Public land lease

Surrounded by 100-armed police officers, authorities in Mondolkiri province yesterday said the roughly 200 families living on a rubber company’s land concession in Koh Nhek district have until Friday to leave their homes. After having already seen district police burn down three of their homes over ...

In a land dispute with overtones of last week’s deadly eviction in Kratie province, villagers in Mondolkiri province yesterday said dozens of police were surrounding their houses and threatening to force them out of a private land concession. Sen Sophon, one of about 200 families in ...

After a three-day blockade, soldiers pulled out over the weekend from the Kratie province village where a teenage girl was shot dead last week by government security forces, officials said yesterday. However, human rights workers denied a report by a provincial official that freedom of ...

The Svay Rieng Provincial Court on Friday questioned three female factory workers who were shot, allegedly by Bavet City Governor Chhouk Bundith, during a protest inside a special economic zone (SEZ) in February, the plaintiffs said. More than 20 union leaders and labor activists also gathered ...

Authorities in Kratie province have denied entry to journalists and rights workers to the site of violent land clashes that led to the death of a teenage girl on Wednesday. Rights workers say they fear for the safety of villagers in Broma village, but police say ...

Security forces have sealed off a village in eastern Cambodia and denied entry to human rights workers after the fatal shooting of a teenager in the latest violent eviction aimed at clearing land for development. Soldiers said they needed to secure the area around Proma village, ...

The government needs to act – and act now – to review all economic land concessions, which un­derscore the Kingdom’s dark disease of violent land disputes, rights groups said yesterday. Ten days after Prime Minister Hun Sen signed a regulation for an immediate and indefinite moratorium ...

Lawyers for the three women injured in a Feb. 20 shooting at a Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Svay Rieng province were prevented from visiting the site of the shooting, allegedly on orders from the Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC), a lawyer and ...

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 ...

Villagers in Kompong Chnang province have resorted to black magic as a means to even the odds with a long-running land dispute with a powerful company, KDC Development, holding a spell-casing ceremony on Saturday to curse the firm and the provincial court for allegedly colluding ...

The Svay Rieng Provincial Court has issued summonses to question three women who were allegedly shot by a government official during a protest at a special economic zone (SEZ) in February, a court official and the plaintiffs said yesterday. About 20 eyewitnesses have already been questioned ...

A nearly year-long land dispute in Oddar Meanchey has been resolved for most parties involved by the intervention of two RCAF generals, but critics contend the more than 2,400 hectare-giveaway is a ploy to influence upcoming elections. Generals Kun Kim and Chea Tara yesterday granted 1.5 ...

Security forces shot and killed a 15-year-old girl on Wednesday during a clash with about 200 villagers armed with axes and crossbows in eastern Cambodia, in the latest of several violent evictions aimed at clearing land for development. ...

Companies that have seized land, confiscated livestock and destroyed homes and property have gone unpunished, the UN special rapporteur for Cambodia has said. Surya Subedi, professor of international law at Leeds University, said all the communities he had met raised the issue of misconduct by ...

Srey ambel district, Koh Kong province – A roadblock by locals in a long-running land dispute with CPP Senator Ly Yong Phat petered out after several hours in the dying rain on Saturday without the protesters winning any concessions from either the senator’s firm or ...

U.N. human rights envoy to Cambodia Surya Subedi wrapped up his seventh mission to Cambodia on Friday, saying that his own assessments of land concessions confirmed that they are being unfairly granted and leaving many communities out in the cold. Mr. Subedi said that meetings held ...

More than 600 people, including 50 Buddhist monks, who have been affected by illegal logging across the country arrived in Koh Kong province yesterday ahead of a memorial service to be held today at the site where well-known forestry activist Chut Wutty was shot dead ...

Surya Subedi, the UN’s human rights envoy to Cambodia, expressed concern Friday over land concessions provided to private companies that are forcing people from their land in the provinces. “the royal government has the primary responsibility for respecting, protecting and fulfilling the rights of its ...

Ministry officials were silent yesterday on how exactly they planned to implement Prime Minister Hun Sen’s suspension of any new economic land concession grants and review of existing ELCs. Provincial authorities involved in granting the now-suspended land concessions yesterday said they were ready to implement ...

Displaced villagers from two Phnom Penh neighborhoods on Wednesday submitted a petition to the UN’s human rights envoy, who is in Cambodia on a routine fact-finding mission. The envoy, Surya Subedi, was visiting the Phnom Penh eviction site of Borei Keila ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has issued an immediate and indefinite moratorium on the granting of new economic land concessions and called for a review of all existing concessions, a regulation signed by the premier yesterday states. Dated to an April 27 Council of Ministers’ meeting, the ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday issued a moratorium on economic land concessions, temporarily halting a long-standing policy of granting land to private companies and those with powerful political connections that has sparked growing concerns from national and international human rights groups. The prime minister’s announcement comes ...

Cambodia’s government, facing growing protests by villagers and warnings about disappearing wilderness, suspended the granting of land to domestic and foreign companies on Monday in a move to curb forced evictions and illegal logging. Rights groups in the impoverished but resource-rich Southeast Asian country said the ...

The U.N.’s human rights envoy to Cambodia, Surya Subedi, was in Ratanakkiri province yesterday as part of his weeklong visit to the country to investigate the impact land concessions have on local communities. Some rights groups have singled out land concessions as the premier human rights ...