Public land lease

The filling of Boeng Kak lake and the eviction of thousands of residents was necessary to root out the “prostitutes and terrorists” that were drawn to the area’s once-popular tourist zone, the Phnom Penh Municipality said in a statement yesterday. In a statement posted to its ...

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has given approval to grant state-owned land to three private companies despite issuing a temporary ban on land concessions, drawing criticism from local NGOs concerned about increasingly frequent land disputes in the country. Copies of three subdecrees obtained by RFA showed ...

Less than a week after Prime Minister Hun Sen called for land to be returned to villagers embroiled in land disputes, a Pursat province villager has been summonsed by the court in a scenario many see as all too common in these disputes. Kuch Veng, a ...

Hundreds of people have ordered video compact discs (VCDs) of Thursday’s speech on land rights given by Prime Minister Hun Sen after an official at CTN offered on-air yesterday to send a copy to anyone who requested it Orders of the speech have been pouring in ...

More than 100 villagers from Svay Rieng province’s Romeas Hek district protested yesterday on land they say was stolen from them in 2007 and recently cleared by a former community representative, whose uncle is a local commune chief Villagers said lang Hai, who acted as ...

Commune and village officials in Kratie province yesterday threatened to shut down a community meeting on the protection of Prey Long forest because the organizers had failed to get permission and allegedly invited only opposition party activists. The authorities eventually allowed the meeting to proceed, after ...

Thirteen Boeung Kak protesters released from jail Wednesday say they will continue their demonstrations until they obtain more land on a real estate development in the capital. Representatives wasted no time in meeting after their release from prison following a decision by the Appeals Court Wednesday. “The ...

The government on Friday denied it had violated a moratorium on granting new land concessions when Prime Minister Hun Sen signed off on more than 20,000 hectares of land to three rubber companies 11 days after the ban was announced on May 7. According to documents ...

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 ...

According to documents published in the latest Royal Gazette, Prime Minister Hun Sen signed off on three land concessions covering more than 20,000 hectares last month, 11 days after a moratorium on the granting of such concessions was announced. On May 7, Mr. Hun Sen signed ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen made a bold pledge to the hundreds of thousands of Cambodian villagers fighting companies for their homes yesterday, ordering that in every economic land concession across the country, space must be provided for those they would displace. But last month’s royal book ...

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has urged the Cambodian government to release 13 Boeung Kak lake women imprisoned after a three-hour trial last month, telling Foreign Minister Hor Namhong at a meeting in Washington that such a move would support freedom of expression. “The secretary ...

The U.S. has called on the Cambodian government to give fair legal treatment to the 13 women recently jailed for demonstrating against their evictions from the Boeng Kak area, according to a U.S. State Department spokeswoman. Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong met with U.S. Secretary of ...

The Svay Rieng Provincial Court is scheduled to question two witnesses today over the shooting of three workers at a special economic zone (SEZ) on Feb. 20, investigating Judge Pech Chhoeut said yesterday. “We will question two more witnesses on Thursday,” Judge Chhoeut said. ...

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen on Thursday gave authorities six months to end a spate of land disputes pitting developers against villagers that have sparked increasingly violent protests. Hun Sen ordered officials to visit contested areas and issue deeds to families facing illegal evictions, a move ...

A Cambodian court is asked to re-examine the jailing of Boeung Kak land activists. Cambodian authorities have asked a court to review the jailing of 13 women involved in a land dispute as protests over their sentences escalated with over 100 demonstrators threatening Thursday to march ...

The case of the 13 imprisoned Boeung Kak women is in the hands of the Appeal Court now, the women’s defence lawyer said yesterday. Lawyer Harm Sunrith said that Phnom Penh Municipal Court had sent the case to the Appeal Court on Tuesday, adding that he ...

The Ministry of Justice will not press the Phnom Penh Municipal Court to review the case of 13 Boeng Kak residents sentenced to jail last month for demonstrating against a CPP senator’s real estate project, despite asking the court to consider releasing the women. Now that ...

Seventeen villagers from Banteay Meanchey province’s O’Chrou district filed a complaint yesterday with the rights group Adhoc after their homes were allegedly unlawfully bulldozed in June last year. ...

The Ministry of Justice has called on the Phnom Penh Municipal Court to re-examine whether the decision to sentence 13 Boeung Kak women to two and a half years in jail was just, according to a letter obtained by the Post yesterday. The letter was ...

The Justice Ministry has written to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court requesting that it review the case of 13 Boeng Kak women recently jailed for demonstrations against a CPP senator’s real estate project, a ministry official said yesterday. Bunyai Narin, deputy Cabinet chief for the Justice ...

The Koh Kong Provincial Court summonsed 23 villagers from Chikor Leu commune to present themselves – and any relevant documents – at a July 12 hearing with representatives of the two sugar companies that bulldozed their farmland and evicted them from their homes in 2006. ...

The 13 Boeung Kak lake women imprisoned after a three-hour trial on May 24 were tried unjustly on charges that had no basis, according to a Cambodian Center for Human Rights report released yesterday. Ou Virak said the women’s sentencing, which came two days after ...

Residents of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak community yesterday said they visited four former neighbors now serving jail terms in Prey Sar prison for demonstrating against CPP Senator Lao Meng Khin’s real estate project and urged the women to end their reported hunger strike. A prison official, however, insisted there was ...