Not All Chams To Make Mecca This Year

By Win Thida, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
08 December 2008

Click here to listen to the Khmer audio program

The closure of Bangkok’s international airport earlier this month cost Cambodia millions of dollars and crippled Thailand’s tourism sector. It also thwarted the pilgrimage to Mecca of nearly 200 Cambodian Muslims.

The pilgrimage, or hajj, is an annual rite for many Muslims, a tenet that the faithful should make the trip to Mecca, a holy city in Saudi Arabia, at least once in a lifetime. It can cost thousands of dollars for travel and accommodation.

“I have never been there before, and now it was canceled,” said Mary Ya, a Cham who missed her chance this year due to delays in Thailand. “Now I have to wait for the next opportunity.”

At least one travel guide said the failure of some Chams to reach Mecca this year was due to the high number of people wanting to go.

“This year I felt a lot of regret,” said Halgi Sakariya Suleu Mana, who has been a travel guide for many years and never seen this kind of problem. “I was not successful with this, not because the Thai airport was closed, but this year there were too many people who wanted to travel.”

Chams Gather for International Conference in California

Young Cambodian Cham Muslim women stare at a pile of sculls in a stupa at Choeung Ek memorial on the outskirts of Phnom Penh.

Neou Sarem, VOA Khmer
Original report from Washington
29/06/2007

Scholars of the Champa people, who are descended from a kingdom representing the farthest reach of the Indian-Hindu civilization, will meet in California next month in an effort to improve the relationship of the descendants of the culture in their respective home countries.

The conference, "Socio-cultural Issues of Champa 175 Years After Its Disappearance," was organized by Champa Communities in America with support from the International Office of Champa and the Champaka Journal. It will be held in San Jose July 7 and July 8.

"The goal and purpose of this conference is to assess the sociocultural issues of the people of Champa, in terms of education, economic and social standing in their host countries," said Nhuong Tu, a conference organizer.

The kingdom of Champa, which covered much of modern-day southern Vietnam, flourished from the 7th Century through 1832. Descendants include the Cambodian Chams, the only Muslim group to emerge from the empire.

So Farina, head of the Documentation Center of Cambodia's Cham Muslim Oral History Project, said in an interview at VOA Khmer this week she would attend the conference to search for ways to help Cambodian Chams improve their lot and to mitigate negative perceptions toward their community.

Chams were targeted for persecution and execution by the Khmer Rouge for their religious beliefs.

About 400,000 Cham remain in Cambodia, 150,000 in Vietnam and 20,000 in Malaysia, in a diaspora fueled by the spread of communism in Indochina.

Khmer Muslisms, the latest Thai scapegoats: Thai Army recommends suspension of Khmer Muslim visas

End of Khmer Muslim visas sought

Sa Kaeo (TNA) – The Royal Thai Army's Burapa Task Force, which oversees the border with Cambodia, will advise the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to consider suspending issuing visas to Cambodian Muslims after finding that increasing numbers are crossing the border and travelling to the kingdom's southern provinces, a senior officer said on Thursday.

Burapha Special Task Force Division 12 commander Col. Chaichaiyan Sothornchai said the special task force is investigating information that the southern insurgents were using the strategy to increase the Muslim population in the three southernmost provinces by encouraging Muslims from Cambodia and Burma to join their co-religionists in the South.

According to immigration records, Col. Chaichaiyan said, since 2005 almost 20,000 Cambodian Muslims entered Thailand legally via Aranyaprathet in the Cambodian border province of Sa Kaeo, and then travel on to the southernmost provinces.

Of that number, according to the records, only 10 per cent returned to their home country, Col. Chaichaiyan said, expressing his concern regarding the rising number of Khmer Muslims entering Buddhist Thailand.

"There are also a lot of Cambodian Muslims who enter the kingdom illegally," he added, "and they cannot be counted."

