News

The former deputy director general of Anco Groups and his wife yesterday defended themselves against convictions handed down by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court for embezzling nearly $60 million dollars from the firm – owned by CPP Senator and tycoon Kok An – during the ...

Forestry officials and police in Siem Reap province’s Banteay Srei district seized a car transporting more than 100 pieces of illegally logged rosewood on Wednesday night, the 10th haul of the luxury wood in the province since January, according to a court official. Despite the efforts ...

One garment worker was killed and 30 others seriously injured on Wednesday when the truck in which they were travelling crashed in Kandal province’s Ang Snuol district, a police official said yesterday. Free Trade Union (FTU) President Chea Mony said all 58 women were workers ...

The number of migrant workers abused by their foreign employers abroad more than doubled in 2011, rights group Adhoc announced yesterday before calling on the government to improve its efforts to protect both migrant and repatriated workers. “It’s a dangerous sign,” said Adhoc president Thun Saray ...

The World Bank said yesterday that it is continuing to search for a new country manager following the departure of Quimiao Fann last month for a new role in the former Soviet Union. A Chinese national and economist by training, Mr. Fan has been ...

The chief executives of the firms behind two large-scale real-estate projects in Cambodia have been sentenced to jail in Seoul for obtaining illegal loans and using the money to finance fictitious companies abroad, according to a South Korean court official. The two executives were among a ...

Sam Rainsy Party lawmaker Son Chhay has sent an amended version of his draft freedom-of-information law to the National Assembly this morning and urged the parliament to at least debate the legislation. Son Chhay said yesterday his revised law had taken into account amendments requested ...

The Royal Government of Cambodia and private land developers were exploiting indigenous communities in Mondulkiri and Ratanakiri provinces by signing concession deals for the communities’ land without prior consultation, advocates said yesterday. “We urge the government as well as the private sector to respect [indigenous peoples’] ...

About 90 Siem Reap families have rejected what they say is a preliminary move by the provincial authority to have them moved off land declared part of Kulen Mountain National Park in 2002. The families, in Banteay Srei district’s Tbeng commune, said yesterday they had rejected ...

In the wake of several violent garment-factory protests last week, the International Labour Office yesterday launched a five-year, US$5 million Decent Work Country Program in Cambodia to focus on improving industrial relations. “[This] marks the beginning of a new body of work for the ILO in ...

About 160 villagers from Kratie province’s Meanchey village cancelled plans to block National Road 7 yesterday after provincial authorities and a Vietnamese rubber company agreed to their requests regarding an ongoing land dispute, but some expressed skepticism that the agreement would last. Village representative Saren ...

The governor of a city in southeastern Cambodia was arrested Friday in connection with a shooting that left three workers hospitalized as they took part in protests for better labor conditions at a sportswear factory that supplies goods to German sportswear giant PUMA. Moeun Tola, head ...

Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority is gearing up to price an initial public offering of up to $24 million on 18 April, making it the first stock to be traded on Cambodia’s fledgling stock exchange. Huy Vatharo, an executive director at underwriter Tong Yang Securities, ...

The Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority (PPWSA) will become the first publicly traded company on the Cambodian Stock Exchange (CSX) when trading begins on April 18, Ming Bankosal the general director of the Securities and Exchanges Commission of Cambodia said yesterday. “We are planning on ...

The potential for investment in Cambodia certainly appears to be there, as the country’s location in Indochina affords much opportunity for cross-border trade with Thailand, Laos and Vietnam, says Mark Mobius. Mr Mobius, who oversees more than US $40 billion worth of investments as executive chairman ...

Phnom Penh Water Supply Authority aimed to raise US$20.4 million in a long-awaited initial public offering scheduled for mid-April, the company said yesterday during its first pitch to investors. “We’ve targeted trading for the 18th of April,” said Han Kyung-tae, managing director of Tong Yang ...

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) is taking over from the World Bank as lead foreign donor in Cambodia following the departure of the World Bank’s country manager, the ADB said yesterday. The switch followed a year in which the World Bank imposed a funding freeze ...

The Interior Ministry said yesterday that it has sent the results of an investigation into last weeks’s triple shooting of protesters at a special economic zone (SEZ) in Svay Rieng province to the provincial court there. Ministry spokesman Lieutenant General Khieu Sopheak did not reveal any ...

More than 200 villagers from Kandal’s Kien Svay district gathered in protest yesterday to urge the National Authority for Land Dispute Resolution to resolve their long-standing dispute with a CPP official. The protesters assembled in the Samrong Thom commune brandishing photos of the prime minister and ...

Eleven village representatives from Stung Treng and Ratanakiri provinces traveled to Phnom Penh yesterday to meet with National Assembly lawmakers and appeal for an end to the planned construction of the Lower Sesan 2 Dam. The hydropower project, funded by Vietnam Electricity, will flood tens ...

Cambodian border officials urged their Thai counterparts not to shoot Cambodians who cross into Thailand illegally during a special meeting in Siem Reap city yesterday to cement border relations. The request comes as Thai soldiers have already fatally shot 11 Cambodians this year who illegally ...

Ten representatives from the Borei Keila community met with Phnom Penh police chief Touch Naruth yesterday to discuss whether their housing documents could qualify them for an apartment, a representative said yesterday. Chhum Ngan said Mr. Naruth asked representatives to furnish housing documents from 106 ...

The Ministry of Interior has sought a warrant for the suspect who shot three people at a protest outside a shoe factory last week amid more allegations from government and police officials that the perpetrator was Bavet town governor Chhouk Bandith. Interior Ministry spokesman Khieu Sopheak ...

If the government continues to grant economic land and mining concessions at the current rate, there will be no more arable land left in the country to give away within one year, a researcher from the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights said yesterday. Pointing to the ...