Social development
Disability initiatives launched as jobs quota not met
For Cambodians with disabilities, the launch of two major initiatives in the past two days designed to improve their lives has brought some optimism about the future—tempered by a note of caution. At Koh Pich island on Thursday, in front of a crowd of more than ...
Holly Robertson
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/disability-initiatives-launched-as-jobs-quota-not-met-63276/
Land battle leads locals to protest
About 100 villagers in the capital’s Por Sen Chey district who allege two powerful families are trying to push them off their land protested yesterday after workers fenced off more than 3 hectares of the land they claim in Kouk Rokar commune. ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/land-battle-leads-locals-protest
Cities, provinces ordered to report on illegal logging, fishing
In yet another attempt to stem the looting of Cambodia’s forests, lakes and rivers, the Interior Ministry has given all cities and provinces until July 20 to submit detailed reports on all the illegal logging and fishing taking place in their jurisdictions. The latest initiative comes ...
Illegal Ratanakkiri gem mine raided
District and military police in Ratanakkiri raided an illegal gem mine inside a Chinese company’s land concession on Saturday but failed to make any arrests, according to a rights group representative. Chhay Thy, provincial coordinator for Adhoc, said about 200 illegal gem miners had settled on ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/illegal-ratanakkiri-gem-mine-raided
Chemicals in war-era barrels tested and confirmed as tear gas
The head of the Cambodian Mine Action Authority (CMAC) said Thursday that field testing of a pair of war-era barrels found by villagers in Mondolkiri province earlier this week identified the contents as CS, a tear gas-like powder or aerosol that was used by the ...
Zsombor Peter and Saing Soenthrith
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/chemicals-in-war-era-barrels-tested-and-confirmed-as-tear-gas-63226/
Cambodia sees 83 pct drop in dengue fever cases in first half
Cambodia has reported 1,005 dengue fever cases in the first six months of 2014, down 83 percent from 6,039 cases in the same period last year, a health official said Friday. Char Meng Chuor, director of the National Center for Parasitology, Entomology and Malaria Control, said ...
Xinhuanet News Staff
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/health/2014-07/04/c_133460228.htm
Maids forced into debt bondage in Singapore
In August last year, the government launched a pilot project that sent 220 women to work as maids in Singapore, the first major effort to open up a new market for Cambodia’s domestic workers after the government halted sending maids to Malaysia due to persistent ...
Matt Blomberg and Hul Reaksmey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/maids-forced-into-debt-bondage-in-singapore-63194/
Man arrested, shots fired at land dispute protest
A villager was arrested and authorities fired shots Thursday in an attempt to quell a protest against the pending eviction in Preah Vihear province of more than 80 families at the hands of timber magnate Try Pheap, villagers said. Lor Chan, provincial coordinator for rights ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/man-arrested-shots-fired-at-land-dispute-protest-63224/
ILO says shaming factories leading to improved standards
Naming and shaming factories that fail to ensure a basic standard of conditions for their workers is starting to improve standards in the crucial garment sector, according to the International Labor Organization (ILO), but persistent offenders remain. Nine factories are included in the “lowest compliance” category ...
Holly Robertson and Sun Heng
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/ilo-says-shaming-factories-leading-to-improved-standards-63202/
Joint patrols on agenda
In response to a spate of Cambodian illegal loggers being shot dead by Thai soldiers near the border, the government on Tuesday urged a Thai delegation to consider border patrols composed of representatives from the two countries, the foreign minister said. “I would like to request ...
Chhay Channyda and Amelia Woodside
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/joint-patrols-agenda
Officials ‘take cut’ of dam compensation
Officials involved in negotiating compensation offers between the developers of the Lower Sesan II dam and affected villagers have kept a portion of the money paid out to 12 families for themselves, according to an official. Duong Pov, Stung Treng provincial administration director, claimed that a ...
Phak Seangly and Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/officials-%E2%80%98take-cut%E2%80%99-dam-compensation
Six months on, no justice for shootings
Six months ago today, security forces opened fire on garment workers protesting for a doubling of their minimum wage on Phnom Penh’s factory-lined Veng Sreng Boulevard. At least five people were killed in what rights groups called the worst state violence against citizens in 15 ...
