“Incidents like this have happened before but we stopped it in time and it’s very rare,” Chau Sun said. “This is the first time we’ve had to deal with several situations like this in such a short time. I don’t understand what would drive people to do this.”

Tourists keep getting naked at Angkor Wat in Cambodia

The Mashable | 10 February 2015

Ankgor Wat

Image: travellingzenwolf

Two American sisters are the latest tourists to get into trouble at Cambodia's Angkor Wat temple for taking off their clothes.

Lindsey Kate Adams, 22, and Leslie Jan Adams, 20, from Prescott, Arizona, were deported Saturday after being caught Friday morning at the temple with their pants down, literally, according to a statement from the authority that protects the site.

Angkor Wat is considered sacred ground — ground on which the sisters "lowered their pants to their knees and took pictures of their buttocks," according to local authorities.

Sisters Lindsey (left) and Leslie Adams appear in Cambodian court before being deported on Saturday.

"It's an offense to the culture of others, regardless of religion," Kerya Chau Sun, spokeswoman for the site's conservation authority, told CNN. "As a Cambodian, it's hurtful to my belief, and especially to the poor Cambodians saving up money to be able to come across the country to pray at Angkor."

The sisters were charged with trafficking pornography and exposing sexual body parts, according to The Phnom Penh Post.

"The two tourists admitted that they really made a mistake by taking nude photos," read a statement from the conservation authority, called Apsara.

The incident was the latest in a string of poorly behaving tourists at the temple.

“Incidents like this have happened before but we stopped it in time and it’s very rare,” Chau Sun said. “This is the first time we’ve had to deal with several situations like this in such a short time. I don’t understand what would drive people to do this.”

Earlier this month at a different temple at the world heritage site, three French men posed nude, and were then deported. They are banned from re-entering Cambodia for four years. And topless photos of a woman at the site appeared on social media last month.

Authorities are baffled as to the tourists' motivation.

“Frankly, we don’t understand why they’re doing this,” Chau Sun added.

“Maybe the girls copied the others, but whatever it is, it’s disrespectful.”

Apsara has now started making signs and flyers that will warn tourists to behave at the world's largest religious monument. It is also an important revenue driver in the area, bringing in more than $59 million from more than 2 million foreign visitors last year, according to Phnom Penh Post.

While the authority had hoped to print just a few flyers, it is now planning many more along with an increased security presence.

“We have already increased security but it looks like we need to amplify it more when it seems that some people don’t care about how they offend Cambodian culture,” Chau Sun said.

“Angkor is still very much a sacred site and people go there to pray every day and this is something that should never occur,” UNESCO cultural specialist Philippe Delanghe said. “I think for the future Apsara and the government will consider different and more severe measures like maybe increasing sentences.”