Aid and development

Moody’s Investor Services will review ACLEDA Bank and Cambodian Public Bank (Campu Bank) for potential downgrades, according to a release from the rating agency on Wednesday. But the move comes primarily as a response to the global financial crisis and the rating agency’s attempt to realign sovereign ratings with ...

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) yesterday revised its prediction for economic growth in Cambodia down to 6.5 percent as it warned that weakening demand from markets in the US and Europe could affect exports leaving the country. The ADB’s biannual outlook report for 2012 also said ...

A group of NGOs on Friday called on Australia and the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to suspend work and funding for a government-led project to rehabilitate the country’s railway system should authorities in Poipet City follow through on an eviction notice delivered to 22 families ...

An airline in China’s Yunnan province will begin offering flights from its capital, Kunming, to Phnom Penh and Siem Reap City, Council of Ministers spokesman Ek Tha said yesterday. ...

Three villagers who were evicted last year to make way for the rehabilitation of Cambodia’s railway—part of a $142 million project paid for by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and AusAid—were hospitalized early Friday morning after they were attacked with rocks and sticks at a ...

Unless Cambodian exporters find new routes to China, a proposed doubling of bilateral trade to US$5 billion by 2017 would mean little more than increased Chinese goods and investment flooding into the Kingdom. Chinese investments and imports dominated bilateral trade with Cambodia, which was worth about ...

The Ministry of Economy and Finance yesterday signed a US$60.3 million loan package with Asian Development Bank to aid in reconstruction efforts after the Kingdom last year suffered its worst floods in a decade. ...

The rift between Cambodia and the Philippines over the role of China in addressing the South China Sea issue continued to widen yesterday, with the Philippines’ president telling his counterparts during an Asean Summit meeting that China should be left out of discussions on a ...

Cambodia’s Prominence Investment Enterprise and Thailand’s Panpee Group have signed an agreement to supply China’s Yunnan Rubber Co Ltd with 500,000 tonnes, or US$2 billion worth, of rubber per year, Sam Kay, general manager of the local partner, said yesterday. ...

The Philippines thrust the South China Sea dispute to the forefront of the ASEAN Foreign Ministers’ Meeting yesterday, causing the topic to dominate discussions. Myanmar by-elections and North Korea also featured prominently on the eve of today’s ASEAN summit, overshadowing the foreign ministers’ planned focus on ...

More than 150 residents evicted from Phnom Penh’s Russei Keo district to make way for a railway rehabilitation project filed a complaint yesterday with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) office in Phnom Penh, one of two principal financiers for the project, saying their relocation site ...

Families forced to move by the rehabilitation of the Phnom Penh stretch of the national railway petitioned the Asian Development Bank yesterday for help with their livelihoods. About 50 people gathered outside the ADB’s office to submit a petition representing more than 160 families relocated to ...

A weekend meeting between Chinese President Hu Jintao and Prime Minister Hun Sen concluded with millions in loans and aid agreed to and a clear message: neither nation is in a rush to deal with the prickly South China Sea dispute. At the Saturday one on ...

Cambodia’s exports to the European Union increased by 40 per cent to a total value of US$1.3 billion in 2011, according to European Trade Commissioner Karel De Gucht, who is in Phnom Penh for the ASEAN-EU Business Summit. “I think it is fair to say ...

About half of the land concessions granted since 1994 are in the hands of Chinese companies, according to data released yesterday by the Cambodian Center for Human Rights. Ouch Leng, CCHR land reform project coordinator, said that from 1994 to 2012, the Cambodian government granted 4,615,745 ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Friday urged the economic leaders of the Asean bloc to go through with a plan to double a bailout pool, funded largely by China, Japan and South Korea, to prevent future financial crises in the region. Opening the Asean Finance ...

Chinese President Hu Jintao asked close economically Cambodia on Saturday not to push talks on the vexed issue of the South China Sea “too fast” as he pledged to double bilateral trade to $5 billion and announced fresh aid to the impoverished country. Cambodia holds the ...

President Hu Jintao today becomes the first Chinese head of state to visit Cambodia in 12 years, in a trip days before Southeast Asian leaders gather for talks that may touch on territorial disputes in the South China Sea. Hu’s visit, which lasts until April 2, ...

A shortage of workers, particularly those with skills, is the biggest threat to economic growth in Cambodia today, Sok Chenda, secretary general of the Council for the Development of Cambodia (CDC), said yesterday. Speaking at the Greater Mekong Subregion Investment Policy Forum organized by the Organization ...

The European Union has launched a $4.5 million program aimed at increasing food security among indigenous minorities in Ratanakkiri province, including those whose land has been affected by the growing number of economic land concessions in the area. Speaking on the sidelines of the launch in ...

The Asian Development Bank (ADB), one of the two major financiers of the rehabilitation of Cambodia’s railways, yesterday rejected criticism that they were providing insufficient resettlement packages to residents displaced by the project. On Friday, the ADB released a cost study that showed that the compensation ...

China’s presence in the Cambodian capital Phnom Penh is obvious. The city skyline is dotted by Chinese-funded projects. But the full extent of Beijing’s influence here will be tested when President Hu Jintao visits this week ahead of a regional summit. The timing of Hu’s visit ...

Chinese Ambassador Pan Guangxue yesterday said that China opposes the contentious issue of the South China Sea being discussed by countries that are not directly involved in the regional maritime dispute. Speaking at a news conference at the Chinese Embassy to discuss Chinese President Hu Jintao’s ...

Foreign Affairs Minister Hor Namhong said yesterday that the contentious issue of the South China Sea should not become an international issue, but must be solved among the region’s neighbors. Speaking to reporters at the Foreign Affairs Ministry alongside visiting Australian Foreign Affairs Minister Bob Carr, ...