Social development

The international watchdog Frontline Defenders has called on Cambodian authorities to drop a defamation lawsuit against a prominent human rights worker. Ny Chakrya, head of legal assistance for the rights group Adhoc, is facing a suit filed by two court officials in Siem Reap province last ...

A Cambodian NGO director who on Saturday took about 40 of his primary- and high-school students on a trip to a disputed border area in Svay Rieng province was beaten by Vietnamese civilians and imprisoned overnight, officials said Sunday. ...

Warnings from civil society groups that they will urge citizens to vote against any politician who supports the draft law on associations and NGOs have drawn a stern rebuke from the ruling Cambodian People’s Party. ...

The Por Sen Chey Social Affairs Centre, better known as Prey Speu, is facing a probe over alleged human rights violations, an opposition party lawmaker said yesterday. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Health Department has closed more than 200 illegal dental clinics in the capital in the first six months of the year, and has filed complaints against their owners to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, health officials said yesterday. ...

The human rights non-governmental organizations (NGOs) Licado and Adhoc both say they will not attend Wednesday’s consultation workshop on the controversial draft Law on Associations and Non-Governmental Organizations (LANGO) hosted by the National Assembly. ...

The National Assembly has announced that members of the public hoping to participate in the consultation regarding Cambodia’s contentious draft Law on Associations and Non-Governmental Organisations (LANGO) will have until Tuesday to register. ...

A rights group and journalist organization on Thursday slammed a lawmaker from Cambodia’s ruling party for barring an opposition MP from addressing the media with his concerns over a controversial draft law on nongovernmental organizations currently under review by parliament. ...

Unicef and the Ministry of Health have prepared four spots to raise awareness in the care of newborns and young children with illnesses. The ads, for radio and television, aim at improving the country’s high child mortality rate. ...

A ruling party lawmaker says pro-democracy and rights groups staging protests against a draft law at the National Assembly are trying to “topple the government.” On Wednesday, Chheang Vun, a lawmaker for the Cambodian People’s Party, said three days of protests over the draft are ...

Public and private universities are experiencing an exponential rise in the number of students opting for two-year associate degrees rather than four-year bachelor’s programs following last year’s disastrous high school exit examinations, education officials said yesterday. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday sentenced a woman and a man to 10 years in prison each on drug-trafficking charges after their arrest in Sen Sok district last year. ...

Despite government assurances that the controversial NGO draft law was still undergoing review, committees of the National Assembly said yesterday that the only revisions will be minor corrections to spelling and wording. ...

Despite the deployment of law enforcement officials across the capital in a bid to halt the demonstration, activists yesterday marched as promised to the National Assembly to protest the looming adoption of highly controversial union and NGO laws. Starting at about 8am, hundreds of land activists, ...

When an anti-human trafficking group recently reported a 73 percent drop in the sale of children for sex, another referenced its list of 15 establishments offering minors to predators as evidence to the contrary. ...

Unicef and the Cambodian government have launched a campaign to promote better health for children and newborns. Cambodia has made some progress improving the health of women and children, but a high rate of death for children remains a major concern. It saw its newborn mortality ...

As concern about the MERS virus’s spread mounts in the region, the Ministry of Health has ordered health workers in Siem Reap International Airport to use manual thermometers to screen passengers entering the Kingdom as the airport’s only ThermoScan unit is beyond repair. ...

With cases in the past six months more than doubled compared to last year, the Ministry of Health is urging Cambodians to exercise caution as the Kingdom builds toward an expected periodic dengue outbreak. ...

NGOs on Monday vowed to press ahead with a protest march through Phnom Penh on Tuesday against a draft law that threatens to rein in the country’s non-government groups and associations despite City Hall’s threat to stop them by “any means.” ...

Pro-democracy and rights groups in Cambodia have launched a three-day demonstration in an attempt to stop the passage of a law to regulate NGOs. The protest is expected to continue Tuesday. Organizers said that if they are not satisfied with the Assembly’s actions, they will ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has repeated that he will stand by the draft law on nongovernmental organizations currently under review by parliament, despite continued opposition by some groups which say the legislation would hinder their work in Cambodia. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen and minority leader of the National Assembly Sam Rainsy held talk this morning on the controversy of the draft of law on NGOs, Associations and Unions. ...

Ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP) President and Prime Minister Hun Sen on Sunday appealed to foreign countries not to interfere in his country’s internal affairs over the establishment of the draft laws on Non- Governmental Organizations (NGOs) and Associations and on Trade Unions. ...

NGOs brought about 300 people together in front of the National Assembly on Sunday to protest the pending passage of a law that would force all non-government groups and associations in the country to register and file regular reports with the state. Critics of the draft ...