News

Cambodia’s parliament on Friday approved a law providing financial guarantees for the developers of a planned hydropower dam on a Mekong River tributary, despite opposition from civil society groups seeking to delay the project. Villagers campaigning against the Lower Sesan 2 dam in northeastern Cambodia’s Stung ...

Cambodia’s Tonlesap Airlines said Saturday that one of its scheduled flights from Taiwan to the Cambodian city of Siem Reap that day would be further delayed due to an engine failure, further enraging 167 already angry passengers who had been waiting for hours for their ...

The director-general of Tele­com Cambodia, one of the country’s most highly regarded state-owned enterprises and a candidate for listing on the stock exchange, has left his post amid an investigation into corruption allegations, the minister of posts and telecommunications said on Thursday. Despite the staff’s ...

Economic land concessions remain a major concern, with more than 230 people arrested in 2012, an increase of more than 150 percent from the year before, according to an annual report by the rights group Adhoc. That means land conflicts have increased, Thun Saray, president ...

Oil prices in Cambodia hit the highest of all time on Friday, with a liter of premium gasoline going for 1.45 U.S. dollars at all petrol stations in the capital. The price is the highest ever if compared with the peak price of 1.41 U.S. dollars ...

Toll Royal Railways, the company holding the 30-year concession to operate Cambodia’s rail network, has so far only spent a tiny fraction of the millions of dollars of investment it promised upon winning the deal, documents of the firm’s expenditure show. The operation of the railways ...

PHNOM PENH: There are about a hundred Singapore-owned businesses in Cambodia, mainly located in the capital, Phnom Penh. Many, who set up shop there, feel the numbers have stayed low because there is a perception that the country is not safe. In 2011, Singapore invested close ...

A pair of cigarette brands distributed by two of the Kingdom’s most prominent businessmen are being smuggled from Cambodia to Vietnam at an estimated rate of more than 300 million packs a year, contributing to tobacco manufacturer losses of nearly $200 million annually, according to ...

Young Cambodians must develop diverse workplace skills if they are to compete in an integrated Asean, a leading economist and adviser to the government says. “We have to make sure we are able to do multiple things if others are able to do just one,” the ...

Malaysia-based Hong Leong Bank, a subsidiary of Hong Leong Financial Group Berhad, is planning to open a branch in Cambodia sometime this year, which would make it the fourth Malaysian bank and the 33rd commercial bank in Cambodia’s crowded banking industry. Ngoun Sokha, director general of the ...

The number of people arrested over land disputes jumped 144 percent from a year earlier to 232 in 2012, the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (Adhoc) said Thursday. Speaking at a news conference, he [Adhoc president Thun Saray] said Adhoc last year received 70 ...

Nean Narin, a humble man and father of three children, says his family is going hungry. Narin lives in the village of Boeung Kak, situated on the edge of Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh. For years, he and other villagers relied on the Boeung Kak Lake ...

Ethnic minority villagers expecting to be displaced by a proposed Chinese-built hydroelectric dam in northeastern Cambodia are asking the country’s parliament not to approve a law providing financial guarantees for the project. Villagers living along three rivers that will be affected by the dam spoke ...

Civil society groups urged the National Assembly Thursday to delay the adoption of a bill on the construction of a $780 million dam on the Sesan River in northeast Cambodia. Chhit Sam Ath, executive director of NGO Forum, told a news conference that estimates of ...

More than 300 activists from Kampong Thom province’s Prey Lang Community Network were stopped by district police yesterday as they were marching from the Vietnamese-owned CRCK Company to deliver a lawsuit in Sandan district calling for the postponement of alleged forest clearing and the “invasion” ...

Ecotourism sites in the northeast of Cambodia last year saw visitor growth of 9.7 per cent – a total of 53,374 tourists – compared with 2011, an official said yesterday during the first Workshop on Northeast Ecotourism Development, organised by the Ministry of Tourism. Tith Chantha, ...

Thai-based movie theatre company Major Cineplex said it will build “a high-end lifestyle and entertainment complex” at the Aeon mall in Phnom Penh, hoping to capture Cambodia’s youth market in what it believes is a stable business environment for its entertainment products. While it sees prospects in ...

Almost 85,000 visitors traveled to Kampot over the first three days of the Lunar New Year. The 84,917 visitors included 1,252 foreigners with the Bokor Mountain resort alone attracting 67,548 visitors including 1,004 foreigners, [a tourism official] said. ...

The number of domestic and foreign tourists visiting Siem Reap’s ancient Angkor Wat temple and the Kingdom’s coastal areas increased sharply during this year’s three-day Lunar New Year. Data from the Siem Reap provincial tourism department show that 52,909 tourists visited Siem Reap during Lunar ...

Energy Minister Suy Sem yesterday defended a draft law on the financing of a massive dam project in Stung Treng province which is slated for debate at the National Assembly on Friday. Environmental groups have called debate of the law premature, as no consultation with local ...

More than 200 employees of Telecom Cambodia demonstrated yesterday morning, demanding the company’s general director step down and that the Anti-Corruption Unit investigate the company. The strikers claimed general director Lao Saroeun had been involved in large-scale embezzlement, other forms of corruption and disrespect ...

Cambodia’s Ministry of Industry, Mines and Energy on Thursday launched a four year project, aiming at promoting the development of biomass-fueled renewable energy generation technologies in industrial sector, officials said. The 5.6 million US dollar project will provide technical and partial financial support for the ...

The Ministry of Agriculture will request that Prime Minister Hun Sen from now on revoke all economic land concessions (ELC) whose owners are found guilty of illegal logging or other major forestry crimes, a ministry official said yesterday. ...

The price of land along four major boulevards in Phnom Penh climbed by 16 per cent in early 2013, according to real estate experts, compared to the same period in 2012. VMC Real Estate chairman Dith Channa said land prices increase because the quality of ...