Environment and natural resources

KOH KONG – The dullness of a rainy day accentuates the lush shades of green rainforest of the Cardamom Mountains in Koh Kong province. Float down the Tatai River and you see bobbing turquoise, red and yellow canoes tied up along the banks—in their vivid ...

Floods from Mekong River and heavy rainfall have killed at least 104 people and affected about 1.5 million people in Cambodia in the last three weeks, a senior disaster control official said Wednesday. “The latest figures showed that the floods have killed 104 people and ...

Flooding continues to ravage 15 of Cambodia’s 23 provinces, acutely affecting Banteay Meanchey, Battambang, Pailin and Siem Reap, and claiming 83 lives, according to the latest figures released by the National Committee for Disaster Management. Nhim Vanda, first deputy chairman of the NCDM, confirmed that while ...

Anti-logging activists wrote to the United Nations yesterday to call for the monitoring of a lawsuit in which they accuse hundreds of officials in Kampong Speu province’s Phnom Oral Wildlife Sanctuary of illegal deforestation. The Natural Resource and Wildlife Preservation Organization (NRWPO) listed 241 officials it ...

Svay Rieng became the latest province to declare emergency water levels as storms continued in the west of the country, prolonging deadly nationwide flooding that has killed at least 83 people and affected tens of thousands of families over the past month, officials said. Keo Vy, ...

Prisons in Banteay Meanchey and Battambang province have been seriously affected by flooding but have not yet been evacuated, according to local rights groups and prison officials. A clogged sewage system has plagued Battambang’s provincial prison, according to Bun Sorn, but extra pumps have alleviated ...

With thousands of families evacuated from their homes due to flooding, the Cambodian Red Cross (CRC), the largest and best-funded humanitarian organization in the country, has yet to provide flood aid to many struggling communities, local officials said Monday. Families living in some of the worst ...

While fears have been raised over the imminent construction of the Don Sahong dam in Laos, environmentalists on Monday said Cambodia should not forget that it has a project of its own that would be equally as disastrous to the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands ...

Lightning strikes have killed at least 100 people in Cambodia in the first nine months this year, down 3 percent from 103 deaths in the same period last year, a disaster control official said Tuesday. ...

Floods from Mekong River and heavy rainfall have killed at least 83 people and affected more than 800,000 people in Cambodia in the last three weeks, a senior disaster control official said Monday. “Up to now, 83 people have died of drowning and over 800,000 people ...

Cambodia suffered far fewer natural disasters than either Vietnam or Thailand over the last decade but twice as many as Laos, the World Bank said Monday. Data published in the annual World Development Report also showed that the incidence of natural hazards in Cambodia in between ...

Flooding spread over the weekend as storms hit the country meaning Siem Reap, Battambang and Pailin have all been added to the list of provinces affected by high waters. In Siem Reap province, Nuon Krisna, director of the provincial department of water resources and meteorology, said ...

A village chief in Kompong Cham province’s flooded Tonle Bit commune Thursday accused opposition leader Kem Sokha of refusing to provide emergency supplies to CPP supporters during a donation run on Tuesday. Prek Touch village chief Sar Bora said that Mr. Sokha, vice president of the ...

Cambodia announced Sunday to cancel the annual Water Festival next month since the country has been hit hard by Mekong flash floods, the government said in a statement on Sunday. “This year, Mekong floods have been severely hitting Cambodia, claiming human lives and inundating houses, schools, ...

The World Wildlife Fund, one of the biggest conservation groups, has called for an emergency meeting with the Mekong River Commission (MRC) in the wake of Laos’ decision to proceed with a second dam on the river. There are fears that this move will seriously undermine ...

The death toll from flooding across the country has risen to 39, while the Mekong River remains above emergency levels in Prey Veng and Kandal provinces, a government official said on Friday. Keo Vy, cabinet chief for the government’s National Committee for Disaster Management, said that ...

Laos has notified the Mekong River Commission (MRC) that it will go ahead with the construction of the Don Sahong Dam, which environmentalists say could threaten the ecosystem of the Lower Mainstream Mekong and have a severe impact on the livelihoods of hundreds of thousands ...

Hundreds of police and soldiers have been working around the clock since Wednesday to prevent a major dam built during the Khmer Rouge period in Banteay Meanchey province from breaking and flooding as many as eight surrounding villages, officials said Thursday. Heavy rains, compounded by floodwaters ...

In Cambodia, there is talk of change. Not just from Hun Sen, the prime minister, who has promised reforms after his party suffered a significant blow in recent elections, but from environmental activists and campaigners, who say there has never before been such an opportunity ...

Thousands of students were unable to attend classes yesterday after returning from holiday, as more than 500 schools remained closed due to flooding that has claimed 50 lives so far this year. According to a report released by the National Committee for Disaster Management, 513 schools ...

A fleet of five speedboats set off from Sisowath Quay on Tuesday afternoon carrying Phnom Penh’s governor, 19 local officials, several bodyguards and a press team, as the municipal authorities’ plan to deal with flooding in several districts of the city switched into first gear. Over ...

As much of the country grapples with crippling floods, a comprehensive report on global climate change released yesterday predicts the situation could be poised to get even worse. According to the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, as the planet grows warmer, cyclones making ...

TBONG KHUM DISTRICT, Kompong Cham province – From November to May, the Mekong River is quiet. So is life for the hundreds of thousands of people who live along its banks, which in Cambodia forms a 155,000 square km basin covering six provinces and Phnom ...

More than 100 sand-pumping systems and 40 boats have been impounded by the Kandal provincial Department of Water Resources and Meteorology in order to prevent riverbank collapse as water levels continue to rise. Chun Penglong, the provincial department director, told the Post yesterday that navy police and the ...