PHNOM PENH: The Governor of Sihanoukville province, Kouch Chamroeun, has stated that rising insecurity in Sihanoukville has been caused by the increase of tourists and foreign investors of all nationalities, who have brought both good and bad outcomes. He said the province does not yet have the resources to effectively respond to certain crimes and prevent and suppress criminal activity.

Speaking at a press conference on the "Success of the Sihanoukville Provincial Administration in the past five years" on Wednesday morning, 15 February 2023, at the Office of the Council of Ministers, Governor Kouch Chamroeun said that the province is normally equipped to crack down on crimes such as robberies, gambling and violence, however, due to the increase in tourists and foreign investors, there have been new technological crimes being committed by foreigners which the province does not yet have the resources to adequately respond to.

The Governor noted that in Sihanoukville, the number of crimes increased significantly between July and August of 2022, with more than 10 reported crimes per day. Seeing this growing insecurity, the Minister of Interior, DPM Sar Kheng, decided to set up a working group to help coordinate, lead and permanently crack down on crimes in the province.

The Sihanoukville Governor said he acknowledges that crime is on the rise in the province because of the increased air, water and land traffic from tourists and investors entering Sihanoukville.

He explained that the most common crimes occurring in Sihanoukville include human trafficking, sex trafficking, labor crimes and technological crimes, and further stated that many of these crimes have been committed by foreigners, making it difficult for local authorities to prevent and crack down on these illegal activities immediately.

“Our police are not foreigners, they are Khmer, they talk to each other and have a hard time, we also have an interpreter, but we cannot cover all the crimes occurring until we bring them in for questioning so we have a translator for that," he said.

He added that it is not that the province does not want to hire police officers who know how to speak foreign languages, which would make patrol and preventing such crimes easier, but it is difficult for the provincial police department to recruit and encourage officers to learn foreign languages.

Governor Kouch Chamroeun explained that crime in the province seems to have eased recently, however, authorities still continue to do their work of cracking down on crimes diligently, as once certain criminal groups have been controlled, new groups engaging in new forms of crime seem to emerge as well.