Social development

Two polarizing narratives emerged after the Monday night discussion between U.S. President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Hun Sen, with the U.S. claiming it had been “tense,” while Cambodia insisted the talks were cordial. When it came to agenda, Mr. Obama put human rights, electoral and ...

Criticism continued yesterday of the Asean Human Rights Declaration, which was signed in Phnom Penh on Saturday after regional leaders decided to make last-minute revisions that were widely deemed as inadequate. U.N. experts ans civil society groups criticized the lack of consultation in drawing up the ...

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen and visiting U.S. President Barack Obama met here on Monday to discuss a number of issues including old debt, human rights, democracy and forced evictions in Cambodia, a senior Cambodian official said. Hun Sen also raised the issue of old ...

U.S. President Barack Obama pressed Prime Minister Hun Sen on the government’s human rights record during a closed-door meeting between the two leaders in Phnom Penh yesterday, calling for fair elections and the release of all political prisoners. In the first visit to Cambodia by a ...

Herewith the full text of the ASEAN Human Rights Declaration adopted by Southeast Asian leaders Sunday: WE, the Heads of State/Government of the Member States of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (hereinafter referred to as “ASEAN”), namely Brunei Darussalam, the Kingdom of Cambodia, the Republic of ...

President Barack Obama arrives in Cambodia on Monday having just won four more years in office, but that is nothing compared to his host, Hun Sen. The 60-year-old Cambodian prime minister has held power since Ronald Reagan was in the White House, and says he’s ...

Capitalising on recent worldwide attention to their plight, some 200 villagers who say they’ve been robbed of their homes and land staged a vivid and stylised protest yesterday aimed at President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, calling for intervention in Phnom Penh’s land-titling ...

A NEW report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) says GDP growth in Cambodia over the next five years is likely to hit 6.9 per cent, the highest of any ASEAN country apart from Laos. However, the report warns that Cambodia needs to ...

Additional investments in family planning yields economic benefits and would save developing countries more than US$11 billion annually, according to a UN report. Better access to family planning in developing countries would reduce costs for maternal and newborn health care by $11.3 billion per year, according ...

THE ten-member Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) is used to fending off “interference” by the West in the internal affairs of some of its members. In recent years the human-rights record of the regime in Myanmar has been the tenderest of these sore spots. ...

The U.S. will address human rights abuses in Cambodia and urge Prime Minister Hun Sen to conduct free and fair elections and end a culture of land grabbing during President Barack Obama’s visit to Phnom Penh next week. Samantha Power, senior director for Multilateral Affairs and ...

Despite a moratorium on the granting of new economic land concessions (ELCs), the government has approved at least 32 ELCs since Prime Minister Hun Sen announced their suspension in May. According to sub-decrees dated from May onward and provided by local human rights group Adhoc, Mr. ...

The cabinet on Tuesday approved a proposal allowing the Commerce Ministry to form a rice trade partnership with Asean’s four other rice-producing countries, namely Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia and Myanmar, to stabilise rice prices in the global market and to promote food security in the region. The ...

A Radio Free Asia (RFA) reporter in Ratanakkiri province will be questioned at the provincial court today in relation to claims that he incited villagers to commit crimes against a rubber company that they have been locked in a land dispute with since 2004. Lim Chanlyda, ...

Human Rights investigator Chan Soveth has returned to Cambodia more than two-and-a-half months after leaving in the face of a criminal charge that is thought to be linked to an alleged insurrection that took place in Kratie province in May. On August 14, the court charge ...

Newly re-elected US President Barack Obama will attend a series of top-level Asian meetings next week, with Cambodia hosting an Asean summit, and China in attendance with new leadership. The high-profile meetings will present challenges for the US president, whose administration has become more deeply ...

Kratie province – Cambodia’s transformation from war-torn basket-case to one of Asia’s most promising emerging economies is being overshadowed by a backwards lurch in human rights and land policies that critics say are entrenching poverty. Next week’s visit by Barack Obama, the fist by a U.S. ...

A top UN diplomat has encouraged Cambodia to ratify a convention that would protect its migrant workers abroad. James Heenan, from the office of human rights at the UN, said in a forum in Phnom Penh that Cambodian workers abroad often see their rights violated. .. ...

Some of the U.S.’ most senior lawmakers are urging Barack Obama to speak out on what they called Cambodia’s deteriorating human rights situation when the U.S. president makes what will be the first visit to the country by a sitting American leader later this month. ...

Insisting on a response from American authorities, more than 100 eviction protestors from Phnom Penh continued to rally outside the U.S. Embassy yesterday and resubmitted a petition asking for President Barack Obama to address their land rights when he visits the country next week. Since confirmation ...

The abuse of Cambodian maids overseas has become one of the most documented human rights violation here. But as the Government, media, NGOs and aid agencies focus their energies on domestic laborer living abroad, advocates have begun to urge that closer attention be paid to ...

As more than 100 protesters continued to spend their days camped outside the US embassy appealing for the release of two land activists, a delegation from Amnesty International visited the Boeung Kak Community yesterday to offer support for their fight Amnesty International would continue to monitor ...

Villagers in Ratanakirri province filed complaints to the provincial court and rights group Adhoc yesterday, claiming three security guards patrolling former state forest in O’Chum district threatened them and fired an AK-47 to scare them away. Kreung ethnic villager Travh Khambon, 37 of La’ak commune Kam ...

Cambodia’s transformation from war-torn basket-case to one of Asia’s most promising emerging economies is being overshadowed by a backwards lurch in human rights and land policies that critics say are entrenching poverty. ...