Angkor Wat under threat

This is no surprise to me and many other "foreigners" in the tourism trade. With the government's goal of increasing tourism numbers, it would naturally follow that the famous temple ruins will eventually be ruined by the increase in numbers.

Photo by onlyincambodia

Sunday, 17 October 2010
By Keeley Smith

An international heritage conservancy has warned that the Angkor Wat temple complex faces “critical” threats in the form of heavy traffic and inefficient conservation techniques.

A report released by the Global Heritage Fund also said the fact that many tourism-related businesses were foreign-owned made it difficult for Siem Reap residents to benefit economically from the temples.

“Hundreds of thousands of visitors climb over the ruins of Angkor every year causing heavy deterioration of original Khmer stonework,” says the report, which is titled “Saving Our Heritage: Safeguarding Cultural Sites Around the World”.

According to the report, the number of visitors to Angkor Wat has increased by 188 percent since 2000, from 840,000 to 2,420,000 in 2009.

An Apsara Authority official said last week that Angkor Wat had seen a 24-percent increase in foreign tourists in the first nine months of 2010 compared with the same period last year.

“Mass tourism is overrunning the fragile archaeology site, with millions every year climbing unabated on the monuments,” said GHF Executive Director Jeff Morgan.

Temple body plans public forum

I'm not sure I'm convinced that a meeting with the APSARA Authority will improve how it treats villagers within the Angkor Park borders. However, it will hopefully be a valuable sounding board to make their rules about building or restoring property within villages near the park area.

Thursday, 26 August 2010 15:03 Rann Reuy

Siem Reap provinceAPSARA Authority officials plan to hold a public forum “as soon as possible”, in order to explain rules concerning the construction of housing by villagers in Siem Reap’s Leang Dai commune.

Chrun Sophal, director of the authority’s communications department, said yesterday that, following an internal meeting, a forum would be held to discuss building restrictions in Leang Dai, which falls within the bounds of the Angkor temple park.

“We will hold the forum after meeting the Siem Reap governor [today],” he said. “We are trying to balance natural resources, the environment and the preservation of culture.”

In a letter dated July 23, opposition Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Ke Sovannarith criticised the Apsara Authority, which maintained the temple park, for preventing the commune’s 1,255 families from building new market stalls, a kindergarten and other facilities.

Contacted yesterday, Ke Sovannarith said that she supported the initiative to hold the forum because villagers were not sure what they were permitted to build. “The problem is not just in Leang Dai, but in other places as well,” she said. “The Apsara Authority should call all affected villagers to listen.”

In March, the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights organised a similar public forum, at which Apsara officials defended the rules aimed at preserving the Angkor temple park.

Sleuth researches enigmatic Angkor girls

An interesting story about a research with a curious theory about all those Apsaras on the temples.

Michigan State University worked with Davis to devise a mathematical trait
analysis system to be used at Angkor Wat.

Friday, 20 August 2010 15:01 Peter Olszewski


FLORIDA-based researcher, publisher and robot manufacturer Kent Davis is rapidly gaining an international reputation as the sleuth of Siem Reap, a new age detective delving into what he sees as one of the greatest mysteries of ancient Angkor Wat – the 1780 images of anonymous and mostly bare-breasted women depicted in carvings throughout the iconic structure.



Commonly known as apsaras (or, as Davis prefers, devatas), these female images were mostly accorded little significance.



But Davis, a former resident of Siem Reap and a regular visitor to Temple Town, is sure he’s onto something. He’s sure that these women represent something decidedly significant, but he’s not quite sure what.



Read more here...

What's the Apsara's Authority? (reading between the lines)

The Apsara Authority in Cambodia is the Authority for Protection and Management of Angkor and the Region of Siem Reap.

It's this "region of Siem Reap" that catches my attention and is the source of questionable conduct against the people in Siem Reap.

Here is how they describe themselves:

[T]he government has created APSARA, the Authority for the Protection and Management of Angkor and the Region of Siem Reap, in charge of research, protection and conservation of cultural heritage, as well as urban and tourist development. This legislative and institutional framework marks the beginning of a new active role Cambodia will take, responding to the call of her own people in the voice of her King, as well as to that of the international community, in managing Angkor as a national and world heritage for the generations to come.

APSARA, in collaboration with other governmental agencies, is responsible for:

• Protecting, maintaining, conserving and improving the value of the archaeological park, the culture, the environment and the history of the Angkor region as defined on the World Heritage List.
• Refining and applying the master plan on tourist development according to the five zones, defined in 1994 in the Royal Decree on the protection and management of Siemreap-Angkor and taking action against deforestation, illegal territory occupation as well as anarchy activities in Siemreap-Angkor.
• Finding financial sources and investments.
• Participating in the policy of cutting down poverty of the Royal Government in Siemreap-Angkor.
• Cooperating with the Cambodian Development Council on the investments of all the projects that are involved with APSARA Authority’s mission.
• Cooperating with ministries, institutions, funds, national and international communities as well as international governmental institutions and non-governmental organization on all projects related to APSARA Authority.

"Taking action against illegal territory occupation as well as anarchy activities in Seimreap-Angkor" is what really concerns me. How do they define "anarchy activities?" Is re-storing or building a house considered anarchy?

Apparently the answer is YES because in a certain village in Siem Reap Province, villagers are being threatened of eviction from their land and homes if they attempt to re-build their traditional homes, or build anything new on their own land. Yes, they have land titles!

APSARA Authority members are arriving in large groups (around 20 people) with guns to threaten and scare villagers. They warn that no one can have any new materials put on their homes. If they do, the APSARA Authority will return and take it away from the villagers.

So, what is a poor villager supposed to do if their traditional wooden house is being eaten away by termites and falling down around them? They cannot do anything to protect the house, so it must crumble around them. If they write a letter to the APSARA Authority to request to restore parts of the house, it is an invitation for the mob with guns to arrive at their doorstep.

And when there is no more house to live in, the only choice being offered by the APSARA Authority is to move to a small piece of land in a district which is more than 30km away! It would be just enough land to build a house. They would lose all of their land that they own and farmed on!

Does this sound familiar? Do the land evictions in Phnom Penh ring a bell?

What can be done? How can they stop their land from being taken away from them? This is land that many have lived on for generations, which pre-dates the Khmer Rouge.

Unfortunately in Cambodia, the poor are no match for the rich, or those authority.

Why is the APSARA Authority doing this? Why do they want this village's land so much that they are threatening the villagers by force? What is the plan behind the action?

The villagers do not know. They can only speculate. The APSARA Authority certainly doesn't tell them why they come when they arrive with their guns.

I have an idea, and it relates to the purposes outlined above from the APSARA Authority itself. However, you must read between the lines to discover how the APSARA Authority truly plans to implement its goals.

If you think that this is a human rights issue and that justice is not being carried out, please respond and let's start a discussion for developing a solution to this challenge.