Economic land concessions (ELCs) benefit only a minority, the human rights consequences of the concessions are stark, and Cambodia’s sustainable economic development is threatened by the practice. U.N. human rights envoy Surya Subedi told the Human Rights Council in Geneva yesterday. Mr. Subedi cited uneven access to ...

The homes of 137 families in Pursat province’s Phnom Kravanh district have been demolished since Tuesday, when more than 60 police, military forces and forestry officials began evicting families from land claimed by Touch Hiv, an agricultural company, local officials and villagers said yesterday. “We ...

Delegates from the Import-Export Bank of China will visit Cambodia next week to discuss loans for the rice-processing and exporting sector, according to government officials. Son Kunthor, president of the state-owned Cambodian Rural Development Bank, said yesterday that Chinese delegates will come to study the feasibility of ...

Police targeting of sex workers for arrest has made them vulnerable to contracting or spreading HIV, according to a U.N. report released yesterday. The U.N. report, Sex Work and Law in Asia and the Pacific-Laws, HIV and human rights in the context of sex work, states that ...

About 40 families in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district are disputing local authorities’ demand that they abandon their homes without compensation so the government can increase a nearby canal’s capacity. The residents, who were asked on September 28 to vacate their homes within a week by Meanchey ...

Some 285 million workers will migrate for employment when ASEAN countries open their borders to each other in 2015, Prime Minister Hun Sen predicted yesterday, as he urged speedier regional legislative action to ensure they could travel safely. At an ASEAN Socio-Cultural Community Council meeting, the premier warned ...

Cambodia tapped into the growing global interest in Southeast Asia with the start of trading in the sole stock at its gleaming new stock exchange on Wednesday. Ordinary Cambodians and local businesses scrambled to buy into the country’s first initial public offering—of shares in a local ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen mockingly declared that opposition pledges to increase the salaries of civil servants marked the arrival of “the season of promises” ahead of next year’s elections, during a speech yesterday. The premier deemed boosting salaries by reducing tax losses attributed to graft unfeasible  because ...

The president of the group responsible for rooting out government graft said yesterday that his investigators will look into allegations of corruption filed by state-owned Telecom Cambodia (TC) employees against the director-general of the company, Lao Saroeun. Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) President Om Yentieng told reporters after ...

About 200 people from Siem Reap’s Angkor Chum district protested outside the district governor’s office on Friday, calling for private electricity company Duong Narin to lower its prices and asking the state electricity authority to connect to their area, protesters said yesterday. The residents of ...

The Free Trade Union has vowed to stage a mass strike in the garment and footwear industries if its demands for an extra US$30 per month of bonuses for workers are not met, union president Chea Mony said yesterday. The union sent a letter to Minister ...

As part of its plan to become of the world’s top exporters of rice, Cambodia is looking to increase its rice shipments to the United Arab Emirates, one of the world’s main milled rice importers. Cham Prasidh, Minister of Commerce, met with delegates and businessmen led ...

The National Election Committee (NEC) has removed opposition leader Sam Rainsy from the voter list for next year’s national election on the grounds that he is a convicted criminal, an NEC official said yesterday. The decision means that even if Mr. Rainsy is granted a royal ...

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) have closed an investigation into suspicious payments to officials in Cambodia by the world’s largest mining company BHP Billiton, according to a report released by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). Although the report, released last month, does not ...

The government’s Anti-Corruption Unit has sent a letter to the Ministry of Information asking it to respond to allegations that its officials demanded bribes to let applicants pass exams for jobs in the ministry, a letter published on the ACU’s website reveals. ACU President Om Yentieng’s ...

The National Election Committee (NEC) on Sunday opened official polling records for eight stations in Kandal province’s Takhmao City in accordance with complaints filed by the opposition CNRP to the Constitutional Council of Cambodia over election day irregularities in the province. CPP representative Prum So­kha, secretary ...

The chief of South Korea’s official development assistance (ODA) body agreed with the Cambodian prime minister on Tuesday to further widen grant aid programs to the Southeast Asian country. The grant aid programs were discussed in a meeting between Prime Minister Hun Sen and the Korea ...

The Sihanoukville Autonomous Port, Cambodia’s largest shipping facility, on Tuesday reported a 12 percent rise in cargo shipments in the first eleven months of 2013. The state-owned sea port had received 2.73 million tonnes of goods during the January-November period this year, up from 2.43 million ...

Cambodia is making headway on its 2015 Millennium Development Goal to improve maternal health and is ahead of its target to reduce its under-five child mortality rate, but it still lags behind neighbouring countries, the 2013 State of the World Population Report has revealed. Released yesterday, ...

Senior officials at the Military Court and Ministry of Defense said Tuesday that they have not received a request from Council of Ministers Secretary of State Phay Siphan to investigate an article published in an opposition newspaper. Mr. Siphan on Monday said he had submitted a ...