Social development
Physicians protest against office sale
Some 100 physicians from the Phnom Penh Municipal Referral Hospital staged a protest on Tuesday after their superiors planned to sell the current hospital building. ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=15&token=MmQ5YWRkMDViNTM
Hun Sen warns strikes will lead to factory closures
Prime Minister Hun Sen once again warned the labor union leaders would be held responsible for the closure of factories which can be caused by protests and strikes. “It is very difficult to attract the garment investors to Cambodia, so if the protests and strikes ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=OTJjZTJiYTAzNzE
Cambodian judge sued for threatening to shoot villagers in land disputes
Over 100 families, who live in Kampong Chhnang, filed complaints against a provincial court judge and his group for allegedly threatening to shoot them in land disputes. The residents sued San Sophat, a judge at Kampong Chhnang Provincial Court, his bodyguard, and Hem Dara, a lawyer, ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://www.thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=15&token=ZWY2MTI3MmE0YmV
Cambodian PM holds opposition-backed unions responsible for future factory closures due to strikes
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said Tuesday that the opposition-aligned unions, inciting garment workers to stage strikes for higher wages, must take responsibilities for any future closures of factories. “The government has worked very hard to attract investors to build factories and has urged manufacturers to ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/world/2014-02/25/c_133142013.htm
Cambodia to host Open Source Tech Conference
Phnom Penh will host one of Asia’s biggest technology conferences later this month. FossAsia, a conference on open source and free software, will be held in the capital Feb. 28 to March 2—a free event open to students, developers and entrepreneurs. Technologies discussed at the conference will ...
Khoun Theara
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/cambodia-to-host-open-source-tech-conference/1858192.html
UDG accused of farming instead of building
The Chinese-owned Union Development Group in Koh Kong province is bulldozing swaths of its land concession, originally intended for a massive tourist resort, to plant cassava and palm oil trees instead, a CNRP lawmaker-elect said Monday. Son Chhay, lawmaker-elect and CNRP chief whip, visited the area ...
Lauren Crothers and Hul Reaksmey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/udg-accused-of-farming-instead-of-building-53164/
Grave sites cleared by rubber firms: NGOs
Four Vietnamese rubber firms are responsible for destroying an estimated 1,000 hectares of community forest, including an indigenous graveyard, in Ratanakkiri’s Andong Meas district, a group of NGOs have claimed. The land dispute involving 196 families living in Talav commune dates back to 2011, Chhay Thy, ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/grave-sites-cleared-rubber-firms-ngos
Education system out of its depth
When Sim Sok Toeur, 32, returned from study in Australia last April, he did so with a vision for Phnom Penh’s skyline. For Sok Toeur, a scholarship to study overseas granted him a better quality of education than was possible in Cambodia – even though ...
Maria Wirth
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/education-system-out-its-depth
Gender gains lacking: report
Cambodian women are bumping up against a steadfast glass ceiling, according to an annual report by the Cambodian National Council for Women. The report, released yesterday, tracks what the government has done to execute the prime minister’s 16 recommendations regarding women’s access to and engagement in ...
Chhay Channyda and Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/gender-gains-lacking-report
IFC Ombudsman to help settle Phnom Penh airport land dispute
Representatives for the hundreds of families facing eviction from homes around Phnom Penh International Airport have agreed to let the compliance ombudsman of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private investment arm of the World Bank, mediate a solution to the land dispute with the ...
Aun Pheap and Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ifc-ombudsman-to-help-settle-phnom-penh-airport-land-dispute-53146/
Villagers file complaint over chief stealing land
Five families from Oddar Meanchey province’s Samraong district have filed a complaint with district authorities and rights group Adhoc in a bid to reclaim more than 16 hectares of land they allege was sold to other villagers by their village chief without their permission. Adhoc provincial ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-file-complaint-over-chief-stealing-land-53166/
Cambodia fights to balance Vietnam, China
When an ethnic Vietnamese crashed his motorcycle into an ethnic Khmer’s car in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district last Saturday night, he was attacked by Khmers shouting the racially charged term for Vietnamese — “yuon” — and beaten to death. That an ordinary traffic accident turned into ...
