Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, May 31, 1993 TAG: 9305310039
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-4 EDITION: HOLIDAY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: PHNOM PENH, CAMBODIA LENGTH: Medium
Competitors are hot on his heels.
In only a few months, Cambodia's press has bloomed. Eight new privately owned newspapers are testing the press freedoms introduced by U.N. peacekeepers and competing for sales with sensationalized stories.
Some journalists worry that the freedoms will end when the U.N. mission leaves in August. In the meantime, the U.N. is trying to make sure the racy new papers are also responsible.
Before the peacekeepers arrived 18 months ago to monitor a cease-fire and prepare for last week's election, Cambodia had four newspapers, all state-controlled.
The rigid party organs are languishing at newsstands as many of the new private papers thrive.
"We print articles about issues that all Cambodians are interested in, while the party newspapers consist mostly of party statements," Samitthy, 33, said.
In many of the new papers, there's little distinction between news and editorial comment, and the writing is often stridently partisan. Cambodia's bitter political polarization, bred by 13 years of civil war, has made neutrality a foreign idea for many editors.
"After years of having only the government party's papers, they haven't gotten over the concept of newspapers being aligned with one party," said Jason Roberts, who monitors the media for the U.N. mission.
That has created headaches for U.N. officials who are responsible under Cambodia's 1991 peace treaty for creating a neutral political environment and guaranteeing fair access to all media.
U.N. monitors have imposed controls aimed at preventing unsubstantiated defamation and racism directed at Vietnamese immigrants, who are widely disliked here.
They regularly visit editors to warn about improper practices, and in one recent case demanded a front-page statement saying that an earlier story was unsupported.
"All we can say is `You guys are wrong,' " Roberts said. "Call it censorship if you will . . . but personally I'm comfortable about pulling things which would harm the [election] environment."
Samitthy is editor of Rasmei Kampuchea (Light of Cambodia), which launched its first edition on April 14. It is Cambodia's first daily private newspaper since Khmer Rouge guerrillas seized power in 1975 and quashed a lively independent press.
Vietnam invaded in 1978, ousted the Khmer Rouge and installed another Communist government that allowed only official papers. Rasmei Kampuchea also is Cambodia's first color newspaper. Its daily press run of 22,000 copies is printed in neighboring Thailand because there are no color presses here and because its publisher is a Thai.
Most of Cambodia's new papers publish only several times a week.
by CNB