Social development

Cambodia continues to shoulder a disproportionate percentage of the world’s tuberculosis victims, with a higher prevalence rate of the extremely contagious respiratory disease than anywhere outside of South Africa, according to the World Health Organization. With the assistance of free screenings and free treatment, the Kingdom ...

Employees at the Kampong Speu shoe factory where a ceiling collapse killed two workers last May are headed back to work today after more than a week on strike, but will take their demands to the Arbitration Council. ...

Cheating on national grade nine and 12 exams – which has been rampant in the past – just got harder. The Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) announced yesterday that it will enlist the services of independent NGOs, civil society groups and private companies to monitor the more than ...

On the shore of Koh Kong province’s Kiri Sakor district overlooking a cluster of islands, a flourishing new golf course lies vacant but for a handful of workers tending its empty greens. The Romanesque hotel behind it, replete with a bold central dome, luxury VIP suites ...

Fifty families who have lived in squalid conditions at Borei Keila in the capital’s Prampi Makara district since they were evicted and their homes destroyed have accepted City Hall’s offer of temporary shelter at the site, their representatives said yesterday. Evictee Sar Son said the 50 ...

More than 600 of the Kingdom’s inmates could be released or see their sentences reduced this Khmer New Year if the King responds favourably to a request made yesterday by the Ministry of Interior’s General Department of Prisons, officials said. Kuy Bunsorn, director general of the ...

Cambodian experts on Thursday expressed concerns over the Laos Don Sahong dam development project, saying the proposed hydroelectric dam would pose a serious threat to the existence of the biodiversity on the Mekong River in Cambodia. Some 90 conservationists, environmentalists, development partners, academia, fishery scientists, and ...

Reducing absenteeism in schools in developing countries may be as simple as providing students with safe drinking water. A new study indicates that, but researchers are not sure why. The study was done at eight schools in Cambodia where the attendance records of more than 3,500 ...

Soft-drinks giant PepsiCo has pledged to take a “zero-tolerance” approach to land grabs by its sugar suppliers. In a statement posted on the company’s website on Tuesday, it said the move came in response to a campaign by Oxfam, which targeted Coca-Cola and PepsiCo. ...

A majority government-owned life insurance company has stopped paying out benefits to policy holders who die while taking part in protests and demonstrations, the company confirmed yesterday. The Cambodian Life Insurance Company – 51 per cent owned by the Ministry of Economy and Finance and 49 ...

Housing rights activists from the Borei Keila and Boeng Kak communities protested in front of the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Wednesday to urge authorities to speed up proceedings in an assault case they brought against Prampi Makara district authorities last month. ...

Thousands of workers at the Wing Star Shoes Co. Ltd. on Wednesday blocked the road to the factory in Kompong Speu province for two hours. They demanded the company raise their bonuses by $5 and properly enforce labor laws after arbitration talks failed Tuesday. It was ...

Rights group Adhoc on Wednesday helped 105 communities locked in long-running land disputes across the country refile their complaints with local courts and other state agencies in a concerted effort to push the government to finally resolve their cases. Covering a broad cross-section of the country’s ...

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy has denied fomenting hatred towards ethnic Vietnamese in Cambodia, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported Wednesday. ...

As villagers in Koh Kong province’s Areng Valley continue to block Sinohydro Corp employees from entering the area where the Stung Cheay Areng dam is planned, conservationists and rights workers have spoken of the havoc it will wreak if it goes ahead. In terms of the ...

Villagers emerge from the shade of their homes and gingerly roll up their sleeves, turning their palms upwards to reveal skin braided with dark lesions, ulcers and decaying tissue. They point to houses up and down the street where people have died of symptoms like ...

A 44-year-old woman was run over and killed by a harvesting machine on Sunday while working on a sugarcane plantation in Kompong Speu province owned by CPP Senator Ly Yong Phat, marking at least the second death on the plantation since December. Y Mom, originally from ...

European Union Trade Commissioner Karel de Gucht said he has no plans to launch an investigation into Cambodia’s much-criticized sugarcane plantations after a meeting with Commerce Minister Sun Chanthol in Phnom Penh on Tuesday. Bottom line: Cambodia’s free trade benefits to Europe are safe for ...

A lack of identification papers is the key obstacle preventing ethnic Vietnamese living in Kompong Chhnang province from enjoying the same rights as Khmer citizens, according to a survey released Tuesday. In the new report, the Minority Rights Organization (MIRO) found that ethnic Vietnamese are often ...

A lawyer hired by the opposition CNRP said Tuesday that he would file a complaint next month with the International Criminal Court (ICC) over crimes against humanity allegedly perpetrated by state security forces. “We plan to file a Communication [complaint] before the International Criminal Court next ...

Thousands of workers at the Wing Star Shoes factory demonstrated Tuesday for the second day in a row outside the factory in Kom­pong Speu province after a meeting between union and company officials failed to reach an agreement that would end an ongoing strike, worker ...

The Japanese government will sign up to provide 11.7 million U.S. dollars to Cambodia next week to help the country in its health sector development, according to a news statement from the Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday. ...

The Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) says it will hold a one-day training course on procedures to resolve labor disputes on Tuesday. ...

Cambodians need to be more courageous in challenging endemic corruption, a development expert says. Preap Kol, head of Transparency International Cambodia, told “Hello VOA” last week that the more people challenge corruption, the more likely it is they will free themselves from it. Cambodia remains one ...