The question of not issuing visas should be addressed carefully, he said, and the Burapa Task Force would ask the Ministry of Foreign Affairs via the Internal Security Operations Command to consider suspending issuing visas, temporarily, to Cambodian Muslims.

On Wednesday, Thai Army Rangers and provincial police arrested 48 Cambodians in the eastern province of Sa Kaeo, bordering Cambodia, at highway checkpoints there, while three more Cambodians were detained at the Aranyaprathet border crossing.

Of those arrested, eight are Muslims, travelling from Cambodia's Kampong Cham, who said they planned to go to Thailand's three southern border provinces to seek employment.

Thai Charges Against Khmer Muslims Seen as Trick To Hurt Cambodia's Tourism

Today's Comment: Cambodia Is Not A Breeding Ground for Extremist Muslims

24 May 07
Moneakseka Khmer
Translated from Khmer and posted online

It is ridiculous that the Thai authorities have alleged without evidence that some Khmer Muslims, or Cham, helped give military training to the rebellious Muslims in southern Thailand.

The Cambodian Government has categorically denied the allegation that Cambodia's Khmer Muslims, or members of the Cham ethnic group, have provided military training for the Islamic rebels in southern Thailand. Now, due to lack of proof, Thai General Watthanachai has swallowed his words by admitting that there is no evidence and that this matter is sensitive.

Such an accusation is not funny. It gives the impression that Cambodia is a hotbed for the production of Islamic extremist groups. Cambodia counts hundreds of thousands of Muslims whose ancestors came from Champa, a kingdom Vietnam swallowed up in the 17th century. For centuries thereafter, the Cham have coexisted peacefully with the Khmer to the point that the ethnic Cham minority people have become known as Khmer Muslims.

Different from some groups of Muslims in other regions of the world, the Muslims in Cambodia have never committed or been implicated in any acts of violence. As clear as daylight, with the advent of the JI [Jemaah Islamiya] movement in Southeast Asia or the al-Qaeda terror group in the world, the Muslims in Cambodia have not taken any part in either of them. Now that the Thai authorities charged without proof that the Cham people or the Muslims in Cambodia had provided military training for the seditious Thai Muslims in southern Thailand, we feel that it is a joke.

Moneakseka Khmer holds that before bringing up such a serious matter one should be in possession of clear evidence first. Such a careless comment could be one intended to make the international public look at Cambodia as a camp or an advisory harbor for terrorists. Such an unfounded statement could also be seen as a trick devised with the intention of scaring the foreign tourists away from Cambodia.

Compared to other countries in the region, although it remains under the despotic heel of a strongman, Cambodia does not have any armed conflict or ethnic strife. For this reason, the foreign tourists now start looking at Cambodia as their destination of choice, especially the visit to Angkor Wat and other ancient temples.

The sloppy remark that the Cham ethnic group or the Muslims in Cambodia have provided military training for the separatist Thai Muslims in the south of Thailand could be intended to hurt Cambodia's booming tourist industry. This wicked strategy or evil trick, if true, is unthought-of.

Moneakseka Khmer is sure that the Muslim rebellion in southern Thailand has no connection with the Khmer Muslims in Cambodia. Some of the Khmer Muslims who traveled to southern Thailand went there for study while others only passed through this region en route to Malaysia to seek job or visit relatives. Let us not forget that there are many Khmer Muslims living in Malaysia, many of them having taken refuge in this country during the years of the civil war in Cambodia.

We hold that the Thai authorities should find a solution to their internal problems by themselves. It is not nice for them to keep going around making unfounded accusations against others. Cambodia with its majority Buddhist population believes in the law of cause and effect. We have not committed any evil deeds against any country or nation. We believe that what is taking place in southern Thailand is probably the consequence of bad karma.

We Khmer people do not like violence. A number of violent leaders made Cambodians suffer for decades. For this reason, we do not want to see war ever again on whichever scale and in whichever part of the world. We believe that the leaders of Thailand will use good judgment to resolve their internal problems peacefully and will stop going around making unsupported accusations against neighboring countries.