The Singaporean pastor and school principal murdered on Monday night in her room in Kampong Speu’s Chbar Mon district had loved Cambodians and wanted to commit to missionary work in the Kingdom for the long term, her husband told the Post yesterday.

Speaking at his hotel in Phnom Penh, Paul Ng – who is also a pastor and chairman of the Glad Tidings Church in Singapore – said his wife, Wendy Ng, 55, had fallen in love with the country when she first came on a mission trip years ago.

“Our church started working here many years ago and she came up on one of the trips,” he said. “I think God put it in her heart then to serve the people here.”

Mrs Ng had been making regular trips to work in orphanages here for some 10 years, according to her co-workers in Cambodia.

Mr Ng rushed down to Phnom Penh from Laos – where he was also engaged in missionary work – on Tuesday when news broke of his wife’s death.

“She wanted to come to continue our church’s work. Unfortunately, this has happened,” he said. On Monday night, four men had broken into Mrs Ng’s room at the dormitory of the New Hope International School – a school run by Christian organisation New Hope for Orphans – while she slept, police said.

The men – Chhen Laleu, 27, Ou Milihoung, 20, Koe Savuth, 32 and Tong Sophal, 24 – were construction workers who were building Ng’s new home.

Whilst searching for valuables, the group startled her and she screamed, Sam Sak, deputy chief of the provincial crime office, said.

When that happened, Sophal smashed Mrs Ng’s head on the door, Sak added. In the ensuing struggle, she was stabbed three times in the neck.

Yesterday police paraded the men in a press conference in Kampong Speu, saying that documents were being processed for the men to be charged today in provincial court.

“The suspects will be charged with ‘serious robbery’ [robbery leading to the death of the victim],” Sak said.

If convicted, the men would face jail-terms of between 15 and 30 years.

The men made off with two mobile phones, an iPad tablet, 20,000 riel and 200 Singapore dollars, which they then buried 200 metres from the building.

Police also arrested a fifth man – also a construction worker – but he has since been released as they deemed he had had no part in the crime.

Yesterday, the Ngs’ church in Singapore released a statement on Mrs Ng’s death.

“Wendy has impacted and inspired many lives with her care and love,” the statement said.

“She has always believed that her life, regardless of how long God gives her, will be lived serving her beloved Saviour Jesus Christ.”