Long-running talks between Cambodia's would-be coalition parties sputtered into action again yesterday after a two-week hiatus but failed to move any closer to resolving differences, party officials said.
Cambodia remains without a government 11 months after national elections despite a tentative March agreement between the ruling Cambodian People's Party (CPP) and royalist FUNCINPEC party to revive their coalition.
Prime Minister Hun Sen's CPP won the polls last July but failed to secure enough seats to govern alone, forcing it to find a coalition partner.
The tortuously slow negotiations made a breakthrough early this month when the parties finally agreed on a joint political platform, but since then have foundered on dividing government posts.
"The CPP's stance remains the same; [we want] a 60-40 split," CPP spokesman Khieu Kanharith told reporters, adding that the issue of controlling ministries was not discussed at the talks yesterday.
FUNCINPEC spokesman Kassie Neou said meanwhile that his party would not budge on its demand for half of all posts.
"The two parties remain very far from each other," he said.
The parties did agree yesterday to hold a "package vote" among MPs to elect Hun Sen back to his position and royalist chief Prince Norodom Ranariddh as national assembly president in one vote, as well as other procedural issues, Khieu Kanharith said.
Cambodia's national assembly has not met for more than a year, holding up important legislation including bills to allow a Khmer Rouge tribunal to begin and the kingdom to accede to the WTO.
KINGPIN: Marset allegedly laundered the proceeds of his drug enterprise by purchasing and sponsoring professional soccer teams and even put himself in the starting lineups Notorious Latin American narco trafficker Sebastian Marset, who eluded police for years, was handed over to US authorities after his arrest on Friday in Bolivia. Marset, a Uruguayan national who was on the US most-wanted list, was passed to agents of the US Drug Enforcement Administration at Santa Cruz airport in Bolivia, then put on a US airplane, Bolivian state television showed. “The arrest and deportation were carried out pursuant to a court order issued by the US justice system,” Bolivian Minister of Government Marco Antonio Oviedo told reporters. The alleged kingpin was arrested in an upscale neighborhood of Santa
FAKE NEWS? ‘When the government demands the press become a state mouthpiece under the threat of punishment, something has gone very wrong,’ a civic group said The top US broadcast regulator on Saturday threatened media outlets over negative coverage of the Middle East war, after US President Donald Trump slammed critical headlines from the “Fake News Media.” The US president since his first term has derided mainstream media as “fake news” and has sued major outlets over what he sees as unfair coverage. Brendan Carr, head of the US Federal Communications Commission — which oversees the nation’s radio, television and Internet media — said broadcasters risked losing their licenses over news coverage. “The law is clear. Broadcasters must operate in the public interest, and they will
SCANDAL: Other images discovered earlier show Andrew bent over a female and lying across the laps of a number of women, while Mandelson is pictured in his underpants A photograph of former British prince Andrew and veteran politician Peter Mandelson sitting in bathrobes alongside late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was unearthed on Friday in previously published documents. The image is believed to be the first known photograph of the two men with Epstein. They are currently engulfed in scandal in the UK over their ties to their mutual friend. The undated photograph, first reported by ITV News, shows King Charles III’s disgraced brother and former British ambassador to the US sitting barefoot outside on a wooden deck. They appear to have mugs with a US flag on them
INFLUTENTIAL THEORIST: Habermas was particularly critical of the ‘limited interest’ shown by German politicians in ‘shaping a politically effective Europe Jurgen Habermas, whose work on communication, rationality and sociology made him one of the world’s most influential philosophers and a key intellectual figure in his native Germany, has died. He was 96. Habermas’ publisher, Suhrkamp, said he died on Saturday in Starnberg, near Munich. Habermas frequently weighed in on political matters over several decades. His extensive writing crossed the boundaries of academic and philosophical disciplines, providing a vision of modern society and social interaction. His best-known works included the two-volume Theory of Communicative Action. Habermas, who was 15 at the time of Nazi Germany’s defeat, later recalled the dawn of
RSS