Legal framework

The seven opposition CNRP lawmakers charged last year with “leading an insurrection” could be arrested and imprisoned in the same way that opposition Senator Hong Sok Hour was arrested and imprisoned over the weekend, Justice Ministry spokesman Chin Malin said Tuesday. ...

The Koh Kong Provincial Court on Monday imprisoned three activists from environmental NGO Mother Nature after a prosecutor charged them with threatening to cause damage during their ongoing campaign against a company accused of illegally dredging at a local estuary, according to rights group Licadho. ...

Disgraced former Phnom Penh Municipal Court director Ang Mealaktei was sent to the Kandal Provincial Prison on Sunday after he was charged with embezzlement for allegedly confiscating an SUV from a drug dealer and giving it to his son, a prison official said Monday. ...

Cambodia’s former deputy consul-general to Ho Chi Minh City denied forging a document to help a private company smuggle luxury-grade wood into Vietnam during the first day of his trial at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Monday. ...

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy says the article of the constitution that demarcates Cambodia’s borders could be amended, for use of an older, more accurate map. ...

The Khmer Kampuchea Krom Buddhist Monk Association has slammed the August 1 arrest and defrocking of two monks, accusing police officials of detaining the pair on baseless and politically motivated charges. ...

Following orders from Prime Minister Hun Sen, opposition Senator Hong Sok Hour was arrested and charged with forgery and incitement over the weekend for posting an apparently fake treaty with Vietnam to Facebook. ...

Officials in Kratie province are insisting that a small group of families involved in a local land dispute register with the Interior Ministry or be “punished.” ...

Thirty labor unions and associations appealed to the Labor Ministry on Friday to redraft its planned Trade Union Law, which they say will suppress industrial action and facilitate union busting, despite significant concessions in the latest draft. ...

Three activists from environmental NGO Mother Nature were summoned to appear at the Botum Sakor district police station in Koh Kong province on Friday to answer for their involvement in a campaign to chase off a sand-dredging company accused of destroying the environment, officials said. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Thursday ordered the arrest of opposition senator Hong Sok Hour for “treason” over a fake treaty the senator posted to Facebook that purported to show Heng Samrin, as Cambodia’s head of state in 1979, pledging to dissolve the border between ...

A prominent lawyer and a lawmaker on Thursday rejected the latest explanation from the Anti-Corruption Unit for why it cannot pursue charges against the disgraced former head of the National Malaria Center, who has been told to pay back hundreds of thousands of dollars in ...

The Constitutional Council of Cambodia on Wednesday deemed new legislation regulating the country’s non-governmental organizations to be in full compliance with the Constitution, rejecting all arguments—from the U.N. down to the NGOs themselves—that it flies in the face of the highest law of the land. ...

Responding to criticism of the eighteen-month jail terms handed down to four unionists who blocked a road at a strike in Svay Rieng province last year, a deputy prosecutor said Wednesday that their actions were as severe as those of former Bavet City governor Chhouk ...

Authorities in Mondolkiri province arrested three men Wednesday morning after discovering nearly 150 kg of illegal bushmeat in the vehicle they were driving, a forestry official said. ...

As about 100 fishermen in Koh Kong province on Wednesday resumed their monthslong campaign against a company they accuse of illegal sand dredging, an environmental NGO claimed the firm was now hiring locals as security guards in an attempt to divide the community. ...

Residents of Koh Rong Island, off the coast of Sihanoukville, have this week called on government officials, including Prime Minister Hun Sen, to review what they are labelling “abusive activities” by the Royal Group (RG) conglomerate. ...

The Kompong Chhnang Provincial Court on Tuesday questioned a district police chief over allegations that he raped a high school student in his office last month but did not charge the official, who has been suspended pending investigations by the court and National Police. ...

The Svay Rieng Provincial Court director said Tuesday that the bus company involved in a deadly crash that killed 19 people and injured 21 in Svay Rieng province in May has had its latest compensation offer rejected by the victims’ families. ...

A spokesman for the Justice Ministry said Tuesday that the government was considering a request made by the new Thai ambassador to repatriate seven of the country’s nationals serving prison sentences in Cambodia. ...

The country’s anti-corruption czar on Tuesday said the former director of the National Malaria Center must pay back the $351,000 in bribes he took in exchange for mosquito net contracts—effectively admitting the ex-director’s guilt—but that he would not be prosecuted. ...

Police from Takeo province came under fire in neighboring Kampot province early Sunday morning as they pursued a truck transporting a load of luxury wood while four other cars tried to protect the truck carrying the timber, according to officials, who said police managed to ...

The Pursat Provincial Court on Monday charged a border police official with intentional violence for cutting off his colleague’s fingers with a cleaver at their barracks on Friday night, officials said. ...

The head of the Forestry Administration’s Mondolkiri cantonment said Monday that he had accused one man over an August 1 incident in which military police freed the drivers of four trucks transporting illegally logged timber from the custody of anti-economic crime police and escaped with ...