Law and judiciary
Crime and law enforcement
Violence ‘cost economy $1.5B’
The consequences and containment of violence cost the Cambodian economy over $1.5 billion in 2013, just under 10 per cent of its estimated GDP for the period, according to the Institute for Economics & Peace’s Global Peace Index released yesterday. According to IEP executive chairman ...
Stuart White
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/violence-%E2%80%98cost-economy-15b%E2%80%99
Official in court over fraud case
A high-level agricultural official in Kampong Speu province has been charged with stealing thousands of dollars from paddy rice farmers after promising to deliver them land titles in January 2013, a rights group representative and a court prosecutor said yesterday. Cher Pich, 44, deputy director of ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/official-court-over-fraud-case
Unionist’s case hazy
After a third day of questioning, during which the plaintiff’s story allegedly changed, the head of Cambodia’s largest independent garment union is in the dark as to where his case stands. Investigating judge Chea Sok Heang yesterday did not set a date for further questioning and ...
Sean Teehan
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/unionist%E2%80%99s-case-hazy
Union leader to face another day in court
The leader of Cambodia’s largest independent garment union is due to appear in court this afternoon for a third round of pretrial questioning over a case stemming from a strike that ended more than six months ago. Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers’ Democratic Union (C.CAWDU) president ...
Sean Teehan
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/union-leader-face-another-day-court
Phones Go Up In Flames at Prey Sar Prison
Prey Sar prison officials on Friday set fire to 1,705 mobile phones that had been confiscated from inmates there over the past three years. Yin Kun, deputy chief of Prey Sar’s Correctional Center 1, said that the public burning of phones would remind prisoners that communicating ...
Kang Sothear
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/phones-go-up-in-flames-at-prey-sar-prison-61422/
New guidelines aim to protect women, children
A 100-page set of guidelines for the legal protection of the rights of women and children was launched by the Ministry of Women’s Affairs in Phnom Penh on Thursday in a bid to address shortfalls in how the judicial system handles cases such as rape, ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/new-guidelines-aim-to-protect-women-children-61320/
Four nabbed in provincial logging bust
Mondulkiri provincial police charged four men with illegal logging and immigration crimes after they allegedly caught the suspects collecting wood in O’Raing district. Vietnamese nationals Orng Minh Chhung, 30; Le Vantieng, 38; Tvan Taktech, 33; and Thvang Vanthai, 36, were arrested while gathering freshly cut pieces ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/four-nabbed-provincial-logging-bust
Nine inmates die in 1st quarter; drop from same period in 2013
The number of inmates who died in the country’s prisons in the first quarter of the year dipped to nine from 15 during the same period last year, a rights group and the prison department said. From January to April, nine prisoners—five men and four women—reportedly ...
Phorn Bopha
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/nine-inmates-die-in-1st-quarter-drop-from-same-period-in-2013-60719/
Cambodia called out for extrajudicial killings
Cambodia has been cited as one of 10 countries in which torture and extrajudicial killings are common, in a submission made this week by the Hong Kong-based Asia Legal Resource Center to the Human Rights Council in Geneva. ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/cambodia-called-out-for-extrajudicial-killings-60668/
Freedom Park remains closed to public
Twenty-three labor activists are free from jail, but Freedom Park remains closed to the public. The park is a government-sanctioned place of protest, but it was closed after opposition demonstrations there in April. Phnom Penh spokesman Long Dimanche said there is “no threat” of protests ...
Kong Sothanarith
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/freedom-park-remains-closed-to-public/1931123.html
Thailand releases loggers
Four Cambodian nationals who had been incarcerated in Thailand for logging and illegally crossing the border were released on Monday after completing their prison terms, officials said yesterday. Touch Ra, deputy director of the Chaom-Sa Ngaom international border checkpoint in Oddar Meanchey province, said two of ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/thailand-releases-loggers
Printer cops $12k bill for bootlegged books
The owner of a printing house accused of infringing on the copyright of an author who contracted him was slapped with $12,500 in fines and damages by Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday. ...
Buth Reaksmey Kongkea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/printer-cops-12k-bill-bootlegged-books
Fake outfits, real time
Two men were sentenced to three years in prison yesterday by Phnom Penh Municipal Court for impersonating a police officer by donning a National Police uniform, complete with a plastic pistol and fake number plate. “After stopping, checking and asking him, we knew he was ...
