U.S. Military Programs Postponed or Canceled / National Election Committee

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CAMBODIA: U.S. Military Programs Postponed or Canceled / National Election Committee

Marie Harf
Deputy Spokesperson
Daily Press Briefing

Washington, DC
August 12, 2013

QUESTION: Okay. My last one; it’s very brief. Do you have anything on Cambodia and their suspension of military cooperation with the United States and apparently some other countries?

MS. HARF: I do. Following the elections, the Cambodian Ministry of Defense postponed or canceled a number of international military programs, including with the United States. We would not categorize the cancelation of programs as a suspension of military ties. We haven’t indicated that we would suspend military ties. This was, I believe – again, I don’t have a lot of details on it – but a suspension or cancelation of some specific programs.

QUESTION: Do you know which American programs are affected by their move?

MS. HARF: I don’t know that, no. I can endeavor to get more information shared if I can. I just don’t have that in front of me.

QUESTION: And also, you said that you hadn’t – this is not something coming from the U.S. side, this is something they did unilaterally?

MS. HARF: Mm-hmm.

QUESTION: Was there not any discussion beforehand with the Cambodians about the possible suspension or possible --

 MS. HARF: I don’t know that. I don’t know if there were any discussions. I’m happy to look into it. We --

QUESTION: Before the election, basically if the election goes poorly then there might be some consequences --

MS. HARF: I’m not aware of any.

QUESTION: -- and this might be one of them.
MS. HARF: I can look into it. I just don’t know the answer. And if there’s something additional to share, I’ll get back to you.

QUESTION: Do you – are you disappointed in this move? Do you think that it’s a bad thing?

MS. HARF: Well, again, we are kind of waiting to see what happens next. We don’t view this as a suspension of the overall military ties or relationship. We haven’t indicated that’s something we want. So this is, obviously, in the context of the National Election Committee announcing some preliminary results, so we’re going to keep watching the process as it unfolds and see where we go from here.

QUESTION: Would you like them to reverse their decision? Would you like to have this cooperation back?

MS. HARF: I’m not going to hypothetically say whether or not we’re going to be raising this with them. I’m not aware of us having raised this with them specifically, but I’m happy to look into it when we get more details.

QUESTION: Okay. I don’t understand how that’s hypothetical --

MS. HARF: I will endeavor to get more details for you on this, Matt.

QUESTION: Thank you.

MS. HARF: Yes.

End

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