Government
National government
Interior Ministry says no to campaign demonstrations
Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak said yesterday that the government will not let opposition leader Sam Rainsy dodge a government ban on public gatherings by holding mass demonstrations during the campaign period before the May 18 district, provincial and city council elections. ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/interior-ministry-says-no-to-campaign-demonstrations-55530/
Unions, GMAC tussle over New Year strike
Garment worker unions have tangled with factory owners over the unions’ plan to use the coming Khmer New Year holiday to launch a nationwide strike. A coalition of eight unions will send a letter today to the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) stating that workers ...
Mech Dara and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/unions-gmac-tussle-over-new-year-strike-55543/
Ministry reiterates holiday pay
The Ministry of Labour has announced that factory managers must allow employees three days off for Khmer New Year, even as some union leaders encourage workers to extend that time. In a letter to factory owners dated March 25, Labour Minister Ith Sam Heng reminds owners ...
Mom Kunthear
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/ministry-reiterates-holiday-pay
Half a million Cambodians affected by land grabs: rights group
More than half a million Cambodians have been affected by land conflicts involving the government since 2000, with more than 2,000 families across the country subjected to largely violent land grabs during the first few months of this year, local rights group Licadho said Tuesday. The ...
Joshua Lipes
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/land-04012014170055.html
Experts discuss legitimacy of Government without Opposition
Diplomats, legal experts and political analysts all met in a forum in Phnom Penh Tuesday to discuss the implications of last year’s election and the ongoing political deadlock. Some diplomats, like Dinesh Patnaik, India’s ambassador to Cambodia, questioned the legitimacy of a government the opposition refuses ...
Kong Sothanarith, Khoun Theara
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/experts-discuss-legitimacy-of-government-without-opposition-/1883843.html
Workplace deaths up
Workplace deaths shot up more than 60 per cent last year when compared with 2012, while injuries and payouts to those injured also saw dramatic increases, according to data released yesterday by the National Social Security Fund (NSSF). Speaking during a conference at the Ministry of ...
Sen David and Sean Teehan
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/workplace-deaths
New clinic performs ‘operation smile’
Thirty-year-old Sam Hoiy never dreamed her son would have the opportunity to live a life without the cleft lip that has always marred his otherwise delicate features. Hoiy’s seven-month-old son is one of more than 100 Cambodians being treated and screened by a team of ...
Mom Kunthear and Amelia Woodside
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/new-clinic-performs-%E2%80%98operation-smile%E2%80%99
Company 72 again accused of illegal logging
Ethnic Jarai villagers in Ratanakkiri province have once again accused the Vietnamese owners of a rubber plantation of illegally logging their ancestral forests in a complaint filed with rights group Adhoc. A district official, however, said the plantation owner, Company 72, was granted an extension on ...
Aun Pheap
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/company-72-again-accused-of-illegal-logging-55399/
Moratorium on new universities
The Ministry of Education has vowed to shift its focus from the quantity of the country’s universities to their quality by instituting a moratorium on the approval of new institutions, officials said yesterday. Education Minister Hang Chuon Naron said that with more than 100 universities already ...
Chhay Channyda
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/moratorium-new-universities
Authorities halt march against Lao dam, citing Khmer New Year
Kompong Cham authorities blocked several hundred activists from marching Monday to raise awareness about the environmental dangers raised by Don Sahong dam, officials and activists said. Kompong Cham provincial governor Lun Limthai confirmed that he banned the campaign. “We did not allow them to hold this ...
Khuon Narim and Hul Reaksmey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/authorities-halt-march-against-lao-dam-citing-khmer-new-year-55385/
Big logging cartel alleged
Prime Minister Hun Sen’s brother Hun Neng and a Vietnamese state-owned rubber firm are involved in an illegal logging cartel involving several well-connected companies operating on a “massive scale” in the embattled Prey Lang forest, forest monitors working in the area allege. Video footage and photographs ...
May Titthara and Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/big-logging-cartel-alleged
Compensation plan agreed to, says ADB
Following a scathing report from its internal watchdog about the resettlement of thousands of Cambodian families affected by a national railway rehabilitation project that it is funding, the Asian Development Bank has agreed with the government on an action plan for further compensation, it said ...
