Cambodia: History, Politics, Population, and Geography
Created: 12/21/2021, 10:01 AM
The famous ruined city of Angkor Wat in Cambodia © IMAGO / Shotshop
Cambodia is a fascinating country known worldwide for the famous ruined city of Angkor Wat, which can even be seen on the country's flag.
The late 20th century was marked by the war and the reign of terror of the Khmer Rouge, today the state is under the influence of China.
Phnom Penh - When most people think of Cambodia, only two things come to mind: the unique ruins of Angkor Wat, which in the Middle Ages were the center of probably one of the largest cities in the world, and the double catastrophe of the Indochina War and the Khmer Rouge in the 20th century.
Today the country is trying to catch up with the economically emerging neighboring countries Thailand and Vietnam.
Cambodia: The Long History of the State
The first traces of settlement in what is now Cambodia were dated to the 4th millennium BC, when people settled on the Mekong.
The existence of the Kingdom of Funan is scientifically proven.
Existed until the 3rd century AD and was a melting pot of Indian, Chinese, Malay and Javanese cultures.
When Jayavarman II came to power in 802, the period of the Khmer Empire of Kambuja or Angkor began.
Many of the famous medieval ruins around Tonle Sap in the heart of the country date from this era.
The world famous temple of Angkor Wat was built in the 12th century by King Suryavarman II in honor of the Hindu god Vishnu.
At the time, Kambuja dominated large parts of Southeast Asia from the Indian Ocean to the South China Sea.
With an estimated one million inhabitants, the capital Angkor was the largest city in the world.
Fall of the Empire and Colonialism
The last great ruler in the history of Kambuja is King Jayavarman VII, who built other famous temples such as Bayon and Ta Prohm in the 13th century.
With the rise of Phnom Penh as a new trading center on the Mekong, Angkor began to decline in economic importance.
At the same time, the Thai conquered large parts of the former gigantic empire from the west.
From the 15th century the medieval Khmer culture came to an end and the temples of Angkor sank into the jungle.
In the centuries that followed, the territory of Cambodia continued to melt when Siam conquered further provinces in the west and Annam (later Vietnam) in the east.
In the 19th century, the French reached Southeast Asia and first colonized Vietnam.
In 1863 Cambodia was also made a protectorate.
Cambodia and the Indochina War
France's Southeast Asian colonies eventually included Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos, and they were combined under the name Indochina.
After the Second World War there was a struggle for independence in all parts of Indochina.
Unlike Vietnam, Cambodia was given independence by France in 1953 without a fight.
With the flare-up conflict between communist North Vietnam on the one hand and the capitalist neighbors South Vietnam and Thailand on the other, King Norodom Sihanouk imposed strict neutrality on his state.
When the Vietnam War broke out, the North Vietnamese Viet Cong used Cambodia as a retreat and to smuggle weapons to the south, whereupon the US Army began bombing their bases.
In 1970 General Lon Nol took power in Cambodia after a coup and sided with the Americans and the South Vietnamese.
In Beijing, the displaced Sihanouk founded a government in exile that included the communist Khmer Rouge, who fought alongside the Viet Cong.
In 1975 the Indochina War for Cambodia ended when Phnom Penh fell to the Khmer Rouge.
Their leader Saloth Sar, who called himself Pol Pot, became Prime Minister.
The reign of terror of the Khmer Rouge
After seizing power, the communist Khmer Rouge founded the Democratic Kampuchea, which culminated in one of the most terrible terror regimes in history. In total, an estimated two million Cambodians were killed in just five years, many of them in the so-called killing fields, extensive areas where collective mass murders took place. This corresponded to a quarter of the population. Hundreds of thousands fled to the neighboring countries of Thailand and Vietnam. In December 1978 Vietnamese troops invaded Cambodia and put an end to the rule of the Khmer Rouge. The Paris Peace Treaty was not signed until 1991, but it was not until 1998 that the last Khmer Rouge surrendered. In the same year, Pol Pot died under house arrest under unexplained circumstances.
Cambodia: The Politics of the State Today
Cambodia is now an elective parliamentary monarchy, headed by King Norodom Sihamoni since 2004.
However, its influence is small.
Power in Cambodian politics rests with Prime Minister Hun Sen, who has held the post since 1985.
His Cambodian People's Party won all 125 seats in the National Assembly in the last few years in 2018.
There is no real opposition and experts assume that the elections will be manipulated and, if necessary, distorted.
The Cambodian state is considered to be one of the most corrupt states in the world.
The freedom of the press has recently been increasingly restricted.
For some years now, Cambodia has been under the influence of China, which is investing millions of dollars in construction projects and at the same time deliberately undermining democracy.
The State of Cambodia: Demographics and Population
Cambodia has around 16.5 million inhabitants with an average age of 24.9 years.
Since the mid-1980s, the population has more than doubled from 7,713,000 to 16,487,000.
About 85 to 90 percent of Cambodians belong to the Khmer people.
There are also only a few small minorities such as the Vietnamese (5 percent) and the Muslim Cham (3 percent).
In the mountainous north, the 21 highland Khmer tribes (Khmer Loeu) still live largely semi-nomadic.
The most important cities of Cambodia at a glance (as of 2019):
1
Phnom Penh: 2,281,951 residents
2
Siem Reap: 245,494 inhabitants
3
Battambang: 119,251 inhabitants
4
Sisophon: 99,019 inhabitants
5
Poipet: 98,934 inhabitants
The most important language in the country is Khmer, which is spoken by over 90 percent of the population.
Like Thai, Burmese and Tamil, the script is derived from the South Indian Pallava script.
After the Khmer Rouge banned the religion and destroyed countless temples, today 96.3 percent of the population profess Theravada Buddhism again.
Cambodia: State economy on the ground
Until the outbreak of the Indochina War and the Khmer Rouge regime, Cambodia was considered the most successful state in Southeast Asia with a high standard of living.
After many years of communism, mismanagement and corruption, it is now one of the poorest countries in Asia, but has recently seen a recovery.
Its main exports include textiles, rice, wood and rubber, with illegal logging of tropical forests being a major problem.
In the north of the country enormous mineral resources are suspected, while petroleum is extracted off the coast.
Tourism is becoming increasingly important.
Most recently, around two million foreign guests visited the country annually, with cultural tourism playing a far greater role than beach tourism.
Cambodia: geography and landmarks of the state
Cambodia is located in Southeast Asia between Thailand and Vietnam and is characterized by the Cambodian Basin with the Tonle Sap and the beginnings of the Mekong Delta. Only in the west and north are there mountain ranges worth mentioning, such as the Dongrek Mountains and the Cardamom Mountains with the Phnom Aural, the highest mountain in the country at 1,813 meters. The 443 kilometer long coastline is lined with palm beaches and mangrove forests.
In the densely forested interior of the country, the temple complex of Angkor Wat is by far the most famous attraction in the country.
For many tourists, it is the only encounter with Cambodia as part of a large Indochina tour.
Another worthwhile destination in the state is the capital Phnom Penh with the royal palace, the central market and the colonial buildings of the French.
The former Khmer Rouge torture prison Tuol Sleng has been converted into a genocide museum.
Choeung Ek, one of the most famous killing fields, can also be visited as a memorial.
Beach tourism is concentrated in the city of Sihanoukville on the Gulf of Thailand, which was famous as the Côte d'Azur of Cambodia during colonial times.
Chinese investors have built numerous new hotels and casinos here in recent years.