Photographing Conflict Damage at Preah Vihear Temple for the Australian Financial Review
In mid-September I travelled to Preah Vihear temple in northern Cambodia as photographer and video journalist, working alongside the journalist and author Nick Ray. The UNESCO World Heritage Site sits on a clifftop on Cambodia’s border with Thailand and had been closed to visitors since the fighting in July and December 2025.
Abbot Sun Sang in the ruins of Wat Keo Sekha Kiri Svarak, the pagoda on the mountain at Preah Vihear. © George Jefferies
In mid-September I travelled to Preah Vihear temple in northern Cambodia as a photojournalist and video journalist, working alongside the journalist and author Nick Ray. The UNESCO World Heritage Site sits on a clifftop on Cambodia's border with Thailand and had been closed to visitors since the fighting in July and December 2025. Nick's story, illustrated with my photographs, ran in the Australian Financial Review's Weekend Fin magazine, online on 15 October and in print on 17 October 2026.
The print edition of Weekend Fin, 17 October 2026.
How the trip came together
Nick was heading to the northwest of Cambodia to research his section of a new Lonely Planet book, and Preah Vihear was on his list. As soon as he mentioned it, I asked to come along. I'd wanted to see the temple and the damage for myself since the fighting last year. We went on spec, with no commission in place, planning to shoot the story first and then work together to sell it.
Nick organised the access through the Ministry of Culture and Fine Arts, whose minister, H.E. Dr Phoeurng Sackona, I'd interviewed for the feature documentary Loot. The ministry pointed us to Dr Darith Ea, director of the Department of Conservation and Archaeology at the National Authority for Preah Vihear. Nick and Darith go back to 2000, when Lara Croft: Tomb Raider filmed at the Angkor temples and Nick worked on the production as a line producer. The authority wanted international attention on what had happened to the temple, and they made us welcome from the start.
Battambang to Sra Em
We spent the first night in Battambang, then drove on to Tbeng Meanchey, the provincial capital of Preah Vihear, where Nick looked at hotels for the guidebook. From there we continued to Sra Em, the closest town to the temple. That evening we met Darith and a couple of his staff to introduce ourselves and go over what we'd be allowed to do and what the situation was on the mountain. We had dinner with them afterwards. The mood was sombre.
We set off at about 7.30 the next morning and wound our way up the mountain road. We'd been told to expect a couple of hours at the top, and we ended up spending about four.
The abbot and the pagoda
Our first stop on the way up was Wat Keo Sekha Kiri Svarak, the modern pagoda on the mountain. Abbot Sun Sang has lived at Preah Vihear since 1998. He took us around the pagoda, where most of the buildings are in ruins, including the monks' sleeping quarters. He has gathered the broken Buddha images and fragments together and is keeping them as evidence of what happened.
“The Buddha images were broken, we gathered up so many pieces, all equal to relics of the Buddha's own body,” he said. “We don't want war to happen. We want there to be peace in the country and for everyone to have freedom and wellbeing, peace and harmony, together with the Buddhist community.”
Abbot Sun Sang with a broken Buddha head. He has gathered the damaged statues together at the pagoda. © George Jefferies
The damage to the temple
From the pagoda we went up to the temple itself. Preah Vihear was built by successive Angkorian kings between the ninth and 12th centuries, and runs for around 800 metres along the slope to the cliff edge through five gopuras, or gateways. Gopura V, the gateway that appears on the 2,000 riel banknote, is now a pile of sandstone blocks. A crumpled crane belonging to the Archaeological Survey of India lies beside it. Their team had spent the previous three years restoring the gateway.
“It is really serious damage, especially to the significant attributes, including the famous Gopura V here, as you can see,” Darith said. “Before it was still standing, now it has completely collapsed.” His team has documented 562 separate points of damage across the site.
After an assessment by UNESCO and the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), the first jobs are documenting the damage with photography, photogrammetry and 3D scanning, collecting the broken fragments, and propping up the structures at risk of collapse. “I think the restoration of the temple will take 20 or 30 years,” Darith said.
