T HE Thai and Laotian governments could help free British deminer Christopher Howes,
36 and interpreter Houn Hourth, 30, who were kidnapped on March 26, according to
Siem Reap second deputy governor Hem Bun Heng.
Authorities in the northwest "were still trying to investigate but it is very
difficult for us as the hostages are now in the Khmer Rouge base of Anglong Veng,
far from Siem Reap," Bun Heng said.
He asked the British Embassy to contact Thailand and Laos "as now [the hostages]
are in an area we can't really reach."
The Cambodia Daily recently reported a Siem Reap governor saying that the search
for Howes and Hourth had been called off, however Mines Advisory Group representative
Archie McCarron said as far as he was aware the status of the search was still on-going.
Khmer Rouge leader Khieu Samphan meanwhile responded to a facsimile from King Sihanouk
appealing for the release of the two men, saying that the rebels had nothing to do
with their abduction.
