Stoking anti-Vietnamese sentiment in Cambodia is dangerous

IT COULD be the spark that ignites a Cambodian jungle fire. The country's opposition parties are whipping up anti-Vietnamese sentiment in order to gain voter support. They have learnt nothing from their own violent past, or from the ethnic cleansing of the Rohingyas in neighbouring Myanmar.

Vietnamese investors, and the large Vietnamese immigrant community in Cambodia, are worried about an increasingly hostile social environment in the host country as threats of violence against them are emerging.

This should not be the case especially since the two countries are celebrating the 50th anniversary of establishing diplomatic relations this year, and Vietnam is Cambodia's third-largest trading partner and fifth-largest investor.