Legal and judicial system

Dozens of Cambodian prisoners were released by Thai authorities yesterday after serving 20-month prison sentences in Thailand for crossing the border illegally to log rosewood. The group of 37, all arrested within Thai territory on March 12 last year, were released through the Chaom Sangman checkpoint ...

A US-based group of lawyers has launched an online campaign to raise funding to support a lawsuit against a UK company that bought sugar from a Cambodian plantations linked to human rights abuses. The campaign is being undertaken by the International Senior Lawyers Project, which is ...

Scores of people in Preah Sihanouk province’s Kompong Seila district have asked the provincial court to delay proceedings in a case filed against them by three local businesspeople in September. The 88 people received summonses in September, but yesterday asked the court to postpone a hearing ...

An organisation made up of current and former elected representatives from across Southeast Asia has called on the United Nations to investigate the deaths of two people shot by police during protests over the past three months. In a statement released yesterday, ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human ...

After the management of an embattled garment factory this week refused to follow a government order to reinstate 19 dismissed union leaders and activists, unionists and observers are at a divergence of opinion over how the state should respond. “It’s fairly unprecedented,” Dave Welsh, country director ...

The administrator charged with liquidating bankrupt mobile operator Mfone filed a complaint Tuesday with the Phnom Penh Municipal Court, requesting it to order two companies to pay money owed to Mfone after repayment negotiations apparently failed, the administrator said. Mobile payment service WING Cambodia Co. Ltd. ...

Villagers in Kandal province alleged yesterday that officials had “tricked” them into thumb-printing a petition supporting tycoon Try Pheap’s claim that he is not involved in illegal logging and endorsing his defamation suit against two villagers. In a scathing report released last Wednesday, the Cambodian Human ...

A student who filed a complaint to the Phnom Penh Municipal Court against the city’s municipal and military police chiefs over the fatal police shooting at the SL Garment Factory protest on November 12 said Tuesday that the court has refused to investigate his complaint. Neang ...

On Friday morning, two sources quoted in a report on illegal logging will face questioning at the hands of a Kandal province prosecutor over allegations that they defamed Cambodian tycoon Try Pheap. Under the Cambodian penal code, the legal definition of defamation is much like that ...

A group of Cambodian NGOs threatened on Monday to expose more cases of forestry crime involving businessmen and the police, saying they were unshaken by a defamation suit filed by top tycoon accused of illegal logging and land-grabbing. Representatives of the five organizations told reporters Monday ...

Tycoon Try Pheap has filed a defamation complaint against two people quoted in an NGO report released last week that accused him of illegal logging and widespread land grabbing, summonses obtained yesterday reveal. The documents, bearing the signature of Kandal Provincial Court prosecutor Sam Rithy Veasna, ...

Civil servants including police officers in a supervisory role who cut into their subordinates’ salaries will face consequences including criminal charges, Interior Minister Sar Kheng announced last week. In an order obtained by the Post yesterday, Kheng urged civil servants who handle payroll to immediately report to the ...

Court prosecutors and judicial police held an open meeting at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Thursday to discuss the need for closer cooperation between the two groups in arresting and prosecuting criminals. Appeal Court prosecutor general Ouk Savuth said the meeting was called due to ...

Phnom Penh’s chief prosecutor yesterday attributed an alleged rise in Cambodia’s crime rate to an increase in public demonstrations. Prosecutor general of Phnom Penh Municipal Court Ouk Savuth’s theory came out during a speech he made at a meeting of police and prosecutors held at City ...

When the Supreme Court hears land-rights activist Yorm Bopha’s final appeal this morning, familiar cries for justice will come from Boeung Kak women on the streets outside. Much has been written about the housewives of Boeung Kak who have risen up against the government and developers ...

The Supreme Court on Friday temporarily freed jailed Boeng Kak anti-eviction activist Yorm Bopha on bail, but sent her case back to the Court of Appeal to be reinvestigated. During the hearing, which lasted an hour and a half, dozens of monks and supporters of the ...

An “unofficial” land concession granted earlier this year to an agro-industry firm that has logged luxury hardwood in Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary is in violation of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s 2012 moratorium on new economic land concessions (ELCs), a government spokesman said Tuesday. Phay Siphan, ...

A Cambodian rights group said Wednesday that impunity is on the rise in Cambodia, hitting out at the authorities for failing to resolve a number of high-profile killings and bring the perpetrators to justice. Ahead of International Day to End Impunity on Saturday, the Cambodian ...

The Kompong Cham Provincial Court on Saturday charged the chief of Srei Santhor district’s social affairs office with corruption following his arrest by the Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) on Friday for withholding pensions and other bonuses from retired teachers, a court official said Tuesday. Provincial court deputy ...

The Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) arrested a senior customs official in Preah Sihanouk province and two Electricte du Cambodge (EdC) officials in Mondolkiri province in separate corruption cases this week, ACU and court officials said Friday. Mondolkiri Provincial Court prosecutor Khut Sopheang said two staff members of ...

One week after police opened fire on civilians during clashes that broke out during an SL Garment Factory protest, killing bystander Eng Sokhom and injuring nine others, arrests have yet to be made on the back of an investigation that victims said appears to be ...

More than 200 villagers involved in three different land disputes gathered in front of Cambodia’s top court in the capital Tuesday to demand the release of jailed rights campaigner Yorm Bopha ahead of her final appeal against a criminal conviction later this week. Yorm Bopha’s impending ...

The government has ordered the SL Garment factory to rehire 19 worker representatives, following a brutal crackdown on demonstrators outside the home of Prime Minister Hun Sen last week. In a letter to the company, Khun Chinken, undersecretary of state for the Ministry of Labor, said ...

Nine South Koreans and four Cambodian nationals allegedly participating in an illegal gambling operation in Siem Reap City were sent to the provincial court for questioning Monday, police officials said. The suspects were arrested Saturday night along with 21 Cambodian women when police raided an illegal ...