Civil society

A new study is advocating a bottom-up approach to the Kingdom’s NGO scene, calling on international donors to alter their support strategies and foster the independence of grassroots initiatives taking off at the local level. The draft report, which was published last week by the Stanford ...

Rights groups want Cambodia’s parliament to hold a consultation with civil society about a controversial draft law on nongovernmental organizations approved Friday by the government of Prime Minister Hun Sen, which has long demonstrated animosity toward organizations outside of state control. ...

A controversial draft law to regulate Cambodia’s NGOs has passed a major hurdle and will be moved on to the National Assembly for legislative debate. Om Chandara, a spokesman for the council, told VOA Khmer that two articles were withdrawn at the behest of Prime ...

Some 10 months after leading protests during which Vietnamese flags were burned outside the country’s embassy in Phnom Penh, members of the Khmer Krom community took a more conciliatory approach Thursday as they marked the 66th anniversary of France’s formal splitting of Cochinchine. Thousands of monks ...

A senior US diplomat has raised concerns over a proposed law to govern NGOs in Cambodia. Hor Namhong told reporters Tuesday the draft law is not meant to impose undue burdens on NGOs. Civil society will have a chance to comment on the draft when ...

A deadline set by Prime Minister Hun Sen to finalize a controversial draft NGO law by the end of May will be missed, as a government spokesman said discussions were put on hold while the Interior Minister is abroad. ...

The Ministry of Labor issued a statement Friday claiming that the controversial draft Trade Union Law is aimed at protecting the rights of workers, after unions announced they would write to the ministry, the National Assembly and the European Union next week calling for the ...

Members of Cambodia’s civil society are rebuking their representation at the ASEAN Civil Society Conference/ASEAN Peoples’ Forum last week, alleging the Kingdom’s civil society representatives were disproportionately government-aligned. ...

Locals in Koh Kong province have written to the provincial authorities urging them to expel activists from local NGO Mother Nature who have been conducting a campaign of direct action against sand dredging firms that the NGO accuses of breaking the law and damaging the ...

About 3,000 union representatives, teachers and senior officials from the ruling Cambodian People’s Party gathered at a ceremony on Koh Pich yesterday to mark the 129th International Labour Day – as well as to bolster support for the ruling party, one official noted. ...

A government official rejected calls from a pair of NGOs on Tuesday to do more for Phnom Penh’s slums amid what they described as an opaque land-titling system that has routinely failed poor communities. In a joint report, “The Exclusion of Urban Poor Communities From Systematic ...

About 100 women’s rights activists were prevented from riding tuk-tuks to the National Assembly and the Phnom Penh headquarters of the ruling CPP on Tuesday, but successfully delivered a petition to the opposition CNRP demanding female representation on the reformed National Election Committee. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Sunday said that draft Law on Non-Government Organizations will be discussed and adopted at Cabinet in May 2015, and the law will be adopted by 50 percent plus one majority vote at the National Assembly. According to the figures of ...

Only one child remained hospitalized Wednesday after a group of about 800 people fell ill from food poisoning caused by tainted sandwiches served at a World Vision event in Siem Reap province on Saturday, a spokesman for the NGO said.​ ...

Hang Puthea, the presumptive “neutral” candidate on the new National Election Committee (NEC), said Wednesday that he would accept the nomination in order to pursue electoral reforms that the CPP and CNRP have failed to achieve. ...

Thirty-six villagers remained hospitalized Monday afternoon after about 800 fell ill on Saturday from eating tainted sandwiches distributed at a World Vision event in Siem Reap province’s Chi Kreng district, officials said. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Thursday questioned three defrocked monks over charges of “joining a criminal association,” an NGO worker said. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen on Tuesday chided a group of NGOs who boycotted a seminar on a pair of proposed election laws, saying the groups suffered from “main character syndrome.” ...

Dozens of NGOs are planning to boycott a workshop Monday to discuss the new election law, saying that the CPP and CNRP have not given them enough time to review the draft and that they do not want to give the event a veneer of ...

The former chief of anti-pedophile NGO Action Pour Les Enfants (APLE), who was jailed Friday by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on charges of indecently assaulting children, claimed the allegations were fabricated by APLE founder Thierry Darnaudet as revenge for reporting his ex-boss to authorities ...

A group of activists staged a flash mob in Phnom Penh’s Wat Botom park Thursday evening, performing the Madison and the cha-cha-cha to bring attention to women’s rights in the lead-up to International Women’s Day on Sunday. ...

In a move seemingly incongruent with the government’s plans to offer clemency to a number of female inmates on International Women’s Day on Sunday, a local rights group announced yesterday that new restrictions introduced by authorities have forced them to cancel prison activities marking the ...

The government has failed to meet its obligations in upholding civil and political rights, human rights groups have alleged. A report, released yesterday ahead of a UN Human Rights Committee session later this month, documents what the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) and local rights ...

More than 60 per cent of Cambodian students have experienced gender-based violence in schools, with staff committing the violence a fifth of the time, according to a new research report from Plan International and the International Center for Research on Women. ...