February 23, 20206 yr From South China Morning Post Born foreign: in Cambodia, it’s not easy being Vietnamese Chbar Ampov district, on the eastern bank of the Bassac River in Cambodia’s capital Phnom Penh, is a melting pot of ethnic diversity. Cheerful children play among the winding alleyways, their shouts reverberating off walls carrying colourful graffiti in several different languages. Vietnamese, Khmer and English can be seen on signs advertising the shops and cafes scattered throughout the area, as Vietnamese drinks and spices adorn market shelves. Street sellers pique people’s interest with Vietnamese lottery tickets and multilingual chatter fills the neighbourhood. By a brightly painted church, 25-year-old Dara* checks the engine of his Honda bike. The son of an ethnic Vietnamese Catholic family who live about 50km from Phnom Penh, he is one of 63,000 ethnic Vietnamese in Cambodia, according to a 2013 population survey – though human rights groups say the true number is around four times higher. “I have Cambodian papers. My family had connections with the authorities and got them done for me when I was 12,” said Dara, the only member of his family to have Cambodian citizenship. Around 90 per cent of Cambodia’s ethnic Vietnamese population lack an official means of formal identification, according to the Phnom Penh-based Minority Rights Organisation. And since many cannot get Vietnamese citizenship either, having lived in Cambodia for generations, they are effectively rendered stateless. Continues at https://www.scmp.com/week-asia/people/article/3051863/born-foreign-cambodia-its-not-easy-being-vietnamese
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