Legal framework

As 10 land-rights activists and a monk prepare to take their appeal against one-year prison terms to the Appeal Court today, rights groups yesterday called for an end to government influence over the judiciary. “It’s time for Cambodia’s courts to act professionally and independently from the ...

Municipal anti-human trafficking police arrested three suspects in the past two days for allegedly sending at least four Cambodian women to marry men in China over the past year. Municipal anti-human trafficking police chief Keo Thea said one of the four Cambodian women sent to China ...

A day after the Appeal Court denied bail to the parents of fugitive defense ministry official Thong Sarath, municipal police and court officials Wednesday searched three residences belonging to the family and seized three AK-47 rifles at one of the homes.​ ...

Abuse, discrimination, exploitation and corruption are endemic in Cambodia’s prisons, spurred on by judicial and penal systems “driven by nepotism”, according to a new report from local rights group Licadho. The report, Rights at a Price: Life Inside Cambodia’s Prisons, which was released yesterday, details a ...

Police have warned coffee lovers there could be a couple of bad batches circulating and percolating in Phnom Penh after a raid on a fake coffee enterprise in Sen Sok district’s Khmuonh commune yesterday. Officers arrested four men during the joint operation in Banlar Sa Et ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Monday accused the CNRP of violating the “culture of dialogue” that he and the opposition agreed to last year, and warned seven lawmakers charged with incitement and insurrection that their parliamentary immunity would not save them from prison. The seven CNRP ...

The Phnom Penh municipal government on Monday rejected a request from protesters to stage a one-month demonstration in the city’s Freedom Park for the release of 10 jailed activists and refused to receive their latest petition demanding a solution to their long-running land disputes. About 100 ...

Civil society leaders on Sunday called on the country’s two major political parties to scrap plans to ban them from giving media interviews during election campaigns and from issuing statements that “insult” any party. CPP Deputy Prime Minister Bin Chhin and senior CNRP official Kuoy Bunroeun, ...

Cambodia’s King Norodom Sihamoni has signed off on a more robust traffic law, completing the final step for legislation that could hit the streets as early as next month, according to the government’s National Road Safety Committee (NRSC). ...

Foreign Minister Hor Namhong yesterday took a visit by Lowell, Massachusetts, Mayor Rodney Elliott to offer an impromptu history lesson, he said at a press conference yesterday. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Wednesday convicted self-exiled dissident Sourn Serey Ratha of incitement, plotting and obstructing elections, while three alleged co-conspirators were also convicted of plotting and obstructing elections. The four were sentenced to between five and seven years in jail for the charges, ...

The trial of two Chinese men and three Cambodian women on charges of human trafficking began in the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Monday after they were arrested in May for allegedly brokering marriages between Cambodian women and prospective grooms in China. ...

The Association of Banks in Cambodia has called on the Securities and Exchange Commission to ensure that over-the-counter derivatives transacted by banks do not fall under the governance of the new draft prakas governing derivatives trading on Cambodia’s stock exchange. Speaking at a workshop in Phnom ...

Lawyers for 11 opposition CNRP activists facing insurrection charges Thursday walked out of the Phnom Penh Municipal Court in protest after the judges refused to let three CNRP lawmakers facing the same charges observe what was supposed to be the first full day of hearings. ...

Travellers from nine South Asian, African and Middle Eastern nations are likely to face increased scrutiny at Phnom Penh’s airport security, according to a new release from Wikileaks. ...

Police arrested a commune official for being mastermind behind a grenade attack in October, which left one person dead, and five others injured when two unidentified men threw a grenade at a group of family members who were having lunch in front of their house. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court has summoned activist monk Keo Somaly, for questioning over an alleged attack on a fellow monk at the city’s Wat Neakavorn last month. ...

Anti-human trafficking police on Monday arrested two men at the Phnom Penh International Airport as they attempted to traffic a woman to China to marry a man there, police said Tuesday. Chinese national Xu Xiandai, 30, and Cambodian Heng Seng, 53, were arrested at 7 a.m. ...

Cambodian prosecutors have received a new request from Russia to extradite Russian businessman Sergei Polonsky, TASS reported on Tuesday. The news agency’s source at the Cambodian Prosecutor General’s Office said the request was based on civil claims filed against Polonsky. He said that those who lost ...

Cambodia is managing here today the recovery of missing ancient heritage objects that might be in a cache of relics confiscated from a Thai general arrested for various offenses. About a thousand objects of different types were taken a month ago from the high officer in ...

Military police in Stung Treng City last week raided eight apartments and market stalls where knock-off superglue was being manufactured and sold, an official said Monday. ...

Phnom Penh Municipal Court will hear case of Freedom Park protest on December 25. Chuong Chou Ngy, defense lawyer of CNRP’s senior official Meach Sovannara who was arrested last month for his role in the protest and put in detention at Prey Sar prison, said Saturday ...

In a rare intervention, Cambodia’s King Norodom Sihamoni has demanded an investigation over a Phnom Penh judge who interviewed an opposition party activist without his attorney being present. A lawmaker had complained to the King that Phnom Penh Municipal Court judge Keo Mony had questioned Ouch ...

Forty national and foreign NGOs yesterday called on the government to ratify the International Labour Organization’s 2011 Domestic Workers Convention in order to better safeguard the rights of Cambodian domestic workers, both inside and outside of the country. The missive, which says that the Kingdom’s domestic ...