News

With less than two weeks until Asean leaders meet in Phnom Penh to consider approval of the region’s first human rights declaration, international NGOs yesterday urged them to postpone passing what they are calling a “deeply flawed” document.  “In the current form, the [Asean Human Rights] ...

Soldiers should not have been deployed in support of a warrant to arrest land dispute protesters in Kratie province in May—an operation that led to the killing of a 14-year-old girl by armed forces, a Japanese human rights group said in a new report. The report ...

Time is running out to rid the proposed ASEAN Human Rights Declaration of clauses that would restrict peoples’ rights rather than protect and enhance them, civil society groups said yesterday. Nay Vanda, deputy head of the monitoring section of rights group Adhoc, said civil society groups needed more ...

Less than a month before Asean heads of state are expected to approve the first-ever human rights declaration for the regional group, Cambodian and Indonesian NGOs yesterday urged member states to give their organizations a larger role in the process. In the works for more than ...

The Ratanakkiri Provincial Court has summoned for questioning two human rights workers who have lodged court complaints against local officials for disrupting their land-rights workshop in July. Pen Bonnar, provincial coordinator for Adhoc, and Chhim Savuth, a project coordinator for the Cambodian Center for Human Rights (CCHR), filed ...

A Ratanakkiri-based human rights worker charged by the Ratanakkiri Provincial Court with inciting ethnic minority villagers to protest during a 2009 land dispute with a private agro-industry company has been transferred to work in Phnom Penh. Pen Bonnar, Ratanakkiri provincial coordinator for Adhoc , said yesterday ...

For political economist Sophal Ear, this view is more nuanced. In his book ‘Aid Dependence in Cambodia: How Foreign Assistance Undermined Democracy‘, published by the Columbia University Press (2012), years of dependency are not showing positive results in the rehabilitation of Cambodia, its democracy and war ...

Journalists, NGO workers and politicians are not immune to the long arm of the law if they flout it, Prime Minister Hun Sen said yesterday as he distributed land titles in Kampot province. Mr. Hun Sen’s comments come 10 days after independent radio station owner Mam ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen yesterday lashed out at critics of the Mam Sonando verdict, saying outsiders shouldn’t be seeking the release of a prisoner. Speaking to hundreds of villagers at a land title ceremony held in Chhuok district of Kampot province, Hun Sen defended the guilty verdict handed ...

Officials from Prime Minister’s Hun Sen’s cabinet yesterday accepted the petition of 110 Preah Vihear villager representatives seeking intervention in a land dispute with defunct NGO DARPO. Hun Sen cabinet member Nov Ra told villagers who protested in front of the prime minister’s house to return ...

Gender inequality in education is still palpable in Cambodia, causing women to be undervalued in the workplace and their potential to be untapped, the Under Secretary of State at the Ministry of Women’s Affairs said during the celebration of the United Nations International Day of the ...

An NGO’s plan to build an “entire city” for the victims of a forced eviction has been backed by the Phnom Penh municipal government, with preliminary construction already under way. The $2.2 to $2.5 million project, devised by the organisation People for Care and Learning, is expected ...

Despite the government embarking on a nationwide land-titling program, there is still little space for communities affected by economic land concessions to voice their concerns with the government, members of civil society said at a conference in Phnom Penh yesterday. “We’ve observed that there is limited ...

In a move that stunned his supporters and drew ire from rights groups and foreign embassies alike, independent radio station owner Mam Sonando was sentenced to 20 years in prison yesterday on charges of insurrection. Sonando, owner of broadcaster Beehive Radio and president of the rights ...

Ratanakkiri Provincial Court yesterday summonsed three well-known rights workers and a journalist to appear for questioning next week over years-old incitement charges in connection with a long-standing land dispute. In a summons signed by deputy provincial prosecutor Chea Sopheak, the court ordered Radio Free Asia journalist Sok Ratha, ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court handed down a 20-year jail sentence to independent radio station owner Mam Sonando yesterday for his role in fomenting an alleged secessionist movement in a decision drawing condemnation from human rights groups and some of Cambodia’s main foreign donors. The court ...

Land conflicts, discrimination, corruption and inequality dominated discussions between citizens and lawmakers at forums across the country this year, according to the U.S.-based organization the National Democratic Institute (NDI). In its annual report, obtained yesterday, the NDI noted “significant consistencies in the concerns facing Cambodians across ...

Officials yesterday confirmed that the Cambodian government will receive a majority of the revenue share from Chevron’s offshore Block A oil permit area near Sihanoukville in the Gulf of Thailand. The government expects to issue the American oil giant a production permit licence by the ...

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 ...

More than 100 NGOs and human rights groups yesterday urged foreign donors to flag issues regarding land policies, democratic processes and human rights during today’s Government-Development Partner Coordinating Committee (GDCC) meeting.   Intended as a preparatory meeting for Cambodia’s main government and donor summit, the GDCC is generally ...

Rural Cambodian communities are seeing economic benefits as a result of a biomass and farming resilience project run by GERES, a French NGO. As part of the AREA project, 200 households in Kampong Chhnang province are growing 22 varieties of trees to negate the effects of ...

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 ...

The director-general of Unesco on Thursday spoke out against the murder of journalist Hang Serei Odom in Ratanakkiri province, and called for the authorities to provide justice for the victim and his family. “I am deeply concerned by the killing of Hang Serei Odom,” Irina Bokova ...

On September 10, Thol Vin, 18, left for her job at a garment factory in Phnom Penh’s Dangkor district, just like any other day. She had been working there for more than two years until she disappeared unexpectedly during her lunch break. On Friday, Thol and ...