News
Army did not move to stop CNRP: Tea Banh
The opposition yesterday accused a senior army general of having ordered plainclothes soldiers to block the party from entering the former Khmer Rouge stronghold of Anlong Veng on Sunday, where they were set to hold a public forum. But Defence Minister Tea Banh strongly rejected the ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/army-did-not-move-stop-cnrp-tea-banh
Freedom Park remains closed to public
Twenty-three labor activists are free from jail, but Freedom Park remains closed to the public. The park is a government-sanctioned place of protest, but it was closed after opposition demonstrations there in April. Phnom Penh spokesman Long Dimanche said there is “no threat” of protests ...
Kong Sothanarith
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/freedom-park-remains-closed-to-public/1931123.html
Cambodian opposition slammed over charges of loss of territory to Vietnam
Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen’s administration on Friday hit out at opposition leaders for accusing the government of ceding territory to Vietnam at a ceremony this week commemorating the 65th anniversary of loss of land belonging to the Khmer Krom ethnic minority to Hanoi. Government spokesman ...
Kong Sothanarith
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/freedom-park-remains-closed-to-public/1931123.html
A bridge too far for Sokha?
Deputy opposition leader Kem Sokha has drawn the ire of the government and civil society groups after on Wednesday accusing Vietnam of orchestrating the Koh Pich bridge stampede that killed more than 350 people in 2010 as part of a plot to “eliminate the Khmer ...
Meas Sokchea and Kevin Ponniah
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/bridge-too-far-sokha
Politics at fore on anniversary
Opposition leaders brought politics to the forefront of a ceremony to mark yesterday’s anniversary of France’s official transfer of the former Kampuchea Krom provinces to Vietnam in 1949. Speaking to a crowd of hundreds of monks, Khmer Krom and Khmer attendees at Samaki Rainsey pagoda in ...
Chhay Channyda and Alice Cuddy
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/politics-fore-anniversary
‘Be more responsible’, Rainsy tells Australia
Cambodia’s opposition leader yesterday called on the Australian government to reconsider its plan to send refugees to the country, which he said was a short-term solution that does not address the root causes of displacement. Sam Rainsy, Cambodia National Rescue Party president, told the Post that Australia should ...
Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/%E2%80%98be-more-responsible%E2%80%99-rainsy-tells-australia
CNRP calls for ‘public’ swearing-in
Authorities in Mondulkiri decided to switch a swearing-in ceremony for two newly elected Keo Seima district councillors to a commune hall after the opposition objected to it being held at the home of the district’s pro-ruling party governor, officials said. Khum Kan said he and a ...
Cheang Sokha
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/cnrp-calls-%E2%80%98public%E2%80%99-swearing
After jail, Pov gains following
Before he was arrested in January, Vorn Pov and the union he created were not widely known outside of activist circles. But when he emerged from Phnom Penh’s CC1 prison on Friday, he walked away as one of the highest-profile unionists in the country, and a ...
Kevin Ponniah, May Titthara and Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/after-jail-pov-gains-following
Sanctuary from the storm
Hidden at the end of a pathway that breaks off from Mao Tse Tung Boulevard in Phnom Penh is a temple of a different kind, where seances are sacrosant and French writer Victor Hugo – author of Les Miserables – is considered a saint. Worshippers there practise Caodaism, ...
Amelia Woodside and Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/sanctuary-storm
Kampuchea Krom forum banned by city
Phnom Penh City Hall on Monday banned Wat Samakki Raingsey from hosting a public forum on Wednesday to mark the 65th anniversary of the official granting of Kampuchea Krom to the State of Vietnam. The Khmer Kampuchea Krom Community (KKKC), which advocates for the ethnic minority ...
Mech Dara and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/kampuchea-krom-forum-banned-by-city-60320/
Remains ‘bound for NGO’
The opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party said yesterday that charred human remains retrieved by a local party member in Kampong Speu province on Saturday would be handed over to human rights organisations for examination. Despite a seeming lack of evidence or investigation, opposition activists have speculated ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/remains-%E2%80%98bound-ngo%E2%80%99
Northeast primed for colonisation: Rainsy
Cambodia National Rescue Party president Sam Rainsy yesterday called on residents in the northeast provinces to defend their land lest the area be turned into a Vietnamese “colony”. Rainsy’s comments were quickly condemned by both the Cambodian and Vietnamese governments. Speaking to hundreds of people in Mondulkiri ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/northeast-primed-colonisation-rainsy
Mysterious bones stoke conspiracy
A package containing charred human remains was delivered to the Cambodia National Rescue Party office in Phnom Penh yesterday morning. Despite a seeming complete absence of hard evidence, some are convinced the remains – found on Saturday at a mountain in Kampong Speu – belong to ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/mysterious-bones-stoke-conspiracy
Phnom Penh pagoda offers haven for the marginalized
When 200 villagers from Kratie province walked into Samakki Raingsey pagoda seeking safety and shelter early this month, they weren’t the first to do so. The villagers, whose homes in Snuol district had been torched by authorities just days earlier, were walking a well-trodden path—a path ...
