Legal and judicial system

Former Meachey district police chief Hy Narin has had corruption charges against him upheld by Phnom Penh Municipal Court after he allegedly misappropriated almost $700,000 from the state budget over eight years. ...

An environmental activist and a fisherman said Sunday that about 70 residents of Koh Kong province had worked together over the past few days to chase away sand-dredging barges they accused of operating illegally around Koh Kapi island and damaging vital fishing grounds. ...

The Mondolkiri Provincial Court on Saturday charged a man with having sex with an underage girl, but a rights worker and the girl’s father said Sunday that the allegations were fabricated in retaliation for the man’s involvement in recent protests against a Vietnamese rubber plantation. ...

The Our Home center in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district has reopened under interim management after its director, Hang Vibol, was jailed last month and charged with abusing boys at the organization’s orphanage, which housed more than 50 children but was shuttered and will remain closed. ...

Police in Preah Sihanouk province yesterday arrested a British national in a guesthouse for alleged drug possession. ...

The body of what villagers had suspected was a Montagnard asylum seeker, found partially buried in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Yadaw district earlier this week, was determined to be the remains of a local teenager who had drowned in a river, a villager said Thursday. ...

A day after making—and quickly retracting—claims to the media that disgraced Phnom Penh Municipal Court director Ang Mealaktei had been arrested, national military police spokesman Kheng Tito said Thursday that his comments had been made in jest. ...

Police in Siem Reap City said Thursday that they arrested six people on Wednesday for questioning over an arson attack on a decorative gateway built for the Angkor Sangkranta festival. ...

Following charges by the Appeal Court alleging that he swindled a former supporter out of $70,000 between 2009 and 2011, League for Democracy Party (LDP) president Khem Veasna yesterday criticised the Cambodian judiciary, saying that the courts were under the control of “powerful people” and ...

The widow of Ung Meng Chue, a tycoon who was gunned down outside a fruit store in Phnom Penh in November, was questioned by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court for the first time on Tuesday. ...

Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) chief Om Yentieng on Wednesday denied that ousted Phnom Penh Municipal Court director Ang Mealaktei had been arrested following two days of questioning over serious graft claims, despite two well-placed officials indicating otherwise. ...

League for Democracy Party (LDP) president Khem Veasna was yesterday charged at the Appeal Court on allegations that he cheated a party activist out of $70,000 between 2009 and 2011. The plaintiff, Duk Moeun, had sued Veasna at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court in August 2013, ...

The Justice Ministry on Monday said it had completed its investigation into bribery allegations against ousted Phnom Penh Municipal Court director Ang Mealaktei but refused to reveal the results. ...

A former Ministry of Interior police officer was tried by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday for allegedly embezzling more than $1.5 million under the pretense of buying land from Kandal province villagers for a company he used to work for. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Saturday fined and released 10 workers swept up in a crackdown on illegal sand dredging operations by the Ministry of Mines and Energy last week. ...

Child protection NGO Friends International said this week it will contest being officially cited as the originator of allegations of sexual misconduct at Our Home orphanage that led to the center’s closure last month and to the imprisonment of its director, Hang Vibol, on suspicion ...

The Koh Kong Provincial Court on Friday questioned an Areng Valley villager opposed to a government-backed hydropower dam over allegations of illegal logging but has yet to lay charges. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Friday delayed the trial of fugitive Defense Ministry official Thong Sarath’s parents, who are facing charges of possessing illegal firearms. ...

Angry locals burned tires on the Chroy Changva peninsula Friday to protest the building of a road through their village, which is at the center of a land dispute with the Overseas Cambodian Investment Corporation (OCIC). ...

Three owners of sand dredging companies were among 11 people arrested Thursday by military police—working in tandem with the Ministry of Mines and Energy—for operating without a proper license, according to a spokesman for the ministry. ...

The justice minister on Wednesday wrote to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court requesting that the judge in charge of a case surrounding a long-running land dispute report to the ministry, following intervention from the National Assembly’s human rights commission. ...

The Preah Sihanouk Provincial Court has denied bail to Russian businessman Nikolai Doroshenko, who was arrested at his family’s restaurant in Sihanoukville last week and jailed on a trio of fraud charges related to a dispute with fugitive developer Sergei Polonsky, the investigating judge said ...

The former common-law wife of tycoon Khaou Phallaboth appeared in court yesterday to face allegations she breached the terms of her 2013 divorce by not letting her ex-husband, and his family, see their 8-year-old daughter. ...

Four Chinese tourists were sent to the Preah Sihanouk Provincial Court on Tuesday after being arrested in Sihanoukville on Monday in possession of nearly $500 worth of counterfeit dollar bills, local authorities said. ...