Chinese president arrives in Cambodia

President Jiang Zemin of China is in Cambodia for the first visit by a Chinese leader to Phnom Penh in more than thirty years.

He was greeted by King Norodom Sihanouk and the prime minister, Hun Sen.

The road from the airport was lined by thousands of children waving Chinese flags and portraits of Mr Jiang.

But the BBC South-East Asia correspondent says many ordinary Cambodians find it hard to forget that China was the principal backer of Khmer Rouge rule in Cambodia, during which more than one-and-a-half-million people died.

A protest by students who want China to apologise and pay compensation to victims of the Khmer Rouge was broken up by police.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service