phnom Penh Tuesday, 01 June 2010

“The donors should have influence or power over the Cambodian government to respect human rights and democracy.”

Leaders of Cambodia’s leading development organizations said Tuesday they want the international community to put conditions on development aid pledges, which are expected to be more than $ 1 billion when they meet with senior government officials this week.

A donor meeting Wednesday and Thursday will focus on the government’s national development plan, which is expected $6.2 billion over the next five years.

The meeting, officially known as the Cambodian Development Cooperation Forum, gathers Prime Minister Hun Sen and his Cabinet with representatives from the US, the European Union, China, Japan, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, UN and others.

Local and international non-governmental organizations will also be represented by NGO Forum and the Committee for Free and Fair Elections.

“We request international donors to present the list of recommendations on what to demand from the Cambodian government before agreeing to provide future development aid,” Chhith Sam Ath, executive director of NGO Forum, a consortium of development organizations, said. “We have concerns over the management of land and natural resources, which the government and the donors should think about deeply.”

Much of Cambodia’s annual budget is supported by aid from other countries and larger development banks and agencies. In recent years, that has included large aid packages from China, who Cambodian officials say grant money without the conditions typically imposed by the West.

“The stance of the NGOs is of reflection and discussion,” Chhith Sam Ath said. “We don’t want to prevent development aid. We welcome the aid, but we want the aid provided to Cambodia to be used directly and effectively.”

Aid conditions have nettled Cambodia’s leaders in the past, although some critics say the donors do not use enough leverage to push the government to do more to fight corruption, poverty and human rights abuses.

Ahead of this week’s meetings the outspoken critic of Cambodian policies, Global Witness, called on donors to do more.

“The Cambodian government has been promising to reform for years, but nothing had changed,” Global Witness Campaigns Director Gavin Hayman said in a statement Tuesday. “Our latest report shows that the political elite has no intention of loosening its stranglehold over the country’s natural resource wealth. Donors simply cannot continue to turn a blind eye.”

Hang Chhaya, executive director of the Khmer Institute for Democracy, said the donors should “put condition pressure on the government for providing aid to end human rights violations and evictions, as well as recommend to the government legal and judicial reform and anti-corruption [where] reform is slow.”

“The donors should have influence or power over the Cambodian government to respect human rights and democracy,” Hang Chhaya said.

Ros Sopheap, executive director of Gender and Development organization, said the government’s policy to promote gender equity has not been effectively implemented.

“So we would like the government and the donors to take care of solving the challenges to women, like poverty, low education, domestic violence and trafficking,” she said.

Opposition says aid, foreign investment to drop more than 30pc

Wednesday, 26 November 2008
Written by Chun Sophal
The Phnom Penh Post

A slower global economy and an expected decline in development aid will hit Cambodia more than the government admits, critics say

CAMBODIA'S foreign direct investment is set to drop more than the 30 percent claimed by the government, an opposition lawmaker warned Tuesday, adding that donor aid will also fall further than expected.

Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Son Chhay said the economic slowdown is more serious than the government admits and that lower foreign aid payments will add to the Kingdom's economic woes.

"I think the prime minister will not be able to get more than US$400 million from donor countries because those countries are suffering from the economic crisis," he said.

Son Chhay added that the government has recently increased expenses on public administration by 38 percent and called for new policies to encourage farmers to grow crops on public land and to increase productivity and job creation.

Prime Minister Hun Sen last week predicted a drop of nearly 30 percent in foreign investment in response to a widening financial crisis that has engulfed the Kingdom's principal investor countries.

In his address to the Government-Private Sector Forum on Friday, Hun Sen also said Cambodia could expect $500 million in foreign investment in 2009, down from $700 million this year.

"We think the decrease will not affect economic growth or our poverty-reduction strategies as long as we receive between $500 million and $600 million from official development aid," Hun Sen said.

The government plans to call for aid of at least $600 million from development partners and other countries at the donor meeting set for early December, Hun Sen said.

"How can we avoid the effects [of the crisis] on our economy if investment is decreasing?" he said.

Hang Chuon Naron, secretary general at the Ministry of Economy and Finance, said Cambodia's continued economic growth depends on the Kingdom receiving $600 million in donor aid and more than $850 million in foreign direct investment.