Quotes of the Day
The Khmer avenger wore flip-flops and a Britney Spears T shirt. He strode through the shattered glass doors of Thailand's embassy in Phnom Penh and made his way to a well-appointed interior office. There he joined a group of boys who had thrown a painting of Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej to the floor. The boys didn't hesitate. The picture was torn and stomped on. "Thailand is no good," they shouted.
In the citywide anti-Thai riots that ripped through Cambodia's capital last week, far more destructive and dangerous acts were committed yet none were as freighted with symbolism. Apart from the embassy, scores of hotels and businesses with Thai connections were vandalized, and more than 700 Thai nationals, including Ambassador Chatchawed Chartsuwan and his staff, were forced to flee for their lives. But for stunned Thais watching the riots on TV back home, these acts paled beside news of their revered monarch's image defiled inside their own embassy in Phnom Penh while police stood watching from the lawn. "If Cambodians destroy our property, I can deal with that," says Rangsri, 48, a chauffeur in Bangkok. "But stepping on a picture of our King, our father, cannot be accepted. For that, Cambodia must burn."
The spark was lit when several Cambodian newspapers misquoted Thai TV soap star Suvanant Kongying as saying Cambodians were "like worms" and that she would only visit the country if Angkor Wat were returned to Thailand. Built between the 9th and 13th centuries, Angkor Wat is the heart of Khmer culture and identity—and a persistent snarling point between the two countries. That the temple complex has come under Thai control three times since the 15th century, most recently during World War II, riles Cambodians. To this day, they claim, Thais still covet the temple. Thais, for their part, take umbrage from the very name of the Cambodian city adjacent to Angkor—Siem Riep, which literally means "flattened Thai soldiers." Recently a Thai beer company featured an advertisement with backdrops of well-known scenes of Thailand—that included Angkor Wat. The commercial had to be changed after protests from Phnom Penh.
Cambodian officials soon determined that Suvanant had never uttered the incendiary remarks. That didn't placate Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen. Cambodian politicians have long played to Khmer nationalism, and on Jan. 27, Hun Sen, facing general elections this summer, legitimized the rumors by calling Suvanant "Thief Star" and declaring at a ceremony outside Phnom Penh that the "Thief Star is not even equal to a patch of grass around Angkor Wat." Two days later, fictitious rumors that Thais were killing Cambodians in Bangkok inflamed the Phnom Penh mob.
The most immediate casualty is bilateral links. Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra downgraded diplomatic ties and closed border checkpoints. He fired off a memorandum to Hun Sen demanding an apology, compensation and the arrest of those responsible for the violence, and he put on hold plans to sign a $13.3 million soft loan for a road project in Cambodia. He told reporters, "We have been badly hurt."
Cambodia may have been stung worse. Only lately has the long-suffering nation achieved a measure of stability. Now its international image is again tarnished and its hopes of a tourism-led economic revival dashed. Hun Sen has hastily assembled three committees to repair relations with Thailand, evaluate the damage done to the Thai embassy and estimate the financial losses of the Thai population living in Cambodia. He has also started rounding up "extremists," and his chief spokesman, Khieu Kanharith, has apologized for the government's inability to contain the riots. "We didn't think it would become anarchy," says Khieu. When the mob is unleashed, as it was in Phnom Penh last week, expecting anything less is deadly folly.
- Andrew Perrin/Bangkok and Matt Mckinney/Phnom Penh
- An ancient feud sparks acrimony between Phnom Penh and Bangkok