Mech Dara and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/author/matt-blomberg/
Lawmaker blasts illegal logging in Stung Treng
Two draft laws on judicial reform were easily passed by the single-party National Assembly on Friday but the session was overshadowed by a rookie lawmaker’s attack on lax enforcement of forestry laws in Stung Treng province. On the fourth day of the third plenary session of ...
Khy Sovuthy
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/lawmaker-blasts-illegal-logging-in-s-treng-59494/
City Hall offers final warning to displaced farmers
A group of about 200 farmers from Kratie province refused on Thursday to leave a pagoda in Phnom Penh—their home base for protests against their eviction at the hands of a Vietnamese rubber company—as the city’s deputy governor warned them that the municipal government would ...
Aun Pheap and George Wright
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/city-hall-offers-final-warning-to-displaced-kratie-farmers-59436/
Journalists in CPP firing line over ‘1-party’ tag
The single-party National Assembly sat for the third day of its third plenary session Thursday, with a senior ruling party lawmaker calling on Information Minister Khieu Kanharith to examine whether journalists who call the Assembly “single party” can be punished under law. Sixty-four of the 68 ...
Hul Reaksmey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/journalists-in-cpp-firing-line-over-1-party-tag-59430/
CPP lawmakers lash out at critics of one-party Assembly
The single-party National Assembly sat for the second day of its third plenary session Wednesday, discussing two of eight chapters of the draft law on the Organization and Functioning of the Courts. The CPP-only parliament—minus 55 boycotting opposition CNRP lawmakers-elect—convened to discuss the first of three ...
Hul Reaksmey
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/cpp-lawmakers-lash-out-at-critics-of-one-party-assembly-59332/
Judiciary laws moving forward with ‘debate’
The National Assembly yesterday opened debate for the first time on the first of three controversial judicial draft laws, approving in principle the first two chapters of the Law on the Organisation and Functioning of the Courts, in the continued absence of the opposition Cambodia ...
Vong Sokheng
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/judiciary-laws-moving-forward-%E2%80%98debate%E2%80%99
TVK director resigns, apparently in response to gov’t criticism
Kem Gunawadh, the long-serving director-general of TVK who helped set up the state broadcaster in 1983, resigned abruptly on Saturday in what his successor said was a reaction to government criticism over his decision not to broadcast live that morning’s annual Royal Plowing Ceremony. The resignation ...
Phann Ana and Simon Henderson
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/tvk-director-resigns-apparently-in-response-to-govt-criticism-58980/
Judicial laws put independence of courts in jeopardy
Three constitutionally mandated judicial laws would adversely affect the independence of the courts if they are passed in their current draft state, legal experts warned on Friday. Draft versions of the Law on the Organization and Functioning of the Supreme Council of the Magistracy, the Law ...
Lauren Crothers
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/judicial-laws-put-independence-of-courts-in-jeopardy-58942/
Rainsy attack ‘shocks’ tycoon
Prominent businessman and Cambodian People’s Party Senator Ly Yong Phat yesterday questioned what he had done to warrant a verbal attack from opposition party leader Sam Rainsy, who said on Wednesday that the tycoon had grabbed land from people in Koh Kong province and should ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/rainsy-attack-%E2%80%98shocks%E2%80%99-tycoon
Nearly 850 protests this year: police
Almost 850 demonstrations or strikes have occurred nationwide since the year began – a seemingly anarchic average of more than six a day, the General Commissariat of National Police announced this week, blaming politicians, NGOs and trade unions for helping to incite demonstrators and “complicating ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/nearly-850-protests-year-police
Government spokesman summons student over Facebook post
Council of Ministers spokesman Phay Siphan has summoned a student from the country’s top state journalism school for a meeting at his office after she used a post on her Facebook page to question the sense of a guest lecture he delivered last week. Mr. Siphan ...
Alex Willemyns and Phorn Bopha
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/government-spokesman-summons-student-over-facebook-post-58460/