Remote airstrip stirs fear about China’s intentions
DARA SAKOR: The airstrip stretches like a scar through what was once unspoiled Cambodian jungle. When completed next year on a remote stretch of shoreline, Dara Sakor International Airport will boast the longest runway in Cambodia, complete with the kind of tight turning bay favoured by fighter jet pilots. Nearby, workers are clearing trees from a national park to make way for a port deep enough to host naval ships.
The politically connected Chinese company building the airstrip and port says the facilities are for civilian use. But the scale of the land deal at Dara Sakor — which secures 20% of Cambodia’s coastline for 99 years — has raised eyebrows, especially since the portion of the project built so far is already moldering in malarial jungle.
The activity at Dara Sakor and other nearby projects is stirring fears that Beijing plans to turn this small Southeast Asian nation into a de facto military outpost.
Already, a far-flung Chinese construction boom — from the South China Sea to Djibouti — has raised alarms about China’s military ambitions at a time when the United States’ presence in the region has waned. Known as the “string of pearls”, Beijing’s defence strategy would benefit from a jewel in Cambodia.
“Why would the Chinese show up in the middle of a jungle to build a runway?” said Sophal Ear, a political scientist at Occidental College in Los Angeles. “This will allow China to project its air power through the region, and it changes the whole game.”
As China extends its might overseas, it is bumping up against a regional security umbrella shaped by the United States decades ago. Cambodia, a recipient of Western largesse after US bombs devastated its countryside during the Vietnam War, was supposed to be firmly ensconced in the democratic political orbit.
Down the coast from Dara Sakor, US military officials say, China has reached a deal for exclusive rights to expand an existing Cambodian naval base, even as Beijing denies military intentions in the country.
Hun Sen denies that he is letting China’s military set up in Cambodia. Instead, his government claims that Dara Sakor’s runway and port will transform this remote rainforest into a global logistics hub that will “make miracles possible”.
“There will be no Chinese military in Cambodia and to say that is a fabrication,” said Pay Siphan, a government spokesman. “Maybe white people want to hold Cambodia back by stopping us from developing our economy.”