Social development

UNHCR, the U.N.’s refugee agency, will question the government over its decision to deny asylum to the majority of Montagnards left in Cambodia, officials said, a month after the group was criticized for its role in repatriating some of the asylum-seekers to Vietnam. ...

The Ministry of Health yesterday denied a local media report that children in Cambodia under one year old have a 50 percent chance of catching whooping cough. ...

A group of women running as opposition candidates in the upcoming local council elections has vowed to prioritize development, improve administration and protect the price of agricultural products if elected. ...

A European Union election expert mission yesterday met with the government’s Cambodia Human Rights Committee in a closed-door meeting as part of its visit to the Kingdom, at the end of which it will submit recommendations to the Cambodian authorities. ...

Local residents in Battambang town took part in a political debate organized by U.S. Democracy promotion group, the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) on Monday ahead of local elections early next month. Attendees asked prospective candidates questions related to citizen’s concerns over unemployment, migration, ...

Political campaigning in Cambodia’s local elections began on Saturday and has so far passed without incident. Cambodians in Phnom Penh on Monday said they hoped that the election could be conducted fairly and free of violence. Sim To, a second-year student at Paññāsāstra University of Cambodia, ...

The needs of disabled Cambodians have not been taken into account in the forthcoming local elections, a disabilities group has said. Ngin Saoroth, executive director of the Cambodian Disabled People’s Organization (CDPO), told reporters this week that politicians were not putting “the issue of the disabled ...

The trend of Cambodian workers flocking to Thailand can have a devastating ripple effect on children living on the margins in the border town of Poipet, where they face a litany of risks such as drug use, sexual abuse and physical violence, according to a ...

A study published in the Malaria Journal last week suggests that to combat malaria, the outmoded approach of mass anti-malarial drug administration may be effective, but only if local community leaders play a prominent role. ...

Officials from the government’s Cambodian Human Rights Committee (CHRC) yesterday appeared to lay the blame for the delayed establishment of an independent rights body at the feet of civil society. ...

More than 86 percent of 3,151 sex workers surveyed across 18 provinces regularly use condoms with clients, according to research released yesterday by the National Center for HIV/AIDS, Dermatology and STDs. But only 27 percent consistently use condoms during sexual intercourse with their husbands, boyfriends ...

The CPP has filed a complaint to a commune election committee in Takeo province alleging that a group of CNRP supporters obstructed a ruling party parade of about 400 supporters on Saturday, officials said yesterday. ...

A report by the Global Fund’s Office of the Inspector General (OIG) has confirmed evidence of corruption and nepotism at Cambodia’s National Malaria Centre (CNM), first revealed by The Post last year, calling the centre’s oversight “dysfunctional and unauditable”. ...

The Cambodia National Rescue Party yesterday celebrated its top female candidates before the upcoming communal elections at an event under the slogan “Thousands of Lights for Women”, though women’s rights activists criticised the strategy as lacking teeth in fostering greater representation for women. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen used a news conference at Thursday’s World Economic Forum on Asean in Phnom Penh to warn that two foreign-owned news outlets, including The Cambodia Daily, were “against” the government and that journalists who did not report “properly” would be seen as ...

The number of women standing in the upcoming commune elections remains low, civil society groups have warned, driven by a lack of nominations from Cambodia’s male-dominated political elite. ...

With the Kingdom in the middle of a controversial “war on drugs”, six Mekong countries agreed yesterday to adopt a regional drug policy that puts health care first, and mandates police and judicial cooperation. ...

When Khemarey Khoeun is sworn in as a park district commissioner in Skokie, Illinois, on May 16, she’ll be making history as the first Cambodian-American woman elected to public office at any level of government in the United States. ...

The National Election Committee has so far approved more than 30,000 observers from NGOs for the June 4 commune elections and confirmed that more than 100,000 observers affiliated with political parties will also monitor voting. ...

The government has lashed out at the U.S. and E.U. over their criticism of the detention of five current and former rights workers in Cambodia for more than a year, adopting the language of its critics by calling their statements “politically motivated.” ...

Half of the residents of Mondulkiri’s Norng Buor village fell ill during a mass flu outbreak this weekend, prompting a rapid mobilisation of the province’s health authorities, who ascribed the flu’s rapid spread to poor hygiene. ...

Cambodia has been asked to more than double its yearly contribution toward the fight against HIV/AIDS to at least $3.2 million in each of the next three years, an official from the National AIDS Authority said yesterday. ...

About 130 villagers and more than 20 of their children demonstrated in front of the Ministry of Land Management from 8am to noon yesterday, demanding that the government exclude their villages from a proposed development plan and protect their homes by granting them land titles. ...

The Social Affairs Ministry has purchased $150,000 worth of musical instruments and sound equipment for Phnom Penh’s blind musicians in a bid to persuade them to perform in designated spaces, though many worry that restricted venues will limit their income. ...