Troop movement

The Royal Cambodian Armed Forces will end a four-day military exercise tomorrow. It involves more than 1,000 troops in Kampong Speu province and began on Monday, an official from the Ministry of Defence said.

Lieutenant General Chhum Socheat, a spokesman for the Ministry of Defence, said on Monday that RCAF forces were using live 100mm and 82mm artillery shells and Minister of Defence Tea Banh was overseeing the exercise.

“We have trained for one month since May 13 with participation from more than 1,000 military officials from several units,” Chhum Socheat said.

He did not detail the total number of rockets that would be launched during the exercise.

He added that Cambodia purchased 200 tanks and armoured personnel carriers from the Ukraine late last year, in an effort to strengthen the country’s military capacity, which would  be used in the exercise.

In addition to this, 47 RCAF soldiers had left for Thailand on Monday to participate in a joint multinational peacekeeping exercise, called Araya Guardian 2011, that involved the participation of 13 countries, Chhum Socheat said.  “The exercise will last until June 31,” he added.