Vong Sokheng and Buth Reaksmey Kongkea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/six-months-no-justice-shootings
Villagers agree to remeasuring of disputed land
Villagers caught in a land dispute with an agribusiness firm in Kompong Speu province Wednesday attempted to reclaim farmland they say is theirs, but were thwarted by provincial authorities, who appeased them by promising to measure the land again. About 250 families in Phnom Sruoch district ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-agree-to-remeasuring-of-disputed-land-63077/
200 workers protest against forced overtime
About 200 workers from the Chinese-owned Pollysa (Cambodia) Home Textile factory in Sihanoukville protested Wednesday against the overtime they were being forced to work and the firing of 20 employees earlier this week who refused the extra hours, workers and a union representative said. Starting at ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/200-factory-workers-protest-against-forced-overtime-63085/
Developer ordered to halt work on disputed land
The governor of Phnom Penh’s Chroy Changva district Wednesday ordered the private firm heading a $3-billion real estate project on the peninsula to temporarily stop pumping sand onto land being contested by about 40 local families, but urged the families to reconsider the compensation on ...
Sek Odom and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/developer-ordered-to-halt-work-on-disputed-land-63087/
‘Chemical’ barrels to be tested
Experts will begin tests today on two barrels discovered in Mondulkiri province earlier this week, which are suspected to contain chemicals used by the US in the 1970s in its war against the Viet Cong, officials said yesterday. Heng Ratana, director general of the Cambodian Mine ...
Sen David and Alice Cuddy
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/%E2%80%98chemical%E2%80%99-barrels-be-tested
Cambodia’s Defense of Rights Record at UN Review Slammed
Foreign donors should push Cambodia’s government to end its human rights abuses as part of its bid to maintain political control of the nation, a rights group said Wednesday, after Phnom Penh allegedly snubbed recommendations by foreign governments to improve the country’s rights record. Representatives of ...
Joshua Lipes
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/review-07022014161641.html
Villagers find chemicals dropped by us in 1970s
Villagers in Mondolkiri province have found a pair of rusty barrels believed to date back to the early 1970s and which officials suspect hold chemicals the U.S. used in its war against the Viet Cong to defoliate trees and eliminate cover. The officials said they did ...
Saing Soenthrith and Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-find-chemicals-dropped-by-us-in-1970s-62934/
Borei Keila solution talks set
A public forum will be held next month to find a solution to the Borei Keila housing crisis, city officials said yesterday. During a meeting with about 50 representatives of the community, Nhem Chanthary, deputy director of City Hall’s poor community development office, said Governor Pa ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/borei-keila-solution-talks-set
Ethnic activists targets of arrest, threats: NGO
More than 100 ethnic minority activists trying to protect community forests have been arrested, jailed, threatened and subjected to violence so far this year, a major local rights group has said. In a statement released yesterday, Adhoc condemned the “discriminatory” treatment of indigenous people who have ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/ethnic-activists-targets-arrest-threats-ngo
Bunong vow to act against Mondolkiri loggers
Ethnic Bunong in Mondolkiri province’s Sen Monorom City said Tuesday that they would no longer cooperate with local officials in fighting illegal logging and that they would begin to confiscate loggers’ equipment and burn illicit timber themselves. At a press conference in Phnom Penh, representatives of ...
Sek Odom
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/bunong-vow-to-act-against-mondolkiri-loggers-62960/
Chroy Changva locals threaten ocic pipeline
District security guards were deployed to Chroy Changva peninsula Tuesday to intercept villagers who were ready to smash a pipe that has been pumping sand onto their land for the past year. The roughly 40 families occupy the northeastern corner of a 387-hectare swathe of wetlands ...
Sek Odom and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/chroy-changva-locals-threaten-ocic-pipeline-62950/
Delay Sesan dam: villagers
Villagers who will be displaced if the controversial Lower Sesan II dam is built called on the developers yesterday to postpone construction for five years, allowing time for a comprehensive resettlement scheme to be devised. But a government official dismissed their request as “beyond the pale”, ...
Phak Seangly and Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/delay-sesan-dam-villagers
Security guards accused of beating
Security guards working for a firm building a resort in Koh Kong province beat a woman who was trying to farm the land from which she had been evicted, she has told police. Khun Phall, 40, said that on Monday evening, she and family members returned ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/security-guards-accused-beating