District Police Chief Removed Over Link to Sale of State Land
A district police chief in KAmpong ChhnAng province hAs been removed from his post over his Alleged involvement in the sAle of Almost 130 hectAres of stAte lAnd to privAte buyers, provinciAl officiAls sAid yesterdAy. Kim SAreth, the chief of police in Toek Phos district, wAs <A href='https://opendevelopmentcAmbodiA.net/km/news/district-police-chief-removed-over-link-to-sAle-of-stAte-lAnd/ ' clAss='cAmbodiA-color'>...A>
Journalist Murdered in Ratanakkiri
A CAmbodiAn journAlist, who reported on forest crimes in RAtAnAkkiri province for A little-known newspAper, wAs found murdered in the trunk of his cAr yesterdAy, police sAid. HAng Serei Odom, 42, A journAlist At the Khmer-lAnguAge VirAkchun Khmer DAily, hAd been missing since SundAy, when he <A href='https://opendevelopmentcAmbodiA.net/km/news/journAlist-murdered-in-rAtAnAkkiri/ ' clAss='cAmbodiA-color'>...A>
BBC Report Says Media Stifled, Journalists Targeted in Cambodia
In a week that has seen one journalist murdered and another threatened for their investigations into corruption and forest crimes, a timely new study into the state of Cambodia’s media has found that the country’s press is being stifled. Eleven journalists have now been killed in the country <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/bbc-report-says-media-stifled-journalists-targeted-in-cambodia/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Villagers Say Preservation of Pond Is Worth Fighting For
The future of a pond that sparked controversy last Monday, when about 400 people stopped authorities from filling it with sand in preparation for the construction of a military police base, remains in question, locals said yesterday. The residents of 10 villages protested last week in <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/villagers-say-preservation-of-pond-is-worth-fighting-for/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Wildlife at odds with ELCs
Economic land concessions strewn over the remote Western Siem Pang forest, in Stung Treng province, are threatening the survival of Cambodia’s national bird, the giant ibis, a report reveals. The forest, flanking the Kingdom’s border with Laos, is home to five critically endangered bird species, yet <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/wildlife-at-odds-with-elcs/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Construction site mishap injures four
Four construction workers were injured, two seriously, when a wall dividing their building site from a school collapsed on them yesterday, police said, the latest in a string of mishaps in Cambodia’s burgeoning construction industry. The brick wall, between the site of an apartment complex being <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/construction-site-mishap-injures-four/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Phnom Penh to get new airport
Prime Minister Hun Sen announced yesterday that Cambodia is going to build a new international airport in Phnom Penh, in response to the rising number of passengers received every year. The Kingdom is expected to get seven million tourists a year by 2020. The initial concept <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/phnom-penh-to-get-new-airport/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
After bust, cosmetics shops under scrutiny
Less than a week after the arrest of alleged beauty parlour madam Chan Sreynuch, military police say they are taking a closer look at a number of hair salons and beauty shops in Phnom Penh suspected of being involved in human trafficking and prostitution. according to <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/after-bust-cosmetics-shops-under-scrutiny/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Investment to aid low earners
US-BASED OverseAs PrivAte Investment CorporAtion (OPIC) yesterdAy signed A deAl to provide A $5 million long-term loAn to ThAneAkeA Phum (CAmbodiA) Ltd (TPC), A locAl microfinAnce institution (MFI), to support TPC’s expAnsion of its home improvement loAns for low-income CAmbodiAns. FernAndA LimA, director of US-bAsed sociAlly <A href='https://opendevelopmentcAmbodiA.net/km/news/investment-to-Aid-low-eArners/ ' clAss='cAmbodiA-color'>...A>
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/2013022861653/Business/investment-to-aid-low-earners.html
RPT-World Bank cuts East Asia GDP outlook, flags China risks
The World Bank cut its economic growth forecasts for the East asia and Pacific region on Monday and said there was a risk the slowdown in China could get worse and last longer than expected “Economic projections for EaP (East asia and Pacific) are surrounded by <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/rpt-world-bank-cuts-east-asia-gdp-outlook-flags-china-risks/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/08/worldbank-asia-outlook-idUSL3E8L81IN20121008
