The letter signed by Sar Kheng, deputy prime minister and minister of interior, and sent out to all country's 24 provincial and municipal governors and foreign embassies, said the temporary halt in allowing marriage to foreigners was needed to "prevent any negative acts and aims to uphold the honor of the nation and the Cambodian women."

The letter, dated March 29, said some marriages were properly and legally arranged for being a husband and a wife, but some others were "fake, deceitful," and were managed by brokers.

"Some networks of brokers or matchmaking business companies have brought Cambodian women to foreign countries to work as housemaids, or forced (them) into prostitution," Sar Kheng said in the letter.

You Ay, secretary of state for Women's Affairs, said the temporary suspension of the paperwork allowing foreign marriages were mainly applied to foreign men who are willing to marry Cambodian women.

"We have temporally halted all visas for Cambodian women to get married to foreign men," she said, adding that all foreign embassies have been informed of the government's action.

You Ay, however, said the government will re-permit such foreign marriages soon after Cambodia has completed a new rule or legislation dealing with the issue that ministries such as interior, foreign affairs, and women's affairs are now working on.

She, meanwhile, acknowledged there have been some positive benefits for Cambodian women who marry foreign men, but the government has learned of some irregularities and negative impact, mainly in Taiwan and South Korea.

After a fact finding mission in Taiwan last year, the Cambodian Women's Crisis Center, a Cambodian nongovernmental organization, said in a report that 5,219 Cambodian women were living in Taiwan, some of whom had been trafficked outright and many of whom it claimed were enduring some kinds of abuse.

Last month, the International Organization for Migration released a report warning that many Cambodian women went to South Korea through matchmaking brokers.

The report said that over the past four years some 2,500 Cambodian women have married South Korean men in which each man would pay up to $2,000 to marry a woman, but only half the amount went to a bride's family and the rest went to brokers.

Following the government move, the South Korean Embassy in Phnom Penh announced it had already suspended the issuance of the marriage visas.

The embassy said it had issued 1,759 marriage visas in 2007, up from only 72 in 2004.