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March 16, 2017

Cambodia Resisting U.S. Demands to Repay Loans Paid to Former Dictatorship
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Cambodia's prime minister says he will resist a demand by the U.S.
government that Cambodia repay a 50-year-old loan to a government that
came to power through a U.S.-backed coup. Prime Minister Hun Sen said
this month the U.S. is pressuring the International Monetary Fund to
withhold loans to Cambodia unless it repays approximately $500 million
in U.S. loans paid to the Lon Nol dictatorship, which used the money to
buy weapons it used to kill its own citizens. The loans came as the U.S.
government dropped 500,000 tons of explosives on Cambodia as part of
President Richard Nixon's escalation of the Vietnam War.


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