France visit offers ‘margin of manoeuvre’ in Cambodia’s bid to ease reliance on China

Cambodian leader Hun Manet’s visit to France last week to discuss defence cooperation, among other issues, gives the Southeast Asian nation “a margin of manoeuvre” of counterbalancing its over-reliance on China, analysts have said.

Together with Cambodia’s increased security cooperation with Japan, foreign policy experts said the Paris trip represented Phnom Penh’s tilt “towards diversification” as it sought to hedge its bets among the great powers vying for dominance in the region.

During Manet’s state visit to France on Thursday and Friday, he met French President Emmanuel Macron at the Elysee Palace, where Paris confirmed that it would provide €200 million (US$217 million) in support of Cambodia’s vocational training, energy, and water treatment sectors.

France is the first country in Europe and outside Asia that Manet has visited since assuming office in August.

While the trip largely focused on economic cooperation, as well as clean water, energy, and education initiatives, Macron also discussed Cambodia’s role in France’s Indo-Pacific strategy.

Following the release of the Indo-Pacific Strategy by the United States in February 2022, many mainly Western countries have come up with similar strategies, widely seen as blueprints to countering China’s growing dominance in the region.

In a letter to Manet on December 31, Macron said France hoped to work with Cambodia on defence, adding that the two nations ought to “develop new projects in an Indo-Pacific space which is open, and regulated by international law”.

Sophal Ear, associate professor at the Thunderbird School of Global Management at Arizona State University, said Paris was suggesting opportunities for defence sales and even joint military exercises.

“While the details