Crime and law enforcement

Three alleged members of a money-laundering operation worth more than $11 million who were arrested earlier this year in Phnom Penh have had their cases sent to court and are now awaiting trial, Om Yentieng, head of the Anti-Corruption Unit, said yesterday. The three suspects – ...

During a four-hour pop concert in Phnom Penh to mark International Anti-Corruption Day on Monday, the Coca-Cola Company and the government’s Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) signed an agreement that commits the international soft drinks company to avoid committing bribery in Cambodia. “Corruption is the barrier to development ...

KANDAL PROVINCE – At Kandal provincial prison on Monday, about 100 male and female prisoners and pretrial detainees assembled to play games and receive fruit and drinks from rights group Licadho, which is visiting 18 prisons around the country this week in a bid to ...

Interior Minister Sar Kheng has ordered all prison, detention and rehabilitation center chiefs to accommodate and give full access to delegates from the U.N.’s Subcommittee on the Prevention of Torture (SPT), whose five-day mission to assess the use of torture, cruelty and other inhumane treatment ...

The government will deploy double the usual number of armed security personnel on the streets of Phnom Penh on Tuesday to keep control of the large number of rallies planned in the city to celebrate International Human Rights Day, a military police official said Monday. “We ...

A law student who filed a complaint with the Phnom Penh Municipal Court against the city’s police and military police chiefs over the fatal shooting of a bystander by authorities during a protest last month took his complaint to the U.N.’s human rights office on ...

Two men were arrested and charged on Sunday with smuggling more than 2,000 kilograms of luxury-grade rosewood from Kampong Thom to Siem Reap town, anti-crime officials said yesterday. Thanh Ti, 21, and Viet Thy Thanh, 19, were caught manning a truck transferring 2,400 kilograms of rosewood ...

Kampong Cham police officials arrested 10 suspects on Sunday for illegally fishing the Mekong River in Koh Sotin district. “Seven are Vietnamese and other three are Muslim Cambodians. They used illegal equipment to fish in the Mekong River, such as four motor boats, trawls and two ...

Cambodian authorities unlawfully detain hundreds of drug users and others deemed “undesirable” in centers where they face torture, sexual violence, and forced labor, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Human Rights Watch called for the immediate closure of the country’s eight detention ...

Authorities issued an arrest warrant last week for the director of a local NGO involved with an operation that allegedly bilked thousands out of money by claiming the company could find them work in South Korea. Warrants for the arrests of Theun Samnang, head of NGO ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Friday issued a statement ordering that anti-graft education be incorporated into the national schooling system as part of a wider effort to stamp out corruption in the country. The statement, released in the lead-up to International Anti-Corruption Day, which falls today, ...

Injecting methamphetamines is on the rise in Cambodia, particularly among younger addicts, as recreational users have begun to switch from smoking and pill-popping to mainlining, a report by the Australian National Council on Drugs suggests. The report, released yesterday, details how amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS) and their ...

Prisons across the country will soon be referred to only as “correctional centres” to change a public perception that they are places where people are simply locked up, the Ministry of Interior announced yesterday. Nuth Sa An, secretary of state at the ministry, said the change ...

The Ministry of Interior’s general department of prisons has been advised to address prison overcrowding and transportation issues between prisons and courts as it begins to tackle its 2013 to 2018 strategic plan for the country’s jails. The advice was given at the start of a ...

A semiannual study of defendants’ rights in Cambodian courts released this week found an alarming prevalence of pre-trial detention in cases involving juvenile suspects, who are routinely blended with adult prison populations. The Cambodian Center for Human Rights’ sixth semiannual report of trial rights, which cited ...

Cambodian authorities frequently hold suspects, especially the young, in detention pending trial, even though the law could allow them to be released on bail while awaiting the completion of their judicial proceedings, according to a report released Wednesday. Minor crime suspects are also provided a “worryingly ...

Well-known timber magnate Try Pheap is preparing to expand cross-country with a scheme that already gives him exclusive rights to buy all the wood felled on economic land concessions (ELCs) in Ratanakkiri province, a spokesman for the businessman said. The Agriculture Ministry’s Forestry Administration in February ...

More than six years after the slaying of Free Trade Union president Hy Vuthy, one of the men convicted of his murder, Chan Sophorn, 35, appeared in court yesterday for a retrial. Sous Sam Ath, the judge presiding over the case at the Phnom Penh Municipal ...

The privately-operated International Ship Registry of Cambodia (ISROC), a South Korea-based company that owns the rights to register foreign vessels under the Cambodian flag, told ship owners last year that it was not monitoring their observance of international maritime laws, and that it was their ...

Villagers in Mondolkiri province filed a complaint with rights group Adhoc on Friday, saying that they had discovered loggers illegally felling trees in their local community forest who claimed to be working for businessman Try Pheap. Mr. Pheap, who owns plantations, mining concessions and special economic ...

Two teenagers charged with intentional acts of violence, damage to public property and insulting public officials in clashes with police during a demonstration by SL Garment Factory workers last month were denied bail Monday. The suspects, 14-year-old Meas Non and 17-year-old Vanny Vanan, were charged by ...

Stung Treng Provincial Court yesterday questioned six men apprehended while allegedly transporting more than 17 cubic metres of illegal Thnong timber by boat in Sesan district, said Y Ek Savtey, director of the provincial forestry administration. Hou Sam Ol, a provincial coordinator with rights group Adhoc, ...

The deputy director of the Preah Sihanouk provincial tax branch who was arrested for corruption last week was on Friday charged with the misappropriation of public funds, an official confirmed Sunday. Phy Rith, who was arrested by the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) on Wednesday, was charged by ...

Three staff members of a local NGO that campaigns against resource exploitation were charged yesterday with extorting money from loggers in Stung Treng province. The three staffers from the Natural Resource and Wildlife Preservation Organization (NRWPO) stand accused of extorting groups of loggers out of at ...