Working around the restrictions
Parts of the site nearest the border, including the northern staircase, were off limits. The Cambodian Mine Action Centre (CMAC) has been through the temple since the fighting and believes the mines and unexploded ordnance have been cleared, but the red warning signs are still up and we stuck to the paths and the main temple structures.
Shooting stills and video on the move
We didn't know how long we'd have at the top or exactly what we'd be allowed to film, so I kept the kit light, moved quickly and worked with available light throughout.
I shot stills on the Sony A7 IV with a Sony FE 24-105mm f/4 G, and used the same camera for handheld video with the Sony XLR-K3M adapter kit and its shotgun mic on the hot shoe. A second body, the Sony A7S III with a Tamron 17-28mm f/2.8, was on a gimbal with a Rode VideoMic for following Darith and the abbot as they walked us through the site. Sinat, one of Nick's guides, came up with us as an assistant and held the boom during the interviews. We'd worked together before on CNN's Nomad with Carlton McCoy.
From 500 frames to the magazine
I shot just under 500 frames over the morning. Afterwards the magazine asked to see what we had, and we sent around 25 selects. Once they'd seen the photos, they asked Nick to write the piece. I delivered the final selection as full-size JPEGs and DNG raw files.
The online version carries six of my photographs, and the print edition opened with the abbot at Gopura I across the top of page 34, with a second frame of him holding a broken Buddha head on the facing page.
I also shot video throughout the day, including the interviews with Darith and the abbot. The stills and footage from Preah Vihear are available to license for editorial and broadcast use. You can read Nick's full story on the AFR website.
Back down the mountain
Four hours wasn't long, but it was enough to see the scale of the damage and to hear from the people looking after the temple. Darith and his team are ready to start the long work of restoration as soon as the situation allows. For more on covering the border dispute, see my post on filming CNA Insider's documentary on the Thailand-Cambodia border.
For licensing, commissions and collaborations across Cambodia and Southeast Asia, get in touch. You can see more of my work as a photographer in Cambodia and as a video journalist.
Photographing FELM's Bilingual Education Programme in Ratanakiri
The first time I visited Ratankiri Province was when I was working with UWS as a videographer. The beauty of the Stoeng Ta Pok river left a lasting impression on me, so I was more than happy when FELM contacted me and asked me to work as a documentary photographer in the province for them.
The work for UWS was to show the schools they build in remote areas and the education projects they run, so I was on familiar ground when FELM, a Finnish NGO, asked me to photograph their bilingual education programme.
FELM have an interesting development model whereby they select and support local NGOs who run projects they believe in.
The partner for this project is International Cooperation Cambodia.
The programme is designed so that children entering school learn in the mother tongue for the first couple of years.
This increases attendance and children learn faster while transitioning to a Khmer education.
For the project we travelled to a small village just outside Banlung and took documentary photographs of a class in action.
The teacher and students were great, the classroom was vibrant and I’m really happy some of the photos I took.
After class, we travelled to one of the student’s houses to see how he carries on learning at home. He lives in a traditional wooden house. I’m really happy with the portraits as the natural light is great and the tone of the wood gives the images warmth.
As part of the assignment, I also photographed commune and provincial levels officials as their support is essential to the implementation of the project.
I enjoy working on education projects as the positive impact is often very apparent. You can see some work I did for World Food Programme here.
In the Field - NGO Photography for FELM's Mushroom Cultivation Initiative, Ratanikiri, Cambodia
Spending time in the forests of Ratanikiri bought back memories of the extended periods I spent in the forests of Mondulkiri for Last of the Elephant Men.
Then I was working as a director, camera operator and Steadicam operator, this time I’d been assigned as an NGO photographer to document FELM’s mushroom cultivation programme.
FELM, a Finnish NGO, identify partners in the countries they work in and supports them in implementing their projects.
