Crime and law enforcement

Svay Rieng provincial police Thursday publicly defended a district police official accused of corruption after conducting their own investigation into the claims. According to a report published by the local news website CEN on April 7, Svay Chrum district deputy police chief Meas Soeun embezzled money ...

Most garment factories did not open for business Thursday, choosing to extend the Khmer New Year holidays—which officially ended Wednesday—rather than face industrial action in the form of a planned nationwide stay-at-home strike. However, a number of workers interviewed Thursday said they knew nothing about the ...

Traffic accidents killed 38 people over Khmer New Year, with a further 306 injured, officials said yesterday. National Police spokesman Kirth Chantharith said that between Monday and Wednesday, 148 traffic accidents were recorded across the country. ...

Cambodian land advocates face some of the most threatening and deadly working conditions in the world, according to a new report by UK-based environmental watchdog Global Witness. Since 2002, 908 reported killings linked to land activism have occurred across 35 countries – with 13 taking place ...

Mu Sochua, a lawmaker-elect for the opposition CNRP, announced Thursday that she will on Sunday morning resume her campaign to enter Phnom Penh’s Freedom Park. Last month, Ms. Sochua appeared at the park alone for four straight days—each day being physically barred by authorities—in an effort ...

Security guards at the center of a yearlong land dispute between families in Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak community and the Khun Sear Import Export Company on Wednesday accused the families of attacking them during a late-night Khmer New Year drinking party. Nuon Sokhannara, one of the ...

A senior government adviser on information technology says a draft of a cybercrime law is unnecessary and could lead to demonstrations and unrest if passed as currently written. Critics say the draft law, made public last week, criminalizes online behavior in vague language open to ...

The leader of Cambodia’s largest independent garment union may soon be in jail, with the group fearing it will not be able to afford the $25,000 bail a judge has ordered be paid by April 25, its vice president said yesterday. Ath Thorn, president of the ...

Thirty tons of chemicals seized by police on Wednesday were used to make counterfeit soap, officials confirmed Thursday, refusing to release the name of the Chinese national arrested in connection with the raid. The liquid and solid chemicals were stored in blue vats, bottles and sacks ...

The Cambodia Red Cross, NGOs and traffic accident victims Thursday marked annual road safety week by appealing to the government to quickly pass a new traffic law in an effort to reduce road accidents. The Ministry of Justice must still review the new traffic law ...

Police on Wednesday busted what they believe to be an illegal soap-making operation, seizing 30 tons of illicit chemicals and arresting a Chinese national in Kandal province. The chemicals, which were held in blue vats, were discovered at a warehouse belonging to a Chinese businessman in ...

Cambodia’s cybercrime law, a draft of which was made available online Wednesday, could be used to arbitrarily punish people who share controversial opinions online or air complaints about the CPP government, rights groups said Wednesday. According to the law, people who publish content online that slanders ...

The governor of Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat district will face arrest if he fails to appear for a second summons to Ratanakkiri Provincial Court to answer questions about his alleged involvement in the illegal logging of protected land around the Ou’Sinlair waterfall, the court said yesterday. The ...

Cambodia will pardon the prisoners or reduce the punishment for to mark annual Khmer New Year celebration from 14-16 April. ...

Without more efforts to punish traffic violators, the government is all but certain to miss its 2020 goal of cutting traffic deaths by 20 percent and drunk driving deaths by 50 percent, road safety experts said at a forum Tuesday. There were 1,910 deaths due to ...

Ath Thorn, the president of the union that led strikes at the SL Garment Factory last year, appeared before the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Tuesday for questioning over allegations of incitement. The Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers Democratic Union (CCAWDU), headed by Mr. Thorn, spearheaded ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday urged Cambodians to keep safe as they celebrate Khmer New Year this weekend and instructed law enforcement officers to be vigilant during a period renowned for causing an annual spike in traffic accidents. Speaking at a graduation ceremony on Koh ...

Seventy prisoners are to be released during Khmer New Year next week in an amnesty that will also see hundreds of prison sentences reduced by up to a year. The Ministry of Justice approved 555 applications for sentence reductions and pardons following a request by its ...

Preah Vihear provincial governor Oum Mara has sent a letter to inform Interior Minister Sar Kheng that he is ordering an NGO to close its local offices, on the grounds that the organization is inciting villagers to destroy sugarcane farmed by a Chinese company. In the ...

A villager involved in a dispute over 684 hectares of land with Pailin provincial governor Y Chhien claimed Thursday that in 1999 Mr. Chhien and a senior military officer distributed axes and farm tools to the families now on the land. Pailin Provincial Court on Wednesday ...

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 ...

Siem Reap Provincial Court on Wednesday charged four soldiers from the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) with illegally logging rosewood and placed them in pre-trial detention, an official said. “We charged them under article 96 of the Forestry Law,” said Hok Pov, an investigating judge at ...

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 ...

Two suspects arrested during a deadly garment-worker demonstration in November appealed for bail at the Supreme Court yesterday. Vann Ny and Vann Norn have been detained since an intended march of striking SL Garment factory workers devolved into a riot on November 12, at which participants ...