Extractive Industries

Cambodian mining firm Angkor Gold has agreed to accept payment by instalment on Mesco Gold’s final tranche for the purchase of its Phum Syarung gold mine in northeastern Cambodia, the company said in press release. ...

Singapore-listed KrisEnergy Ltd is considering selling or farming out a stake in its Cambodia Block A offshore oilfield to ease its debt burden, according to the company’s 2016 year-end report. ...

Illegal miners in the remote reaches of Cambodia are repelling government inspectors with armed middlemen, the Mines and Energy Ministry said on Wednesday as it hosted its annual meeting in Phnom Penh.   ...

Sand exports will remain suspended amid questions about a 56 million-ton discrepancy in deliveries to Singapore. Dith Tina, a secretary of state and spokesman for the Ministry of Mines and Energy, said yesterday that no date had been set for the exports to resume. ...

The controversial exporting of Cambodian sand to Singapore has finally—if temporarily—been stopped, according to officials from the two countries, amid long-running criticism over discrepancies in shipment records and environmental damage. ...

Breaking months of silence over accusations that it imported tens of millions of tons of smuggled sand, Singapore’s government on Monday distanced itself from any wrongdoing, a response an environmental NGO leader deemed “full of lies” and “devoid of any meaning.” ...

The owners of two Chinese mining companies that attempted to transport illegally mined copper from Siem Reap province to Phnom Penh have been fined and handed suspended prison sentences, the Ministry of Mines and Energy announced on Thursday.   ...

Road users can expect to pay up to 500 riel ($0.12) more per liter of fuel due to the increase in global crude oil prices after the government last March pegged local prices to that of the international market, a Commerce Ministry official said yesterday. ...

The government is stepping up the fight against illegal mining in the country, cracking down on an illegal mine in Mondulkiri province last Friday and arresting two people. But local residents targeted by the crackdown protested after the raid, complaining that large mining corporations were allowed ...

Singaporean President Tony Tan Keng Yam’s visit to Phnom Penh on Monday yielded two agreements on education and health, but no words on controversial sand imports or migrant maids, an official said. ...

Officials were tight-lipped yesterday about whether huge discrepancies in sand exports to Singapore would be discussed during a visit by the city-state’s president to the Kingdom later this week, though a Ministry of Mines official said a new export process was in the works. ...

Environmental NGO Mother Nature has hired a Singaporean law firm to investigate alleged irregularities in the country’s importation of Cambodian sand, the organization’s founder said on Wednesday. ...

Cambodia exported more than 108,000 tonnes of sand to India in 36 separate shipments between 2013 and 2015, according to Indian customs data obtained yesterday, contradicting Cambodian customs data that show no sand being sent there at all. ...

Alex Corporation, the firm behind a proposal for an ambitious Mondulkiri mining project, appears to be ultimately owned by ruling party Senator Lao Meng Khin and his wife, Choeung Sopheap, the Post has discovered, a scenario rights groups say should give cause for concern.​ ...

A mysterious cluster of crude oil storage tanks recently constructed on the coast near Kampot are linked to a $400 million project by timber baron Try Pheap to build an industrial park and oil refinery, government officials confirmed yesterday. ...

An environmental impact assessment released on Friday for a $245 million mining project slated to begin operations in Mondolkiri province next year has raised concerns about its potential effects on the environment and local communities. The project, proposed by the Chinese-owned Alex Corporation, would see a ...

Kampong Cham authorities met with concerned villagers on Friday over a proposed sand-dredging project that some fear could lead to the collapse of their riverbank. More than 220 families living on the riverbank in Tamieng village thumbprinted a petition delivered to provincial authorities requesting that ...

The National Assembly’s anti-corruption commission has asked Suy Sem, the minister of mines and energy, to appear for questioning on December 15, as villagers in Koh Kong province cast doubt on government claims that it had temporarily banned sand mining there. Mr. Sem will answer questions ...

The National Assembly’s anti-corruption commission will summon Minister of Mines and Energy Suy Sem to answer questions about an apparent $700 million discrepancy in sand exports to Singapore. ...

Canadian exploration company Angkor Gold announced on Tuesday that it agreed to buy back all shares sold to investors in 2014, through its net smelter rights (NSR) scheme in the Kingdom’s first commercial underground gold mine in Phum Syarung, in Rattanakiri’s O’Yadaw district – now ...

Civil society members and Ministry of Mines and Energy officials came together recently to discuss discrepancies in the export figures of sand from Cambodia to Singapore, after 47 NGOs wrote an open letter early this month to the ministry seeking an explanation. The letter from civil ...

Last month’s purchase by Singapore-listed KrisEnergy of a 42.75 percent working interest in the Block A offshore energy concession made them a majority owner in the project, with an overwhelming control of 95 percent of the stakes. This acquisition is expected to accelerate the development ...

Illegal sand dredging has been eradicated from Cambodia, but reforms are still needed, the Ministry of Mines and Energy said on Wednesday, facing mounting blowback over sand export records that differ by tens of millions of cubic meters from those kept by the U.N. ...

Cambodia is overcoming “ineffective practices” and should not be held to the standards of developed countries, a Commerce Ministry spokeswoman said on Tuesday amid renewed calls for the government to investigate over $400 million in unrecorded sand exports to Singapore. ...