The implementing partner for this one is Integral Cooperation Cambodia, a Phnom Penh based NGO with an office in Banlung.
I arrived at their office to photograph the mushroom cultivation process.
I’m not entirely clear on all the steps, but Nin Samreth, the team leader on the Climate Resilient and Sustainable Indigenous Livelihoods-project, led me through the process while I took photographs of the process and portraits.
Sorl Nhoy, a project officer on the Climate Resilient and Sustainable Indigenous Livelihoods-project, also lent a helping hand. She showed me various parts of the process while I got on with my work as an NGO photographer.
Essentially, they put mushroom culture into sterilised bottles full of straw. The mushrooms then propagate before they can be transported to indigenous communities where they grow them in wall gardens.
After seeing the process at the office, we took a short ride out of town where I photographed Pun Savy at his house where he grows mushrooms.
The visit was rounded off with Pun Sayy taking a basket of mushroom round to his neighbour’s house where they prepared soup.
It’s increasingly important for indigenous people to have alternative food sources as the land they have to farm is getting smaller and climate change is making food production increasingly unpredictable.
You can see other examples of the NGO photography work here.
On Assignment - Photographing Malaria Prevention for WHO, Stung Treng, Cambodia
It’s always a pleasure to get of Phnom Penh on assignment and this job was no exception. The brief was to produce a series of 25 photos for the World Health Organization about Sophal for their WHO’s Who series to commemorate their 75th anniversary of providing health for all.
The series was to highlight some of vital work done by some of the key healtcare workers around the world.
Sophal works in malaria prevention and has dedicated himself to preventing malaria in the remote parts of Stung Treng, which are high risk areas.
Sophal was a great choice for the photography series and he is dedicated to his work and he’s very respected within the communities he works in. He led a fundraising campaign when one of his team lost their house through fire. On another occasion, he donated blood to one of his community health workers’ wives after being alerted to the need in the middle of the night.
He’s also studying for a masters in public health in his spare time.
It was a busy day photographing Sophal. We arrived at Siem Pang Health Center early in the morning where Sophal met with the local health centre workers, checked malaria records and did a stock take of the preventative medicine before travelling into the community.
Working in remote villages, we had to take a ferry an ox and cart and small boat to reach the most remote village.
When we got to the community, Sophal checked the records and spoke to his team of community health workers.
From there, his team went into the community to provide training to the village and to check on people who had recently returned from the forest to give them preventative medicine.
The team managed to get all of this done before a storm blew in and the heavens opened.
You can see other examples of my NGO photography for the World Health Organization here and here.
Portrait photography of Him Sophy at his Conservatory of Music in Phnom Penh
It’s not every day you get an email from a libretto asking you for your services as a documentary filmmaker, but this is one of the upsides of making documentaries in Cambodia.
Catherine Filloux, a playwright and librettist, had seen my work on Last of the Elephant Men and she got in touch to discuss the potential of collaborating on a documentary.
She’d written the words to Where Elephants Weep, a rock opera set in Cambodia and along with Him Sophy, who wrote the music, they were looking to reprise the opera after it was banned in Cambodia only a couple of performances its run in Phnom Penh.
It was great speaking to Catherine, an award-winning playwright, librettist and human rights activist who has written plays in conflict zones across the world and believes in the power of theatre as a tool for peace.
It was also a privilege to meet Him Sophy, an internationally acclaimed Cambodian classical musician and composer, at the music school he has established in Phnom Penh to train the next generation of Cambodian musicians. Sothy wrote Bangsokol: A Requiem for Cambodia. The process of writing the music involved reviving traditional Khmer instruments depicted on the wall carvings at Angkor Wat.
Unfortunately, due to scheduling conflicts and uncertainty about the production the documentary never got off the ground, but it was fascinating researching Khmer theatrical and musical traditions. It’s definitely an area I would like to explore more in future documentaries.
You can see more examples of my photography work here and here.