The China Post News Staff
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/commentary/the-china-post/special-to-the-china-post/2014/02/24/401368/Cambodia-fights.htm
Australia asks Cambodia to take asylum seekers amid violent crackdown
The Abbott government wants to send some asylum seekers to Cambodia, at a time when the country’s strongman prime minister, Hun Sen, is overseeing a brutal crackdown on dissent in one of south-east Asia’s poorest nations. Facing growing opposition after decades of authoritarian rule, Hun Sen ...
Lindsay Murdoch
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/australia-asks-cambodia-to-take-asylum-seekers-amid-violent-crackdown-20140223-33amf.html
Groups call for probe of racist mob killing
The Minority Rights Organization and the Cambodian Center for Human Rights on Friday condemned the racist mob killing of a 28-year-old ethnic Vietnamese man in Phnom Penh this week, which came after the destruction of Vietnamese shops last month and months of anti-Vietnamese rhetoric from ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/groups-call-for-probe-of-racist-mob-killing-52976/
CNRP to gauge land dispute
Lawmakers-elect from the Cambodia National Rescue Party are scheduled today to visit families in Koh Kong province affected by a long-running land dispute with Union Development Group, just weeks after the company destroyed dozens of homes there. Rights groups say that Chinese-owned Union Development has burned ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/cnrp-gauge-land-dispute
Unions set to begin first phase of nationwide strike
A coalition of 18 labor unions and associations is today set to begin the first phase of a nationwide labor strike in the garment sector by calling on workers in about 100 factories to boycott working overtime, according to union leaders. Despite efforts by the government ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/unions-set-to-begin-first-phase-of-nationwide-strike-52989/
Plan aims to cut road deaths
Every day, five people die in traffic accidents in Cambodia – a number the government is hoping to reduce with a new policy aimed at cutting traffic accidents by 50 per cent in 2020. The National Policy on Road Safety, passed by the Council of Ministers ...
Chhay Channyda and Lieng Sarith
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/plan-aims-cut-road-deaths
Waiting for the deluge
The Lower Sesan II dam project is a microcosm of the carving up of Cambodia. In one of the world’s most diverse river ecosystems, the ground burns. Whole forests are felled with scant regard for the law, while the project is backed by the country’s ...
Daniel Pye and Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/waiting-deluge
Labor union asks workers not to go on strike
Trade Union Workers Federation of Progress Democracy (TUWFPD) on Sunday appealed to workers in garment sector not to attend strikes called by other union leaders, saying that the strikes would adversely affect the workers themselves. The strikes are scheduled for March 12. ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=ZWQ1MjNlZTBhZDl
More Chinese humanitarian aid reaches Cambodia
The Cambodian Red Cross ( CRC) on Saturday distributed China-donated relief items to victims of last year’s flood, HIV/AIDS patients and disabled people. Bun Rany, CRC President and wife of Prime Minister Hun Sen, and Chinese Ambassador to Cambodia Bu Jianguo handed out the relief items ...
Global Times News Staff
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/844146.shtml#.UwqmPPmSxqU
800 garment workers on peaceful strike
Some 800 workers from a Taiwanese-owned Yu Da Garment Industry (Cambodia) Co., Ltd protested Saturday to demand better working condition and pay. ...
The Cambodia Herald News Staff
http://thecambodiaherald.com/cambodia/detail/1?page=13&token=NDdhZDYwNTY3NDR
Court overrules decision to compensate Dey Krahorm families
The Court of Appeal on Friday overruled a decision by the Municipal Court ordering the company 7NG Group to provide a total of $195,000 in compensation to 13 families whose houses were destroyed during the violent eviction of the Dey Krahorm community in 2009. “The Court ...
Khuon Narim
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/court-overrules-decision-to-compensate-dey-krahorm-families-52966/
Students may monitor textbook delivery
Transparency International (T.I.) Cambodia and education NGOs on Friday held a conference titled “Promoting Integrity to Strengthen the Quality of Education in Cambodia,” where ideas were put forward on stamping out corruption in schools. “We need to mobilize the students themselves in tracking the delivery ...
Matt Blomberg and Sek Odom
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/students-may-monitor-textbook-delivery-52968/
Court delays verdict for protesters
The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Friday said it would delay issuing a scheduled verdict against six people tried for intentional violence against police and property damage during an opposition protest on Phnom Penh’s Kbal Thnal overpass in September, saying that the case was very ...
Khuon Narim
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/court-delays-verdict-for-protesters-52974/