Environment and natural resources

Two more people died in Kompong Cham province on Monday as a result of flooding that has claimed at least 30 victims since heavy rains spawned by tropical storms over the past two weeks caused the Mekong to break its banks and inundate thousands of ...

The government’s National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM) fails to meet regularly and is void of an annual budget to cover its operations while most of its staff members are totally unaware of their job description, according to a report released in March and funded ...

Two monks living a remote pagoda in Kampong Speu province’s Oral district said yesterday that a shot had been fired at their living quarters last Tuesday in what they suspected was a threat motivated by their conservation efforts and participation in an opposition rally. Venerables Sam ...

Though authorities have called on residents to move to higher ground, those in some of the worst flooded areas of Cambodia said yesterday that they had neither the means nor the ability to do so. Instead, they said, they will remain in their rapidly flooding ...

Cambodia’s only U.N.-backed carbon trading scheme is still nowhere near making any money for communities and logging in the area continues to threaten the very forests supposed to generate tens of millions of dollars over the next 30 years, community representatives and officials in charge ...

Phnom Penh will face flooding in certain areas in the coming days as the level of the Mekong River surpasses emergency level, while heavy rainfall from tropical storm Wutip, which made landfall in Laos from the South China Sea on Friday, prompted the government to ...

The government’s latest five-year strategy calls for a complete halt to economic land concessions (ELCs) and an inquiry into those still in the pipeline. But the plan has drawn scepticism from conservationists and rights groups, who pointed out that loopholes have been liberally applied after the ...

The death toll caused by severe flooding along the Mekong River increased by eight yesterday, bringing the total number of deaths over the past two weeks to more than 20, including 11 children, an official said. Keo Vy, deputy chief of the information department at the ...

A community forest patrol of locals yesterday confiscated a large haul of illegally logged luxury wood that was being transported to the Vietnamese border in Mondolkiri province, local officials said. Commune police chief Pech Sotheary said the case has been referred to provincial forestry administration ...

PHNOM PENH, Sept. 26 (Xinhua) — Floods have killed at least 20 Cambodian people, including 11 children in the last two weeks, a disaster control official said Thursday. Keo Vy, chief of the Cabinet of the National Committee for Disaster Management (NCDM), said nearly 5,000 families ...

Thousands of families continue to be affected by relentless flooding caused by heavy rains and the opening of dams in neighboring Thailand and Vietnam, causing a surge in the Mekong River in Cambodia that has inundated communities along its banks. The floods have claimed at least ...

The death toll from recent flooding continued to rise yesterday, with meteorology officials voicing concerns that floods in some parts of the country could rival the catastrophic ones of 1996, which claimed almost 170 lives and affected more than a million Cambodians nationwide. At least 25 ...

SAN FRANCISCO — The Oddar Meanchey REDD+ (Reduced Emissions for Deforestation and Degradation) project in Cambodia is the first in the world to complete verification of emission reductions under the Verified Carbon Standard (VCS) with a triple gold Climate, Community and Biodiversity (CCB) accreditation for emission ...

Flooding across the country has now killed seven people, including four children, since water reached emergency levels in some areas on Friday, the National Disaster Management Committee (NDMC) said Monday. Flooding is affecting a total of seven provinces and authorities have already evacuated hundreds of families ...

Nearly 2,000 families have been evacuated from their homes and thousands of hectares of crops flooded in the wake of continuing rains and the opening of dams in Vietnam and Thailand. At least two people have died since Friday in the flooding, which has affected at ...

In the months leading up to Cambodia’s national election on July 28, authorities in the Angkor Archaeological Park allowed dozens of land owners to build new houses and develop plots of land inside highly protected areas of the world heritage site. Villagers interviewed last week said ...

Unicef during a discussion yesterday pressured the Phnom Penh Municipality to develop a plan to eradicate slums in the capital, but government officials offered no quick fixes. According to the municipality, there are 281 slum communities in the capital, which 2,033 families call home. Earlier this month, ...

The Siem Reap Provincial Court charged three men Wednesday with illegally logging luxury rosewood inside the Angkor Archaeological Park, a Unesco world heritage site, officials said. Provincial prosecutor Heng Pheng said the suspects had been identified as Sun Phearak, 20, Phay Sophea, 18, and Phin Ron, ...

The number of Ratanakkiri residents trapped in their homes by floodwater that continues to rise amid relentless rain is now estimated by provincial authorities to be at least 4,000. Heavy rain has put five Lumphat district communes – Lbaing I, Chey Uddom, Batang, Seda and Kaleng ...

A conservation group yesterday accused a military commander in Kampong Speu of smuggling two tonnes of illegally cut rosewood to Vietnam on Monday night. Chea Hean, director of the Natural Resources and Wildlife Preservation Organisation, said the commander had cut the timber in the protected Oral ...

Flash floods left hundreds of families trapped in their villages, destroyed properties and killed livestock in Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat district Tuesday, officials said. Heavy rain had softened the walls of a canal, which gave way to the pressure, according to Khlem Sovann, chief of Lbaing I ...

KAMPONG SPEU PROVINCE— Three years ago, Pao had a farm and a charcoal stove near a stream in a community called Omlaing in western Cambodia. The farm gave her rice, charcoal sales gave her extra income and the nearby forest provided edible and medicinal plants. Pao ...

Four unidentified men were arrested yesterday for allegedly killing an endangered and pregnant gaur – a species of wild bovine – in a protected wildlife reserve in Mondulkiri province, provincial officials said. After villagers discovered the carcass on Wednesday, provincial authorities along with conservationists in charge ...

Civil society groups yesterday hit back at the government after a Ministry of Interior statement released on Wednesday warned NGOs that they would be breaking ministry protocols on political neutrality by “directly or indirectly” supporting an unnamed political party or its protests. The Cambodia National Rescue ...