Philip Hampden-Smith, general manager of Southeast Asia operations at Manulife, talks about the company’s entry into the Cambodian market and what the new few years might bring. Cambodia’s nascent life insurance industry may be just only a year old but the nation of nearly 15 million ...

The Mekong River Commission (MRC) will forgo an opportunity to voice opposition to the Xayaburi dam project – which member state Laos began building in November – when it meets for its annual council meeting next week. Surasak Glahan, communications officer with the MRC secretariat, confirmed ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen yeserday lauded his government’s strong ties with China but said Cambodia does not give Chinese any preferential treatment. Mr. Hun Sen was speaking at the inauguration of the $47.1 million Kirirom III hydropower dam in Koh Kong province’s Sre Ambel District- constructed ...

Security forces in Cambodia have shot dead a 15-year-old girl who was taking part in a land protest. She was demonstrating against the development of a rubber plantation on farmland in eastern Kratie province. Authorities say local residents, armed with axes and crossbows, would not vacate the ...

Authorities in Stung Treng province have confiscated some 651 pieces of “luxury timber” from three communes in Se San district over the past week in an ongoing operation to crack down on illegal logging in the area, police said. The goods were confiscated just as a ...

About 50 workers at the M&V manufacturing factory in Kampong Chhnang province fainted yesterday morning due to overwork and exhaustion in the factory’s third fainting incident this year, officials said yesterday. Noun Sam Ol, Free Trade Union representative at M&V, said that the collapse of a ...

INTERNATIONAL Finance Corporation, the private-sector arm of the Washington-based World Bank, has invested $US805 million ($770m) in Australian projects around the world These projects are in 24 countries and in sectors ranging from financial services to infrastructure. IFC is an investor in three Macquarie Group-sponsored infrastructure ...

One hundred and thirteen Jarai families from Ratanakkiri’s Bakeo district are sending a letter of protest to the provincial fishery administration today, after a Vietnamese rubber company  started filling in a lake that they had promised last month to preserve for villagers. Rochom Ven, chief of ...

Cambodian Vannak Prum’s destiny changed in a dirt-road town called Malai. It’s a Cambodian outpost on the border with Thailand that is known for its involvement in the trafficking of human beings. Prum arrived in Malai seven years ago searching for work. His wife was pregnant, ...

A local police official in Ratanakkiri province has been suspended for demanding money from villagers before adding their names to a list of people eligible for Prime Minister Hun Sen’s new land-titling program, police and villagers said yesterday. A total of 1,100 student volunteers are being ...

More than 100 families who had their evictions delayed on Thursday in observance of a nationally broadcast speech by Prime Minister Hun Sen have once again been ordered to move out, according to local officials. Provincial governor Sboang Sarath said yesterday that the provincial court had ...

This year’s dry spell could be an opportunity rather than a disaster for farmers, Cambodian Center for Study and Development in Agriculture (CEDAC) officials said yesterday. Although drought has destroyed several thousand hectares of crops in the past two months, Cambodia’s largest agricultural NGO is encouraging farmers to ...

Authorities in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district continued to demolish houses in Niroth commune yesterday, despite 46 families appealing to the municipality and Prime Minister Hun Sen’s Cabinet to intervene. On Tuesday, three houses were torn down as part of efforts to clean up a stretch of ...

Cambodian authorities arrest a journalist who exposed the illegal smuggling of timber. Taing Try, a reporter affiliated with the Khmer Democratic Journalists’ Association, was taken into custody on Friday, police in Kratie’s Snoul district told RFA on Sunday. But Ing Savoeun, a representative from the ...

Though the mood was congratulatory yesterday at the inauguration of ruling party Senator Ly Yong Phat’s sugar company – a gleaming, new facility nestled in between two hills in Kampong Speu province’s Omlaing commune – the mood just a few kilometres away bordered on desperation. Sitting ...

As Cambodia’s economy continues to grow, advertising in the country has developed to keep pace. But the industry still faces challenges, insiders say. According to Media Adex data by Indochina Research, which monitors advertising spending for TV and print (but not radio) $105.4 million was ...

Six Boeung Kak village representatives will appear in Phnom Penh Municipal Court accused of threatening to kill their one-time representative Ly Mom, who was spoke on their behalf from 2007 until last year. Although no charges have been laid, Ly Mom is demanding $10,000 from each ...

VimpelCom Ltd., the Russian mobile telephone operator that runs the Beeline brand in Cambodia, is reviewing its assets in Cambodia to decide whether it should stop doing business here or merge with another firm in the country, an official at the company said yesterday. “We will ...

PHNOM PENH — China’s Hainan Ruijin Investment Holding Group planned to invest in rice plantation, cow farm and tourism development in Cambodia, the group’s chairman Pan Xiaoping said Wednesday. Pan said during a meeting with Heng Samrin, president of Cambodia’s National Assembly that his company decided ...

The five-star, 17-story Mittapheap Hotel in Sihanoukville province, being constructed by Khouch Asia Company, is on track to be completed in 2014 as planned, according to the project manager. The company is aggressively developing the project and the first floor has just been completed. The numbers of ...