Social development

As the grade 12 national exam kicked off yesterday, the Ministry of Education said early indicators suggested a marked improvement on last year’s dismal results, though incidents of students caught cheating and others buckling under the pressure of the high-stakes test remained.The two-day exam began ...

Three free smartphone applications designed by Cambodian women to help reduce gender-based violence in the country were launched by The Asia Foundation on Monday. ...

Environment Minister Say Sam Al and a group of NGOs on Monday agreed to cooperate to resolve a years long dispute between hundreds of families in Koh Kong province and a Chinese company they accuse of stealing their land. ...

The protest for the release of three activists from the environmental NGO Mother Nature entered its sixth day yesterday, with another rally in front of Koh Kong provincial court – where some members of the youthful NGO have been camping out. ...

An anti-government activist has been imprisoned over a social media post in which he called for people in Cambodia to join him in a “colour revolution”, though critics of the arrest say he enjoys no political influence. ...

On the eve of the grade 12 national exam students across Phnom Penh put down their revision notes and flocked to local pagodas and shrines yesterday, praying that they will pass the high-stakes test – and that the proctors will let them cheat.With testing starting ...

Prayers, blessings and visits to shrines have replaced cheat notes in this year’s Grade 12 exam. ...

Over 100 members of the Prov ethnic community in Ratanakkiri province have filed a complaint with a local rights group claiming to have been defrauded for tens of thousands of dollars by a broker for an international investment firm. ...

A group of 12 international and local human rights organizations sent a letter to the U.N. Human Rights Council on Thursday urging it to support a resolution addressing “the deteriorating human rights situation in Cambodia.” ...

Kheo Tha was driving outside Phnom Penh yesterday when she received a frantic phone call from her friend, a sex worker who works near Wat Phnom. ...

An increasing number of women who are victims of violence are looking for solutions outside the country’s dysfunctional court system, the president of rights group Licadho, Pung Chhiv Kek, said yesterday. ...

Police in Koh Kong province yesterday raided a house rented by local environmental NGO Mother Nature in what its members have described as an ongoing campaign of intimidation against the group amid the detention of three of its activists. ...

Not long ago, Sim Pov, a representative of 69 families from Kratie province, came to Phnom Penh to meet with urban housing rights protesters. He wanted to learn from them how he could organize his own community, which is locked in a land dispute with ...

An NGO umbrella group will start holding workshops around the country next month to help independent organizations prepare for the implementation of the new NGO law, which has been viewed as an attempt by the government to clamp down on dissent. ...

Students across Cambodia are preparing for this year’s national high school exam, which will take place Monday. ...

With the end of its four-year program to fight human trafficking approaching, USAID, partner organization Winrock International and the government’s National Committee to Combat Trafficking are taking stock of their progress. ...

More than 5,600 people have volunteered to monitor the national high school examination next week, an Anti-Corruption Unit official said Wednesday, more than double the number of observers who supervised the test last year. ...

Despite unprecedentedly strict anti-cheating measures being implemented in last year’s grade 12 examinations, the Kingdom’s Anti-Corruption Unit pledged yesterday that punishments will be tougher still for proctors caught selling answers and accepting bribes this time around. ...

As the risks of abuse and violence against women morph with societal changes in Cambodia, technology and social media are helping those in need to stay one step ahead. ...

The owners of bookshops near the Bak Touk High School would usually be doing a roaring trade at this time of year. The grade 12 examinations each August have long been an annual boom time for the shops where students copied cheat sheets for the ...

While there are many issues for Cambodia’s journalists to cover these days—from the tensions with Vietnam over border issues to land disputes, the law to regulate NGOs, the labor sector and others—the country’s reporters are often disrupted from their work. ...

Beginning with last year’s Grade 12 national exam, the Education Ministry put a stop to the time-honored tradition of teachers taking bribes to allow students to cheat on the test, drastically reducing the passing rate among students and the profit-making potential for proctors. ...

A push is on to mandate handicapped-accessible ramps at the Kingdom’s tourist attractions, a member of the government’s Disability Action Council (DAC) said yesterday. ...

No Cambodians have been reported among the victims of the Erawan Shrine bombing in Bangkok, the Foreign Affairs Ministry said yesterday. ...