Dear Sir,

W hether it was intended or not the poignant set of photographs in your Nov 4-17 issue pointed out the obvious paradoxes and ironies of the unsettled state of affairs in Cambodia.

On the one hand you have the felicitous RCAF applauding themselves while from the inside pages the benign, benevolent and recently-promoted and newly-attired KR defector Colonel Rin is shown shaking hands with the PM. On the other hand you have the photographs of the industrious, double amputee Mr Ra holding a "plowshare" that only heightens the paradoxes into conclusions that each reader can only draw for themselves.

For me it would have been a fine day to seen a photograph of the PM shaking the hand of Mr Ra, but that, unfortunately, is, now, impossible.

- David Hagenson, Phnom Penh