Social development

The Supreme Court yesterday upheld a lower court’s decision to deny jailed political analyst Kim Sok’s request for bail, also rejecting his request to summons Prime Minister Hun Sen, the plaintiff in the two defamation and incitement cases that landed the analyst in detention. ...

A series of letters issued by the Ministry of Interior on Tuesday night – one chastising two election monitors, and another offering a blanket warning to NGOs – have again raised the spectre of the Kingdom’s controversial and widely criticised Law on Associations and NGOs ...

The ministry yesterday used National Dengue Campaign Day to announce that there were 1,133 reported dengue cases in the first 24 weeks of this year and just one fatality, compared with 2,447 dengue cases and five deaths in the same period last year. ...

At a workshop to commemorate the eighth anniversary of the Law on the Protection and the Promotion of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, executive director of the Cambodian Disabled People’s Organisation Ngin Saorath decried the lack of progress on equal treatment of disabled people ...

Hundreds of people could have their homes demolished by security forces in order to preserve Angkorian heritage following a meeting between the Apsara Authority and the Siem Reap provincial government on Friday. ...

Fifteen people from Siem Reap yesterday delivered a petition to Prime Minister Hun Sen’s cabinet claiming they were left out of a recent land-titling drive in their village, though local authorities said the group had only settled in the area once the titling began. ...

Australians facilitating tours and volunteer programs at orphanages in foreign countries such as Cambodia may eventually face criminal charges if a recently opened inquiry in Australia results in legislation.   ...

After 427 days behind bars, the Adhoc 5 have been enjoying their first weekend of liberty after being released from prison on bail on Thursday night. ...

Despite repeated vows by both of Cambodia’s major political parties to increase female representation, the number of female candidates elected in the Kingdom’s recently concluded commune elections actually decreased since they were last held in 2012.   ...

A Japanese NGO yesterday signed a deal worth nearly $300,000 to assist four Kandal province primary schools in providing access to education for children with disabilities. ...

The Chinese government has pledged to build a vocational training centre in Preah Sihanouk province to help Cambodians develop skills for the workplace. Labour Minister Ith Samheng signed the deal to build the centre as he led ministry delegates on an official visit to China this ...

In a surprise move, four human rights workers and an election official, collectively known as the “Adhoc 5”, were released from pretrial detention yesterday evening, 427 days after they were taken into custody on bribery charges relating to an opposition sex scandal. ...

Authorities in Siem Reap province have stopped negotiating with hundreds of families who recently built homes and shops illegally inside the Angkor Archaeological Park, and Defense Minister Tea Banh said they would start razing the structures without their consent. ...

The government wants to train 50,000 tourism professionals every year between now and 2025 under a new development strategy for human resources within the tourism sector.​ ...

Representatives from housing NGOs yesterday called on the government to do more to help disadvantaged communities access affordable housing. They were speaking at the National Housing Forum, hosted by Habitat for Humanity Cambodia (HHC) at the Intercontinental Hotel, which brought together  NGOs and Land Management Minister ...

Senators will tomorrow discuss the appointment of opposition candidate Kun Lum Ang as a replacement for her imprisoned husband Hong Sok Hour. ...

Riot police were deployed near Phnom Penh’s Wat Chas on Monday to prevent about 30 people from marching to the National Assembly to submit a petition seeking a new national holiday marking the day the French officially handed former Kampuchea Krom provinces to Vietnam. ...

The Unesco representative in Cambodia has expressed support for the Apsara Authority’s actions to prevent the spread of illegal constructions in the Angkor Archaeological Park. ...

The National Election Committee will hold a meeting with political parties and civil society organisations next month to discuss the high number of invalid ballots in the commune elections. Of more than 7 million ballots cast, 133,484 were deemed invalid. ...

More than a month after confirming its investigation into new reports of rampant timber trafficking between Cambodia and Vietnam, the Environment Ministry remains tight-lipped about what—if any—progress it is making, but says the U.K. NGO that exposed the scale of the problem is itself being ...

Sixteen families in Kandal have accused a purported Interior Ministry official of sending soldiers to intimidate them to take their land, though the official denied the claims and said no such dispute existed at all. ...

Transparency International (TI) Cambodia yesterday said that the ruling Cambodian People’s Party appeard to have won 49.4 percent of the nationwide popular vote on June 4 based on the stations it monitored, nearly six percentage points ahead of the CNRP’s 43.2 percent. ...

CNRP President Kem Sokha has promised opposition supporters among the Cham Muslim community that any government he leads would put an end to political harassment from the community’s pro-CPP leaders, whom he claimed pressured followers not to join his party. ...

The 13-month investigation into five current and former human rights workers known as the ‘Adhoc 5’ has ended, a court spokesman said on Wednesday, paving the way for a trial in a case widely condemned as being unjust and politically motivated. ...