Longan farmers in Pailin plan factory
A co-operAtive of longAn fArmers in PAilin plAns to build A processing fActory to increAse export cApAcity As output And demAnd rise. MeAs Loeurn, the co-operAtive’s leAder, told the Post on WednesdAy rising demAnd from ChinA wAs prompting growing numbers of fArmers to cultivAte the fruit. “During <A href='https://opendevelopmentcAmbodiA.net/km/news/longAn-fArmers-in-pAilin-plAn-fActory/ ' clAss='cAmbodiA-color'>...A>
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/2013020861252/Business/longan-farmers-in-pailin-plan-factory.html
Life After the Lake
Shukaku, a company owned by a CPP Senator was given a 99-year lease to to the area in 2007. Immediately, the company started filling in the lake with sand and began kicking out thousands of families in what is one of the most notorious evictions <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/life-after-the-lake/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Koh Kong Land Dispute Case Delayed Again
The Koh Kong Provincial Court yesterday postponed the hearing of a controversial case against a Thai-owned sugar company that more than 200 families alleged had taken their land for the company’s sugar plantations, lawyers and village representatives said yesterday. Ny Sorphornneary, the lawyer for the families, <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/koh-kong-land-dispute-case-delayed-again/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Gov't Requires Bus Companies To Submit Driver Information
In response to a spate of deadly bus crashes in the country, the government has ordered all bus companies to provide authorities with detailed histories of all their drivers, an official at the Ministry of Public Works and Transport said yesterday. Peou Maly, deputy director-general at the ministry’s transportation department, <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/govt-requires-bus-companies-to-submit-driver-information/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
With No Faith In Courts, Embattled Turn to Prayer
Clutching bunches of incense, mouths moving in tandem, those gathered before the Preah ang Dang Keu Shrine on Sisowath Boulevard late last month migth have passed for any group of supplicants save for a notable exception: The prayer was aimed at the judiciary. When supporters of <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/with-no-faith-in-courts-embattled-turn-to-prayer/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
B Kak protesters ask women's minister to retract comments
Dozens of women and children from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighborhood demonstrated in front of the Ministry of Woman’s affairs yesterday to demand that the minister recant her claim that they had attacked police during a June 27 protest in which one of the women <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/b-kak-protesters-ask-womens-minister-to-retract-comments/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Preah Vihear land primed for plantation concessions
The government has reclassified 23,182 hectares of state land in Preah Vihear province for private development by three agro-industry firms, paving the way for them to secure economic land concessions (ELCs). Reclassification of state public land to state private land is a key step toward establishing <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/preah-vihear-land-primed-for-plantation-concessions/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
Missing girl feared trafficked
Meas Bopha, 47, sits in an outdoor pagoda over a lotus-filled pond on her property in Kampong Speu, home to 10 of her 12 children, and wipes back tears as she talks about her missing teenage daughter, Bophea, who vanished one morning last week. Bophea <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/missing-girl-feared-trafficked/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
PM pledges pay boost
The government on Friday pledged a 20 per cent increase to the base salary of civil servants year-on-year in a move one government official insisted was based on economics, not politics. The announcement was made in a statement released over the weekend outlining government spending for <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/pm-pledges-pay-boost/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/index.php/2012102959455/National-news/government-pledges-pay-boost.html
Sweet Prospects
The sugar palm is a national symbol for Cambodia. Harvested by the country’s poor for centuries, no part of the palm tree goes to waste in a process that fashions the tree into a range of products. The durable and strong leaves are weaved into <a href='https://opendevelopmentcambodia.net/km/news/sweet-prospects/ ' class='cambodia-color'>...a>