Foreign correspondents of Cambodia civil war hold bittersweet reunion

Journalists gather in Phnom Penh 35 years after the conflict to remember their wild nights and fallen comrades.

April 23, 2010
By Mark Magnier and Brendan Brady
Los Angeles Times
Reporting from Phnom Penh, Cambodia

The first reunion of foreign correspondents who covered the 1970-75 Cambodian civil war — and perhaps the last, given the advanced ages of many — ended Friday, 40 years after the conflict began. "A bunch of ‘Jurassic Park' journos," one reporter said. "'Hurt Locker' meets ‘Animal House,'" another said.

The self-deprecating humor belied a period that was deceptively deadly for journalists. Although the Cambodia war received far less attention than its counterpart in neighboring Vietnam, 36 correspondents working for foreign news operations were killed or reported missing during the conflict, compared with 33 in Vietnam, according to the Associated Press.

The toll included nine ambushed and killed by the Khmer Rouge on a single day in May 1970.

"It was wonderful to get together," said Chhang Song, the last information minister in the government overthrown by the Khmer Rouge. "Happy and bittersweet. People cried recalling their old colleagues who died."

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