Kevin Ponniah
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/compensation-plan-agreed-says-adb
Tea Banh travels to us for Asean defense ministers meeting
Defense Minister Tea Banh will meet Tuesday in Hawaii with U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel as well as nine other Asean defense ministers at the first U.S.-hosted meeting with the regional defense chiefs, officials said. Gen. Banh, speaking at a news conference at Phnom Penh ...
Mech Dara and Joshua Wilwohl
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/tea-banh-travels-to-us-for-asean-defense-ministers-meeting-55381/
Rubber decline stokes worry
The government and industry insiders are worried about the steady decline of rubber prices over the last three years, during which the area it is cultivated in has grown. “Farmers and investors raised concern . . . over the trend of the market and the price of natural ...
Chan Muyhong
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/rubber-decline-stokes-worry
Report claims $75 Million in damages from January demonstrations
The Cambodian government says it has no plans so far to carry out a lawsuit against the opposition for damages from violent demonstrations in January. The Ministry of Interior has released a report, claiming $72 million in public and private damages, including to 95 different factories, ...
Khoun Theara
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/report-claims-75-million-in-damages-from-january-demonstrations/1883036.html
Officials to rotate after eight years
The Ministry of Interior on Friday announced that provincial and municipal governors and deputy governors will now be reshuffled between provinces every eight years in a move that the ministry maintained would help “improve services”. ...
Vong Sokheng
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/officials-rotate-after-eight-years
Two killed in mine, mortar shell blasts in Battambang, Pailin
A man and a teenage boy were killed by an anti-tank mine and a mortar shell in separate incidents on Friday and Saturday, according to police. In Battambang province, Chea Toum, 37, was seriously injured when the tractor he was walking behind set off a buried ...
Hay Pisey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/two-killed-in-mine-mortar-shell-blasts-in-battambang-pailin-55263/
Mam Sonando says protest will proceed, but he won’t lead
Independent radio station owner Mam Sonando said he would not lead a banned protest he had planned for today outside Information Ministry headquarters in Phnom Penh, but would attend if his supporters went ahead with the demonstration on their own. “I will not lead [the protest] ...
Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/mam-sonando-says-protest-will-proceed-but-he-wont-lead-55252/
Official says Cambodia not ready for ASEAN Free Trade
Cambodia is not prepared to join Asean’s single regional market and production base next year, a Labor Ministry official said Friday. Next year, the 10 nations of Asean are to create the Asean Economic Community (AEC). Within this community, labor is to flow freely and import ...
Denise Hruby
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/official-says-cambodia-not-ready-for-asean-free-trade-55203/
Hundreds protest Laos dam
Yin Vuth, one of hundreds of Cambodians who protested against the Don Sahong dam over the weekend, said that if construction on the project in Laos goes ahead, the fish will disappear, and once the fish disappear, the dolphins will be next. “All we will have ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/hundreds-protest-laos-dam
Big dip in illegal fishing: gov’t
Cambodian authorities intervened in far fewer illegal fishing cases last year compared with 2012, when Prime Minister Hun Sen first banned commercial angling nationwide in a bid to replenish waterways and aid small-scale fishermen. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, which released an ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/big-dip-illegal-fishing-gov%E2%80%99t
Tough talk on ELCs
Economic land concessionaires not abiding by their contracts could have their licences revoked if they have seriously breached the terms, Prime Minister Hun Sen has said. Illegally seizing forest land would be punished under the Law on Forestry, he said on Friday, speaking at an annual ...
May Titthara and Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/tough-talk-elcs
New Clinic Marks Turning Point for Correcting Cleft Surgeries
In a bustling room at Khmer-Soviet Friendship Hospital in Phnom Penh, doctors from the Philippines, the U.S. and Nigeria gathered Sunday around a young boy, sitting in a plastic chair, and asked him to open his mouth wide. The boy is one of more than 100 ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/new-clinic-marks-turning-point-for-correcting-cleft-surgeries-55256/
Royal Group affirms its commitment to ANZ
Local conglomerate Royal Group said Tuesday that while it is committed to its partnership with Australia-based ANZ bank, it would entertain selling its stake in ANZ Royal Bank for “a very high offer.” “The Royal Group would like to clarify that it is a strong and ...
Joshua Wilwohl
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/business/royal-group-affirms-its-commitment-to-anz-54904/