Word: phnom
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...brought peace to the war-ravaged country in 1993, and more recently, since its neighbor Thailand started its own crackdown on child sex abuse over the last couple of years. But the arrest of at least eight alleged foreign pedophiles since the beginning of this year may signal that Phnom Penh is finally getting serious about stopping the sexual abuse of children...
...arrests began in February with U.S. national Michael John Koklich, 49, who was apprehended after plowing his motorcycle into a police barricade - and badly injuring Keo Thea's leg in the process - as he tried to escape arrest. Koklich was charged with having sex with children in a Phnom Penh slum and deported to the U.S. He defended himself to reporters by saying that he only had sex with the children for "a very short period...
...officials. But the stick came in 2005 when the U.S. State Department, fed up with the impunity enjoyed by traffickers here, relegated Cambodia to it lowest tier 3 rating on its global trafficking report. Cambodia was lumped in with Burma, Cuba and North Korea, and Washington threatened sanctions against Phnom Penh for its inability to comply with "minimum standards" to combat human trafficking and convict officials involved...
...April, a German national was charged with sexually abusing young homeless boys in the coastal resort town of Sihanoukville; the man has strongly denied the charges. The same month, a Belgian national, who claims he is innocent, was arrested at his Phnom Penh guesthouse with a 13-year-old boy; according to Cambodian police, he had previously been jailed in Belgium on sex abuse charges...
...Most recently, U.S. national Terry Darrell Smith, 55, was arrested in Phnom Penh on Sept. 20. He had been charged by Cambodian police with sexually abusing (and filming 10 hours of footage of the abuse) two girls, 13 and 14, at his "Tramp's Palace" bar in Sihanoukville. The girls had been allegedly held as sex slaves for five months by Smith and his 26-year-old Cambodian girlfriend before they were rescued by police, who were tipped-off by the low-key but highly effective U.S.-based anti-pedophile organization International Justice Mission. Smith's Cambodian lawyer has denied...