News Round-up

• A Cambodian court in Koh Kong province has sentenced notorious tiger hunter Yor Ngun, 57, to 7 years in prison for repeat offenses, reports the People's Daily Online.

• ABC Radio Australia today reports a warning fromUnited Nation's special envoy Miloon Kothari who fears Cambodia may face large-scale legal wrangles if nothing is done to halt massive land grabs in which thousands of families are being evicted to make way for government officials, business people and the military.

• As previously covered here, the U.S. has been reluctant to provide direct funding for the proposed Khmer Rouge trial without first gaining a number of conditions. But in recent developments, the U.S. has now created a $2 million endowment to assist a Cambodian group in researching crimes. This seems to allow it to indirecly support the trial, without needing to contradict its earlier stipulations.

• China has given six navy patrol boats to Cambodia to help combat drug and human trafficking, piracy, transnational crime and smuggling.