Macron's Angkor Visit Highlights France's Custodial Role

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The newly restored West Mebon temple rises from a reservoir at Cambodia's sprawling Angkor archaeological complex, the latest in a ...

SIEM REAP—The newly restored West Mebon temple rises from a reservoir at Cambodia's sprawling Angkor archaeological complex, the latest in a century of conservation projects led by former colonial power France.

French President Emmanuel Macron and Cambodian King Norodom Sihamoni will inaugurate the nearly 1,000-year-old temple on the sidelines of a summit of French-speaking nations in Phnom Penh on November 15-16.

Conservationists have restored the 16 towers and surrounding walls over the past 14 years, and put the finishing touches on a stone marker at the entrance last week.

The temple is part of the UNESCO World Heritage site at Angkor, once the centre of the Khmer Empire, and includes the national treasure Angkor Wat.

It was here that archaeologists unearthed the largest bronze statue ever found in Cambodia, "Reclining Vishnu", which is now touring the world.

"In 1936, a villager had a dream in which the Buddha came to him to ask to be freed from the earth, where he was suffocating," French project coordinator Sarah Coudry told AFP.

Excavations had already taken place on the site but when work restarted at the exact spot indicated by the villager, they found the statue of the Hindu god.

Now the temple itself has been restored, in what Coudry said was like assembling "a giant 3D puzzle without a reference model".

Crucial to the work has been the French School of Asian Studies (EFEO), which in 1908, under the supervision of the French government, began clearing, cataloguing and safeguarding archaeological remnants that had been forgotten in the jungle.

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