Economic land concessions and plantations

Loun Savath, a monk and rights activist who was detained by plain clothes security officials Thursday, was released that night, after he agreed to sign a letter vowing to stop leading and participating in protests. However, he has promised he will not halt his activism. Loun ...

The number of protests over land disputes increased in 2011 as forced resettlement, restrictions on freedom of assembly and the harassment of peaceful protesters continued to tarnish Cambodia’s human rights record, Amnesty International said in its annual report released yesterday. Noting the huge impact of economic ...

In the face of increasing economic land concessions and ongoing restrictions on expression, disaffected Cambodians were increasingly taking to the streets with success, Amnesty International representatives said yesterday at the launch of their annual report. Amnesty reported that Cambodians continued to face challenges to their human ...

The protectionist bent of conservation groups and the development agenda of the government can come together in Cambodia to create a green economy. That is the message of a new book Conservation International (C.I.) launched yesterday in Phnom Penh, outlining practical options for saving the environment ...

With a looming deadline to move still two days away, police yesterday stormed tiny Rayum commune in Mondulkiri province, dismantling and burning at least 50 homes belonging to villagers embroiled in a land dispute with a Vietnamese rubber company. Seng Channy, a villager representative who escaped ...

As the eviction deadline looms for residents of a Mondolkiri village embroiled in a land dispute with a Vietnamese-owned rubber plantation, police have begun to dismantle vacant homes in the village, an official and a villager said yesterday. Sin Seng, 43, a resident of the remote ...

An additional 200 armed police officers have moved into a village in Mondolkiri province where families locked in a land dispute with a Vietnamese-owned rubber plantation have been given until Friday to clear out, police and villagers said yesterday. Police had already moved about 100 officers ...

Authorities set a May 25 deadline yesterday for residents of Mondulkiri province’s Rayum commune in Koh Nhek district to leave their homes, prompting the deployment of additional provincial forces to the area. Villager Seng Channy, 52, said that the coalition of about 300 police, soldiers and ...

Surrounded by 100-armed police officers, authorities in Mondolkiri province yesterday said the roughly 200 families living on a rubber company’s land concession in Koh Nhek district have until Friday to leave their homes. After having already seen district police burn down three of their homes over ...

In a land dispute with overtones of last week’s deadly eviction in Kratie province, villagers in Mondolkiri province yesterday said dozens of police were surrounding their houses and threatening to force them out of a private land concession. Sen Sophon, one of about 200 families in ...

After a three-day blockade, soldiers pulled out over the weekend from the Kratie province village where a teenage girl was shot dead last week by government security forces, officials said yesterday. However, human rights workers denied a report by a provincial official that freedom of ...

Authorities in Kratie province have denied entry to journalists and rights workers to the site of violent land clashes that led to the death of a teenage girl on Wednesday. Rights workers say they fear for the safety of villagers in Broma village, but police say ...

Security forces have sealed off a village in eastern Cambodia and denied entry to human rights workers after the fatal shooting of a teenager in the latest violent eviction aimed at clearing land for development. Soldiers said they needed to secure the area around Proma village, ...

The government needs to act – and act now – to review all economic land concessions, which un­derscore the Kingdom’s dark disease of violent land disputes, rights groups said yesterday. Ten days after Prime Minister Hun Sen signed a regulation for an immediate and indefinite moratorium ...

Security forces in Cambodia have shot dead a 15-year-old girl who was taking part in a land protest. She was demonstrating against the development of a rubber plantation on farmland in eastern Kratie province. Authorities say local residents, armed with axes and crossbows, would not vacate the ...

Villagers in Kompong Chnang province have resorted to black magic as a means to even the odds with a long-running land dispute with a powerful company, KDC Development, holding a spell-casing ceremony on Saturday to curse the firm and the provincial court for allegedly colluding ...

A nearly year-long land dispute in Oddar Meanchey has been resolved for most parties involved by the intervention of two RCAF generals, but critics contend the more than 2,400 hectare-giveaway is a ploy to influence upcoming elections. Generals Kun Kim and Chea Tara yesterday granted 1.5 ...

Security forces shot and killed a 15-year-old girl on Wednesday during a clash with about 200 villagers armed with axes and crossbows in eastern Cambodia, in the latest of several violent evictions aimed at clearing land for development. ...

Companies that have seized land, confiscated livestock and destroyed homes and property have gone unpunished, the UN special rapporteur for Cambodia has said. Surya Subedi, professor of international law at Leeds University, said all the communities he had met raised the issue of misconduct by ...

Srey ambel district, Koh Kong province – A roadblock by locals in a long-running land dispute with CPP Senator Ly Yong Phat petered out after several hours in the dying rain on Saturday without the protesters winning any concessions from either the senator’s firm or ...

U.N. human rights envoy to Cambodia Surya Subedi wrapped up his seventh mission to Cambodia on Friday, saying that his own assessments of land concessions confirmed that they are being unfairly granted and leaving many communities out in the cold. Mr. Subedi said that meetings held ...

More than 600 people, including 50 Buddhist monks, who have been affected by illegal logging across the country arrived in Koh Kong province yesterday ahead of a memorial service to be held today at the site where well-known forestry activist Chut Wutty was shot dead ...

Surya Subedi, the UN’s human rights envoy to Cambodia, expressed concern Friday over land concessions provided to private companies that are forcing people from their land in the provinces. “the royal government has the primary responsibility for respecting, protecting and fulfilling the rights of its ...

Ministry officials were silent yesterday on how exactly they planned to implement Prime Minister Hun Sen’s suspension of any new economic land concession grants and review of existing ELCs. Provincial authorities involved in granting the now-suspended land concessions yesterday said they were ready to implement ...