Social development
Civil society
Families in Kampong Speu await payments
Representatives of some 250 families who lost their land to a company in Kampong Speu province filed a complaint with Adhoc yesterday, saying they have yet to receive compensation, even after land measurement volunteers allegedly promised a resolution if villagers voted for the ruling party ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/families-kampong-speu-await-payments
Boy caught up in protests faces 11 years in jail
As several hundred garment workers from the SL Garment factory pelted police with rocks during a protest near the Stung Meanchey pagoda in November, Men Sok Sambath, a 14-year-old scrap collector, decided to join the crowd. “I saw other people throwing rocks at the [police] truck, ...
Mech Dara and George Wright
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/boy-caught-up-in-protests-faces-11-years-in-jail-59934/
Villagers vow to defy fresh ban on marches
More than 1,500 villagers plan to march to the Anti-Corruption Unit and National Assembly in Phnom Penh on Thursday in defiance of a fresh ban issued by City Hall prohibiting them from doing so. The villagers form a group known as the Land Communities for Peace ...
Joshua Wilwohl
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-vow-to-defy-fresh-ban-on-marches-59966/
App aims to report bribes
Cambodians may soon find it easier than ever to report official corruption, and not just to the authorities or their friends and neighbours, but to the whole world, thanks to the impending launch of a Khmer-language version of the graft-reporting smartphone app Bribespot. Already popular in ...
Stuart White
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/app-aims-report-bribes
Ocean garment workers on strike after factory halts operations
About 1,000 workers protested outside Ocean Garment factory in Phnom Penh’s Pur Senchey district on Wednesday to demand compensation for being out of work while the factory suspends its operations for a month due to flagging demand from buyers, a union leader said. Workers have been ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ocean-garment-workers-on-strike-after-factory-halts-operations-59954/
Remains ‘bound for NGO’
The opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party said yesterday that charred human remains retrieved by a local party member in Kampong Speu province on Saturday would be handed over to human rights organisations for examination. Despite a seeming lack of evidence or investigation, opposition activists have speculated ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/remains-%E2%80%98bound-ngo%E2%80%99
NGOs lobby China, companies over Sesan dam
A group of 15 local and international rights groups Tuesday sent a slew of letters to the Chinese government and companies involved in the Lower Sesan II hydropower dam in Stung Treng province seeking a halt to dam construction due to serious environmental and social ...
Simon Henderson
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ngos-lobby-china-companies-over-sesan-dam-59807/
Short-lived retirement for Sambo?
Two years after she was walked out of the city in the middle of the night to a quiet life of retirement on the outskirts of the capital, Sambo, Phnom Penh’s iconic and much-beloved elephant, might soon be back at work entertaining tourists. With funding for ...
Kevin Ponniah and Mom Kunthear
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/short-lived-retirement-sambo
Criticism of judicial law grows
Surya Subedi, the UN special rapporteur on human rights in Cambodia, added his voice yesterday to the growing chorus of criticism aimed at three draft laws on Cambodia’s judiciary that sailed through the National Assembly last week. Subedi – who had previously championed the laws as ...
Stuart White
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/criticism-judicial-law-grows
Villager in land row denied character statement by police
A villager involved in a long-running land dispute in Kompong Chhnang province with the wife of Mines and Energy Minister Suy Sem has accused his commune police chief of discrimination after he was refused a character statement he needed to apply for a garment factory ...
Kuch Naren
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villager-in-land-row-denied-character-statement-by-police-59726/
Mysterious bones stoke conspiracy
A package containing charred human remains was delivered to the Cambodia National Rescue Party office in Phnom Penh yesterday morning. Despite a seeming complete absence of hard evidence, some are convinced the remains – found on Saturday at a mountain in Kampong Speu – belong to ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/mysterious-bones-stoke-conspiracy
Help for the elderly extended
The government has approved a second phase of a pilot project in Battambang and Banteay Meanchey provinces that will this time see professional caregivers rather than volunteers visit the homes of the elderly to assist with domestic work, hygiene needs and general companionship. “Families are the ...