Buth Reaksmey Kongkea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/fake-outfits-real-time
After jail, Pov gains following
Before he was arrested in January, Vorn Pov and the union he created were not widely known outside of activist circles. But when he emerged from Phnom Penh’s CC1 prison on Friday, he walked away as one of the highest-profile unionists in the country, and a ...
Kevin Ponniah, May Titthara and Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/after-jail-pov-gains-following
Allegations of death threats after illegal logging reports
A journalist has filed a complaint with the Pursat provincial court alleging that a soldier threatened to kill him on Sunday after he wrote a series of damning articles linking the soldier to illegal rosewood trafficking, court officials confirmed Tuesday. Both the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/allegations-of-death-threats-after-illegal-logging-reports-60426/
Cambodia unveils U.S.-aided defense strategic plan
The Cambodian Ministry of Defense on Tuesday launched a U.S.-aided strategic planning manual with an aim to assist Cambodian strategists to design standardized and effective defense strategic plans. Major Gen. Phat Vibolsopheak, chief of international relations department at the Defense Ministry, said the 17-page instruction manual ...
Global Post News Staff
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/xinhua-news-agency/140603/cambodia-unveils-us-aided-defense-strategic-plan
China's police chief meets Cambodian deputy PM
China’s minister of Public Security Guo Shengkun Tuesday held talks with Cambodian Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Sar Kheng on boosting security cooperation. Guo, also a state councilor, said China and Cambodia have conducted fruitful cooperation on combating telecom fraud, hunting for those who have ...
English People Daily News Staff
http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/n/2014/0604/c90883-8736346.html
Authorities pass buck as hit-and-run investigation stalls
As hit-and-run victim San Chan lies in a hospital bed awaiting justice for his brother’s death, officials from the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, police and traffic police are pointing fingers at one another, while the driver remains at large. A week ago today, Mr. Chan, 18, ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/authorities-pass-buck-as-hit-and-run-investigation-stalls-60309/
Cambodian Villagers Express Helplessness to Protect Forest
Prey Lang is one of Cambodia’s few remaining large forests, covering approximately 3,600 square kilometers across four northern provinces. The forest is home to about 200,000 mostly indigenous people, who depend on it for their livelihoods, according to the Prey Lang Community Network. But, the ...
Say Mony
http://www.voanews.com/content/illegal-logging-in-cambodian-forest-worries-natives/1928013.html
25 found guilty for roles in garment protests; sentences suspended
Twenty-five unionists, garment workers and bystanders were found guilty by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Friday for their involvement in three separate garment protest-related cases, but were handed down suspended sentences. The 22 men who had not been bailed ahead of trial were ordered ...
The Cambodia Daily
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/25-found-guilty-for-roles-in-garment-protests-sentences-suspended-60092/
As verdicts loom in 25 protest related cases, acquittals sought
Verdicts will be handed down Friday in two garment protest-related cases that rights groups say were built on a weak body of evidence. The two cases occurred months apart but followed a similar narrative: Garment workers fed up with their calls for a higher monthly minimum ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/as-verdicts-loom-in-25-protest-related-cases-acquittals-sought-60056/
Stung Treng villagers caught in forestry racket
SIEM PANG DISTRICT, Stung Treng province – For the elite few granted the right to level swathes of woodland in the north of this remote province, the timber trade is worth a fortune. For the Forestry Administration—the government body charged with policing logging—business is also booming. While ...
Phann Ana and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/stung-treng-villagers-caught-in-forestry-racket-60017/
Boy caught up in protests faces 11 years in jail
As several hundred garment workers from the SL Garment factory pelted police with rocks during a protest near the Stung Meanchey pagoda in November, Men Sok Sambath, a 14-year-old scrap collector, decided to join the crowd. “I saw other people throwing rocks at the [police] truck, ...
Mech Dara and George Wright
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/boy-caught-up-in-protests-faces-11-years-in-jail-59934/
Villagers vow to defy fresh ban on marches
More than 1,500 villagers plan to march to the Anti-Corruption Unit and National Assembly in Phnom Penh on Thursday in defiance of a fresh ban issued by City Hall prohibiting them from doing so. The villagers form a group known as the Land Communities for Peace ...
Joshua Wilwohl
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-vow-to-defy-fresh-ban-on-marches-59966/