Illegal labor

Human rights workers say the US and other countries should censure Thailand over fisheries practices that mean near-slavery for many Cambodians and others. An investigative report by the UK-based Guardian newspaper exposed serious abuses in the Thai fishing trade, where workers are cheated of pay, kept ...

Phnom Penh municipality on Monday ordered a curb on vagrants entering the city and a roundup of beggars, homeless people and children selling items at traffic lights. In the directive, signed by deputy city governor Seng Ratanak, City Hall orders the 12 district governors, its social ...

They save for months, borrowing from family and friends, even taking out loans, to pour as much as a year’s worth of earnings into the hands of recruiters that may have no intention and certainly have no guarantee of procuring overseas employment. Recruitment agencies, several of ...

Four parents in Kampong Cham province have filed complaints with provincial police alleging that their daughters are being sexually abused by their husbands in China, officers said yesterday. Thol Meng, deputy bureau chief of the provincial anti-human trafficking department, said a total of 10 concerned mothers ...

The manager of Giant Ocean International, a now-defunct recruitment firm notorious for abuse scandals, was sentenced yesterday to 10 years in jail for trafficking hundreds of Cambodian fishermen to work in slave-like conditions overseas. Taiwanese national Lin Yu-shin, who ran the firm, was arrested in May ...

ANZ’s financing of ruling party senator Ly Yong Phat’s controversial sugar plantation has come under fire once again, this time in an investigation by NGO Oxfam into Australia’s big four banks and their links to rights abuses in developing countries. In a report titled “Banking on ...

The Zongtex Garment factory off Phnom Penh’s Russian Boulevard looks like a nondescript residential compound, hidden down a dead-end road. There are no signs suggesting that it supplied to some of the world’s leading high street names – and the US military. Taiwanese-owned Zongtex Garment Manufacturing ...

Police in Preah Vihear province say they have uncovered more evidence of child labor on a Chinese-owned sugarcane plantation and will send the case to court if further investigation confirms their preliminary findings. A former employee of the Lan Feng plantation filed a complaint last month ...

A Taiwanese woman and five associates charged with trafficking Cambodians to work in slave-like conditions on fishing boats off the coast of Africa had their case heard by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Wednesday. Lin Yu Shin, the 54-year-old owner of the now defunct Giant ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Tuesday heard the case of three people who were charged with fraudulently obtaining passports for four Cambodian women in an attempt to send them to China for marriage. ...

Police and human rights workers are investigating claims that a Chinese-owned sugarcane plantation in Preah Vihear province has been employing child workers since December. Oeu Bunthany said the Y Heng Company fired her on Saturday after she complained to local police that up to 20 children ...

The government on Friday finalized guidelines aimed at reducing the number of children who work in the fisheries sector and do not attend school, the Min­istry of Agriculture and Fisheries and the NGO World Vision said in a statement. World Vision said the guidelines, which it ...

Two unions that called for a stay-at-home strike by garment factory employees Wednesday had little success in mobilizing workers after six other unions, under pressure from the government and factory owners, pulled out of the planned industrial action on Tuesday. Union leaders who pushed ahead with ...

Hundreds of trucks hauling sugarcane queue up along the dusty roads that cut a path through a plantation in Kampong Speu province. Their destination: Cambodia’s most advanced sugar refinery. Its owners say the landmark project, run by the Phnom Penh Sugar Company and its president, ruling ...

Cambodia has provided examples of “best practices” in the fight against human trafficking for a forthcoming Asean convention against the trafficking of people, experts said Friday at the close of a two-day conference in Phnom Penh on irregular migration and human trafficking. The Asean region is ...

The Ministry of Labor said Wednesday that the government has agreed on a final draft of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Malaysia regarding sending Cambodian maids to work there, but that no timeframe for the signing of the agreement has been set. Following reports of ...

Although human-trafficking cases dealt with by the Ministry of Interior decreased significantly in 2013, suggesting progress was being made in tackling the crime, trafficking in persons continues to be a major challenge for the government, the ministry said in its annual report on Tuesday. According to ...

Anti-human trafficking police in Phnom Penh arrested three Cambodians and two Chinese nationals after the group tried to traffic two young women—who had been promised wealthy husbands—to work as prostitutes in China, police said Monday. Keo Thea, chief of the municipal anti-human trafficking police, said the ...

Rights groups yesterday called on ANZ bank to help address alleged labour and environmental violations at Phnom Penh Sugar Company instead of walking away from the problem. A joint statement released yesterday by Equitable Cambodia and Inclusive Development International said it would be wrong for the ...

Many Cambodian women arrive in South Korea or China for marriage, only to find themselves being chosen as mistresses, say labour rights activists. While young Cambodian men, who travel to Thailand to work on fishing boats, often fall prey to drug abuse. Loss of land, debt, ...

Shareholders will want answers from ANZ bank after it was revealed this week that the banking giant’s joint venture in Cambodia financed ruling party senator Ly Yong Phat’s controversial sugar plantation, the Responsible Investment Association Australia (RIAA) said yesterday. Environmental audit documents obtained by the Post on Tuesday ...

SIHANOUKVILLE, Cambodia—In this quiet beach town, Lim Loeung says she spends up to 80 hours a week gluing soles onto shoes at a factory that does work for companies including Japanese sneaker-maker Asics Corp. 7936.TO +0.95% The factory believes Ms. Lim is at least 18 ...

A representative of the Zongtex Garment Manufacturing company in Phnom Penh on Tuesday denied employing workers as young as 15 to make U.S. government clothing, following an exposé by The New York Times on poor standards in factories producing U.S. government attire. On Sunday, The Times ...

Local human rights group Adhoc has called on the government to investigate the alleged detention and torture of a Cambodian woman at a Bangkok casino where she was employed. In a statement released Friday, Adhoc said the government must push for a “full investigation” into the ...