Dear Sir,

I am writing in response to a brief report published by the

Phnom Penh Post in the edition of 25 March 25 - 7 April 7 1994,on page 8, titled

"Cambodian ex-pats play major role".

During my conversations with your

staff reporter, John Brown, I expressed my feeling that the Overseas Cambodians

made a positive contribution to the NCRD/UNDP organized preparations for Icorc.

Every contribution in a process contributes to ultimate success. However, the

tone of the quote implicitly diminishes the far more important role of the

government participants as well as the long term assistance of the technical

advisors from UNDP.

The second clarification I would like to make is in

reference to the following misquote,

"A side from gathering and analyzing

data, Cambodian ex- pats took part in meetings outside the country, identifying

problem areas and having a direct input into the draft discussion

papers".

The Overseas Cambodians did not engage in meetings "outside the

country" during this process.

The third clarification concerns the

quote, "in a bid to entice Cambodians living abroad to return to aid in the

country's reconstruction, trips home were organized by the UN- Indochina

Reconciliation Project in New York".

The Overseas Cambodian participants

in this process worked on a volunteer basis, taking unpaid leave or vacation

time from their current jobs and having responsibility for some of the costs

during their stay.

A more accurate word to characterize the USIRP funding

role would have been "enable", not "entice".

- Kathy Taromina, Deputy

Coordinator/Program Associate, Cambodian Workshop on Reconstruction and

Development, US-Indochina Reconciliation Project

Editor's note:

Concerning the second and third clarifications, the Post apologizes for the

misquotes which were editorial mistakes and not those of author John C.

Brown.