Technology trumps Cambodia’s royal portrait artist

The dozens of identical photographic portraits of Cambodia’s new King Norodom Sihamoni looming over the capital’s boulevards to mark his coronation have left royal artist Kimsong Narykun wringing his hands. Technology has trumped 40-year-old Narykun, who works daily in a fan-cooled studio equipped with just one small easel set on a rattan mat, a stone’s…

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Cambodia’s new king faces baptism of fire into politics

The totally inexperienced Prince Norodom Sihamoni, an ex-ballet dancer named Cambodia’s new king Thursday, faces a baptism of fire when he is plunged into the kingdom’s infamously treacherous political world. The 51-year-old prince, who has spent years abroad pursuing a career in the arts, is largely unknown at home and will have few people to…

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Cambodia’s Prince Sihamoni — the dancer destined to be king

Prince Norodom Sihamoni, the man expected to be Cambodia’s next king, is a clasically-trained ballet dancer who has spent much of his adult life abroad pursuing a career in the arts. Inheriting his father’s King Norodom Sihanouk’s artistic streak, the 51-year-old Sihamoni has pursued a love of dance, music and cinema, and is known to…

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Top Cambodian leader to beg” abdicated king to stay on throne”

Cambodia’s national assembly president left for China Saturday to beg King Norodom Sihanouk to change his mind about abdicating, but left open the option of a new monarch being appointed. Prince Norodom Ranariddh, 81-year-old Sihanouk’s son, told reporters he would "kneel down to beg His Majesty the King to continue to lead us as the…

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Cambodian children get cyberspace savvy with free Internet kiosks

It may be holiday time, but students still hang out at a handful of schools in impoverished Cambodia, lured by free Internet kiosks aimed at getting more people here au fait with cyberspace. At a high school outside the capital Phnom Penh, some students research Asian architecture, others check football results, and a few, like…

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Cambodia’s PM tightens grip on political power

As his new government finally gets to work, Cambodia’s prime minister is tightening his grip on power, shrewdly snubbing or quashing his top rivals, analysts and activists say. Hun Sen, the region’s longest serving leader, formed a coalition government last month with his former royalist coalition partner after a year-long impasse following July 2003 elections…

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Momentum to stamp out foreign paedophiles builds in Cambodia

From billboards warning of harsh penalties to eagle-eyed hotel workers being called on to report suspicious people, Cambodia is stepping up its fight against foreign paedophiles preying on its children. After decades of war that ended just six years ago, the freewheeling, poverty-stricken kingdom has earned a dubious reputation as a haven for paedophiles, with…

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