| 4 June 2016 
PHNOM
PENH – Buddhist monks held a ceremony at the Bodhiyarama Temple on
Saturday to commemorate the 67th anniversary of France handing over
Cambodian territory to Vietnam, an epa journalist reported.
A
total of 1,949 monks and other members of the Khmer Kampuchea Krom
Community (KKC) visited the temple to mark the June 4, 1949 transfer of
Khmer Kampuchea Krom – now part of southern Vietnam – which they
referred to in a press release as “the most painful day in the history
of the Cambodian nation.”
Cambodian Princess Sisowath Pongneary
Monypong also attended the ceremony and took part in prayers to pay
tribute to the loss of the province, an area of around 70 square
kilometers that the KKC claim is still home to around 13 million ethnic
Khmers.
KKC executive director Thach Sitha told the Khmer Times
newspaper that Cambodia should have the right to review the loss of land
and called for the protection of human rights of the Cambodians living
in the area.
“We, Khmer Krom, don’t want to split from Vietnam to
join Cambodia as accused by the Vietnamese government. What we want is
the respect for our religious and cultural rights as a minority group
living in Vietnam,” he said.
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