Oddor Meanchey Travel Package Tours, Cambodia Tour Information Hotel Guide

ODDOR MEANCHEY PROVINCE OVERVIEW

Geography	Demographics	Telephone
Capital: Samraong Location: Northern Area: 6,158 km2	Population: 68,279 Density: 11.1 /km2	Calling code
Town and Districts
Anlong Veaeng, Banteay Ampil ,Chong Kal , Samraong , Trapeang Prasat

General Information

The province of Oddar Meanchey Province is a recent creation that was carved out of the northernmost past of Siem Reap Province that the government did not control of much of the 1980s and 1990s. The name means "Victory Province", a little optimistic for much of that period, but suitable enough by 1999. it straddles the Thai border on its northern edge, which is also covered by the Dangrek Mountains, It is a very remote province that has also been a notorious place because this is where he nastiest of the nasty Khmer Rouge made their last stand. The diabolical Pol Pot and his seemingly bloodthirsty henchmen, Nuon Chea, Ta Mok, Son Sen and Khieu Samphan holed up here for the last years of the Khmer Rouge�s existence (another of the henchmen, Ieng Sary, already worked out a surrender and defection deal with the government in 1996). Pol Pot died mysteriously here, after a supposed power struggle within the power elite (he had Son Sen and his family murdered) and after a controversial show trial. The debate focused on whether it was real or just a sham staged for the outside world to try to legitimize remaining Khmer Rouge figures. The trial took place in the power center of the Khmer Rouge, the village of Anlong Veng. Pol Pot died mysteriously after he was sentenced to house arrest and the international community began real efforts (for the first time ever) to capture and put this butcher on trial. His henchmen had more than enough reason to wasn�t him dead at that point because a Pol Pot on trial, as the ringleader most responsible for the genocide wrought upon his fellow countrymen, would probably have tried to shift portions of the blame (rightfully so in the case of these guys) to the rest of the power elite. The Khmer Rouge kept fragmenting after that and Nuon Chea and Khieu Samphan worked out a surrender-amnesty deal with the Cambodian government and Ta Mok (also called �The Butcher�) was subsequently captured and is still awaiting a trial in Phnom Penh. As of March2000, the United Nations and the Cambodian government finally seem set to come up with an agreement on putting the top surviving members of the Khmer Rouge regime on trial in Cambodia, with assistance from and in a partnership with the international community. Stay tuned though, as this has been a real political football with seemingly more concern for one-upsmanship and personal gain than justice for the dead and surviving victims of Khmer Rouge brutality.Thai Border The border is 14.5 km from the circle in Anlong Veng. There is no market there and it is not a legal crossing. There are plenty of tanks and tank shells to look at along the way and also a strange site in the form of a boulder that had Khmer Rouge soldiers carved out of the sides of it- they have all been decapitated since government forces took control of Anlong Veng. Anyway, it�s an interesting little ride to a low-lying part of the Dangkrek Mountains. The road is in fairly good shape with the exception of the climb up a rocky hillside near the border.