LOCAL officials announced plans Thursday to rebuild a dormitory near Tuol Kork district’s Neak Von pagoda where Prime Minister Hun Sen studied as a young man, after it and other dwellings were destroyed in a Monday fire.

Phnom Penh Governor Kep Chuktema ordered authorities to begin reconstruction of the prime minister’s former dormitory, Dormitory 10, during a visit to the site of the fire, said Ngin Khim, the chief monk at the pagoda.

“Even if Dormitory 10 is not completely destroyed, the city still needs to repair it,” Ngin Khim said Thursday. “It should be preserved because it is where Prime Minister Hun Sen studied as a youth.”

A total of 178 homes and 31 dormitory rooms were destroyed after a fire ripped through a community in Tuol Kork’s Boeung Kak 2 commune on Monday evening.

Though the government has been providing relief supplies at the site, Ngin Khim said specific plans have not yet been made for the reconstruction of other buildings lost to Monday’s fire.