Visitors to Angkor National Park topped 1.15 million in 2010, up 25 per cent on the year before. And at tourist spots across the region it’s a similar story.

Angkor is one of the most important archaeological sites in South-East Asia. Stretching over some 400 square kilometres, including forested area, Angkor Archaeological Park contains the magnificent remains of the different capitals of the Khmer Empire, from the 9th to the 15th century.

They include the famous Temple of Angkor Wat and, at Angkor Thom, the Bayon Temple with its countless sculptural decorations. UNESCO has set up a wide-ranging programme to safeguard this symbolic site and its surroundings.

Angkor is one of the most important archaeological sites in South-East Asia containing the magnificent remains of the different capitals of the Khmer Empire, from the 9th to the 15th centuries.

The influence of Khmer art, as developed at Angkor, was a profound one over much of South-East Asia and played a fundamental role in its distinctive evolution. Khmer architecture evolved largely from that of the Indian subcontinent, from which it soon became clearly distinct as it developed its own special characteristics, some independently evolved and others acquired from neighbouring cultural traditions. The result was a new artistic horizon in oriental art and architecture.

At the beginning of the 9th century the two states that covered the territory of modern Cambodia were united by Jayavarman II, who laid the foundations of the Khmer Empire, the major power in south-east Asia for some five centuries.