The Cambodia Daily
Policing, Free Expression Raised at Donor Meeting
Amid a recent spike in police violence against land protesters, Cambodia’s foreign donors yesterday together called on the government for “responsible policing” and expressed “concern” over the trend. The relative candor from aid donors toward the end of the high-level but long-delayed meeting with top government ...
Families Face Re-Eviction, Submit City Hall Petition
Representatives of 19 families facing the eviction from their homes in Phnom Penh’s Pur Senchey district submitted a petition to City Hall yesterday, demanding land as compensation. The families claim that the eviction is doubly bitter because they had been relocated to Andong 3 Village, Kouk ...
Gov't to Award Three Communal Land Titles to Ethnic Bunong
Three ethnic Bunong communities in Mondolkiri province may soon receive long-awaited collective property titles, which would bring to six the total number of communal land titles granted to the country’s indigenous people since the Land Law was created in 2011. And while the possible issuing of the three ...
More R'kiri Journalists Threatened Amid Illegal Timber Trade
Just two weeks after a journalist’s bludgeoned corpse was discovered in Ratanakkiri province, a human rights group yesterday identified two more recent cases of violence or intimidation against reporters in the northeastern province. The report from Adhoc said the pressure from local journalists has occurred alongside an increase ...
Eviction Protest Held Outside Donor Meeting
Anti-eviction activists from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak and Borei Keila neighborhoods, dressed as white doves, protested yesterday in front of the Council for the Development of Cambodia, where the country’s donors were meeting with top government officials to discuss the country’s reform targets. Donning paper helmets ...
Thais Appeal Sentence in Prisoners Case
Three Thai convicted of imprisoning three other Thai and two Chinese nationals over debts owed to a Poipet City casino asked the Appeal Court yesterday to reduce their 25-year prison sentences. The defendants-Chelao Keutthang,42; Chanadet Chareunsuk, 28; and Narungvit Cheuman, 28-were arrested in November 2009 when Banteay ...
Hun Sen Urges Vigilance as Flood Conditions Persist
More than 100 families were evacuated to higher ground in Banteay Meanchey province’s Serei Saophoan City yesterday, as Prime Minister Hun Sen urged people to be vigilant in the face of continued flooding. After heavy rain last night, 100 more people from Serei Saophan City ...
Anti-Eviction Activists Conjure Up Curses to Bolster Cause
Residents of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak and Borei Keila neighborhoods yesterday sprinkled a concoction of chili, salt and black rice into flames of a small fire in front of the Phnom Penh Municipal Court to “curse” the court officials they accuse of unjustly charging and ...
UN Envoy Paints Bleak Picture of Economic Land Concessions
Economic land concessions (ELCs) benefit only a minority, the human rights consequences of the concessions are stark, and Cambodia’s sustainable economic development is threatened by the practice. U.N. human rights envoy Surya Subedi told the Human Rights Council in Geneva yesterday. Mr. Subedi cited uneven access to ...
US Says Army Truck in Crash Not a Donation
An American-made army truck that was allegedly used to smuggle illegal timber through SIem Reap province, and which crashed and killed a family of three on Friday, was not a U.S. government donation, the embassy confirmed yesterday. A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy said an inspection ...
NGOs Discuss Reforms Ahead of Donor Meeting
At a meeting in Phnom enh to prepare for today’s high-level donor Government-Development Partner Coordinating Committee (GDCC) forum, dozens of mostly local NGOs agreed on their own list of broad reform suggestions for the government. But land disputes took center stage. Today’s GDCC meeting, which the ...
Gov't Says No Plans to Send Maids to Singapore
The governemnt yesterday denied a recent news report that discussions were under way to have Cambodian domestic workers sent to Singapore. An Bunhak, chairman of the Association of Cambodian Recruitment Agencies (ACRA), said he did not know of any immediate plans to send maids to ...
Gov's to Lay More than 400 Km of Fiber-Optic Cable
With a loan from Japan, the government will begin laying more than 400 km of fiber-optic cable early next year to connect Phnom Penh with five provinces, the Ministry of Post and Telecommunications (MPTC) said yesterday. Telecommunication Minister So Khun said the cable-which will connect Phnom Penh with ...
Number of Internet Users More Than Doubled Last Year
The number of Internet users in Cambodia more than doubled last year, but the country still has the third-lowest Internet penetration rate in the region, according to recent statistics released by the World Bank. Internet users jumped from 178,142 in 2010 to 443,461 in 2011-reaching about ...
More B' Meanchey Homes Evacuated After Floods
Serei Saophan City has become the latest area in Banteay Meanchey province to be hit by floods, with more than 300 families evacuated to higher ground yesterday, according to provincial officials. Banteay Meanchey provincial prison has also been affected by the flooding, with some parts ...
Firm Owned by Ministry's Wife Files Suit Against Four Villagers
The Kompong Chhnang Provincial Court has summoned four villagers embroiled in a long-running land dispute over charges of alleged incitement and violence involving a company owned by the wife of government minister, a court official said yesterday. Two summoned vllagers, from Kompong Tralach district’s Ta Ches commune, faced similar ...
Bank Collapse Sees Property Up for Grabs
A prime piece of Phnom Penh real estate was put up for auction last week by a South Koran government agency attempting to recoup taxpayers’ money lost during a bank collapse last year. Bids have been made that could see a new development on the site, ...
UN Concerned By Authorities' Use of Violence
Unprovoked violence by government and private security guards, the use of weapons to quell protests, and communities resorting to violent means in land disputes is a growing cause for concern in Cambodia, the U.N.’s Office for the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said in its ...
Police Say RCAF Trying to Bury Fatal Crash With Cash
Military officials are attempting to squelch a potential lawsuit from relatives of three people killed Friday when Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) soldiers smuggling wood through Siem Reap province drove a military truck, donated by the U.S. government, into the family’s motorbike, police officials said. ...
Lone Firm Takes 23,000 Hectares for Plantations in Preah Vihear
A Malaysian company has been granted three tracts of land totaling more than 23,000 hectares for oil palm and rubber plantations in Preah Vihear province, according to documents submitted to the Malaysian stock exchange. The acquisition flout the legal maximum of concession land that a single ...
Floodwaters Recede in Banteay Meanchey
Floodwaters appeared to be receding in Banteay Meanchey province yesterday, after almost a week of heavy rains saw several communes inundated and over 4,000 families evacuated, provincial authorities said. “The situation is now under control,” said Ngor Mengchroun, governor of Poipet City-one of the worst hit ...
Verdict Due in Kandal Judge Corruption Case
The Kandal Provincial Court on Friday tried a former provincial judge, Huoth Heang, and his clerk, Lim Kompheak, both of whom stand accused of corruption. On January 20, Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) officials arrested Judge Heang during a sting operation in which the judge was caught accepting a ...
Long-Delayed Donor Meeting Set for Wednesday
The government and its foreign donors are preparing for their next high-level aid meeting Wednesday, their first sine the government surprised donors in August 2011 by indefinitely suspending the meetings, citing the global financial crisis. However, officials at the Finance Ministry and the Council for the ...
Army Truck Carrying Illegal Timber Kills Family
A family of three, including an 18-year old girl, died when the driver of a military truck carrying illegally cut wood slammed into their motorbike in Siem Reap province, officials said yesterday. The family died at the scene while the occupants of the military truck, seen ...