Amelia Woodside and Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/help-elderly-extended
March to PM’s house halted
Representatives of more than 400 families who watched as their homes were burned during an eviction this month in Kratie’s Snuol district were blocked by authorities yesterday as they attempted to take their grievance to Prime Minister Hun Sen’s doorstep. Though tensions initially ran high, the ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/march-pm%E2%80%99s-house-halted
Phnom Penh pagoda offers haven for the marginalized
When 200 villagers from Kratie province walked into Samakki Raingsey pagoda seeking safety and shelter early this month, they weren’t the first to do so. The villagers, whose homes in Snuol district had been torched by authorities just days earlier, were walking a well-trodden path—a path ...
Mech Dara and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/author/matt-blomberg/
HAGL called out at the UN
A Cambodian delegation to the United Nations last week used the stage to shame the World Bank’s financial arm for failing to adequately monitor investments in a Vietnamese rubber giant accused of illegal logging, forced evictions and sexual harassment. Representing 17 indigenous communities in Ratanakkiri that ...
Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/hagl-called-out-un
Is Cambodia engulfed in a human rights crisis?
Immigration Minister Scott Morrison has confirmed Australia is working on an agreement with Cambodia that would see refugees currently on Nauru resettled there. But Human rights lawyer David Manne, who launched a successful High Court challenge to the former government’s proposal to resettle refugees in ...
ABC News Staff
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-05-26/is-cambodia-engulfed-in-human-rights-crisis/5446002
Workers turn models on political catwalk
About 150 garment workers turned out to the Phnom Penh offices of the United Sisterhood Alliance NGO on Sunday to watch a politically charged fashion show entitled “Beautiful Clothes, Ugly Reality.” Aimed to highlight “the income gap between Cambodian garment workers and the selected CEOs of ...
Mech Dara and Alex Willemyns
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/workers-turn-models-on-political-catwalk-59540/
Sanctuary ‘protected’
More than 2,000 hectares of the decimated Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary in Ratanakkiri province have been classified by the Ministry of Environment (MOE) as the sanctuary’s first community protected area. Surrounded by three economic land concessions in Kon Mom district, the protected area is populated by a ...
Phak Seangly and Amelia Woodside
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/sanctuary-%E2%80%98protected%E2%80%99
To stop leaks, exam papers to be given to only one teacher
Copies of grade 12 examination papers will only be provided to a single teacher for each subject this year in order to identify the source of leaks, said Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron during a speech on Saturday. Mr. Naron, speaking at the American University of ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/to-stop-leaks-exam-papers-to-be-given-to-only-one-teacher-59555/
More unionists charged on eve of brand meeting
The Takeo Provincial Court charged eight union representatives with incitement Sunday for taking part in a garment factory strike, bringing to 17 the number of unionists charged this month alone. The latest in the spate of recent arrests came just ahead of today’s high-level meeting between ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/more-unionists-charged-on-eve-of-brand-meeting-59538/
US army shuts down website cited in HRW report
Four days after Human Rights Watch (HRW) published a report criticizing Washington for supporting Cambodia’s “abusive armed forces,” a Facebook page containing photos cited in the report has been removed from the Internet. According to the U.S. Embassy in Phnom Penh, the Facebook page titled “Angkor ...
Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/us-army-shuts-down-website-cited-in-hrw-report-59509/
Lawmaker blasts illegal logging in Stung Treng
Two draft laws on judicial reform were easily passed by the single-party National Assembly on Friday but the session was overshadowed by a rookie lawmaker’s attack on lax enforcement of forestry laws in Stung Treng province. On the fourth day of the third plenary session of ...
Khy Sovuthy
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/lawmaker-blasts-illegal-logging-in-s-treng-59494/
Activist ‘threatened with knife’
A forest activist in Kampong Thom province yesterday claimed to have been threatened with a knife by a soldier after reporting that the officer was behind a number of forest crimes in the area. Pen Bunkear, a soldier with the Kampong Thom military research unit, yesterday ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/activist-%E2%80%98threatened-knife%E2%80%99
WWF petitions to halt Don Sahong dam
World Wildlife Fund is taking to the internet to halt a hydropower project it claims will serve as the nail in the coffin for the critically endangered Irrawaddy dolphin. On Friday, WWF launched an online petition calling on the developers of Laos’s 120 megawatt Don Sahong ...
Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/wwf-petitions-halt-don-sahong-dam