NOTE: When I interned with the Wilson Center, I was not aware of how USAID worked, and was taking the best opportunity I could to work in the environmental field right out of college. As a dedicated anti-imperialist, while I am appreciative of the time spent with my wonderful coworkers, who I learned a lot from, I ask anyone visiting this work to treat it with many grains of salt-- USAID funding has a specific agenda that frequently does not align with my own personal views on environmentalism, economic justice, and America's imperialist intervention in the world. I know youthful ignorance and naivete is no excuse for my involvement, but it is my explanation. I also have nothing but appreciation for my former co-workers there, who were only good to me, and I think were there out of a sincere mission, even if I disagree now as to whether good work can be done with USAID funding. -------- Cambodia is a young democracy in transition. It has the highest rate of urbanization in Southeast Asia, but the lowest percentage of current urban dwellers and widespread poverty. The Mekong River, on which millions of rural Cambodians rely, is being dammed at a rapid pace, both upstream, beyond the country’s borders and within. Aided by weak land laws, both foreign and domestic industrial forces have staked claim to large swaths of the country for logging and rubber plantations, displacing thousands. Bopha Phorn, editor-at-large for The Cambodia Daily, the country’s largest English-language newspaper, has amassed an impressive record of investigative coverage on logging, government land deals, dam construction, and gender issues, but not without considerable personal risk. She was recently in Washington, DC, to be honored by the International Women’s Media Foundation for courage in journalism, due in part to an investigation into illegal logging during which one of her companions was killed by military police. Phorn has continued her investigative efforts in spite of increased government pressure. While she was in DC, we had a chance to talk to her about covering environmental corruption in Cambodia and the future of journalism in the burgeoning nation.