Law and judiciary

The government will not accept more Montagnard asylum seekers from Vietnam because it lacks the resources to do so and does not want to provoke Hanoi, Council of Ministers’ Phay Siphan told Khmer Times yesterday. ...

The Chinese owner of a company who was arrested after three of his employees were crushed to death by marble slabs while unloading a shipping container in Phnom Penh on Tuesday was released Wednesday evening, an official said Thursday. ...

Ten Phnom Penh residents, accused by police of having been involved in a car and moto theft ring, yesterday saw their charges dropped for lack of evidence. The decision came after a significant portion of the group had spent more than a year behind bars without ...

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has released a report on the continuous persecution of Montagnards in Vietnam, condemning the Cambodian government for denying asylum to those fleeing into the Kingdom. ...

An interministerial committee has been established to once again investigate the assassinations of Free Trade Union leaders Chea Vichea, Hy Vuthy and Ros Sovannareth between 2004 and 2007, according to a government decree obtained Thursday. ...

Police from the Interior Ministry’s general department of immigration on Thursday detained more than 100 Vietnamese men working at a metal scrapyard in Phnom Penh to assess the legitimacy of their employment in Cambodia. ...

The government has formed a special inter-ministerial commission to investigate the murders of three union leaders, including the slaying of former Free Trade Union (FTU) president Chea Vichea, whose brother and successor was yesterday among voices cynical of the move. The directive, signed by Prime Minister ...

Three activists from the environmental NGO Mother Nature and a human rights monitor were detained in Phnom Penh’s Chamkar Mon district for about three hours Thursday after City Hall deemed a planned march to the National Assembly illegal. ...

An anti-drug police officer was slashed with a samurai-style sword on Wednesday evening while arresting two men believed to have been heading a methamphetamine distribution ring in Kompong Chhnang City, officials said Thursday. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has ordered the formation of a special committee to investigate cold-case murders of several labor leaders. The most prominent killing, of popular unionist Chea Vichea, took place in January 2004. Leaders Hy Vuthy and Ros Sovannareth were killed in 2004 and 2007, ...

Three boys and a girl, one of whom is disabled, were removed from a Phnom Penh orphanage on Tuesday after its main donor accused its director of physical abuse and sexual misconduct. ...

Hang Vuthy, the one-time right-hand man of jailed former Phnom Penh police chief Heng Pov, told the municipal court Wednesday that he was forced to escape from Prey Sar prison in 2007, as his retrial over the jailbreak got underway. ...

A Cambodian company that encouraged clients to pour money into a Hong Kong-based investment firm, which is linked to an alleged ponzi scheme here, on Wednesday held a conference in Phnom Penh to reassure its investors that the scheme is legitimate. ...

A Royal Cambodian Armed Forces soldier arrested last week by Thai authorities over a hit-and-run that killed a man was released from custody on Sunday after compensating the victims and paying money to the court to the tune of $60,000, according to a post on ...

The bus company involved in a road accident last month that killed 19 people in Svay Rieng province has requested that the provincial court delay negotiations for compensation to the victims, a court official said Tuesday. ...

A woman was arrested in Phnom Penh’s Daun Penh district on Monday for allegedly pimping out at least seven underage girls to Cambodian and foreign men, police and an NGO said Tuesday. ...

A Russian expatriate accused of shooting a man during a fight between two groups of foreigners at a Sihanoukville casino in February was charged with intentional violence Tuesday and sent to prison to await trial, officials said. ...

Two foreign filmmakers were arrested Tuesday morning after their drone was seen filming in the skies near Prime Minister Hun Sen’s house in Phnom Penh—a flight that provided a litmus test for February’s ban on unauthorized drone operation in the city. ...

Two foreigners were let off with a warning yesterday after flying a camera-equipped drone near Prime Minister Hun Sen’s house in central Phnom Penh. ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Tuesday dropped a three-year-old case against a group of villagers in Russei Keo district after their mysterious accuser failed for the fourth time to appear before the court. ...

A group of 300 pro-democracy and rights organizations and their supporters delivered a petition to the National Assembly on Tuesday, calling for lawmakers to reject a draft law to regulate NGOs. ...

Three Chinese nationals were jailed by the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Monday for attempting to smuggle four teenage Cambodian girls to China, while the sentences of two Cambodians involved in the trafficking operation were reduced to time served. ...

Police in Sihanoukville on Monday arrested Russian national Roman Dragomir, 39, for his alleged involvement in a violent brawl between two groups of foreigners at the Queenco Hotel & Casino in February, an official said. ...

The alleged “mastermind” of a multimillion-dollar international drug smuggling gang has fled to Laos, while his lieutenant was charged in Phnom Penh on Monday with manufacturing, trafficking and possessing narcotics, officials said. ...