ព័ត៌មាន​

The U.S. has downgraded Cambodia in its latest global Trafficking in Persons Report for showing no discernable improvements in its efforts to combat human trafficking over the past year, the country’s first demotion in five years. The 2013 report cites an increase in the number ...

Thousands of Cambodians cross the border via illegal checkpoints into Thailand every year. Some end up working in slave-like conditions on illegal fishing trawlers. Others work in factories while getting paid under the table. It is often a last resort fraught with danger and uncertainty and ...

The government announced Monday that it will open a new passport office in the northwest province of Battambang, the first such office outside Phnom Penh. In a statement, posted to the Ministry of Interior website, the ministry said that the new passport office will serve people ...

Cambodia’s National Assembly on Tuesday adopted a draft law on fire prevention with jail term punishment for arsonists, neglected firefighters, and false information providers on fires. Ninety-four out of ninety-seven lawmakers, who were present at the session, passed the law, saying it would help maintain security, ...

During his speech last week at the swearing-in ceremony of Phnom Penh’s new governor, Pa Socheatvong, Interior Minister Sar Kheng noted that managing Cambodia’s capital is by no means an easy task. While critics of [former Phnom Penh governor] Mr. [Kep] Chuktema note his failure ...

Around 20,000 workers from the garment, construction, tourism, banking, service and agriculture sectors want to march to present a petition to the National Assembly on International Labor Day, May 1, but Phnom Penh City Hall did not approve the rally. City hall asked them to wait ...

Philippe Laurent became secretary-general of Cambodia Airports in May 2008. He was one of six senior executives in charge of the country’s international airports in Phnom Penh, Siem Reap and the little-used facility in Sihanoukville. Mr. Laurent is now carrying out a one-man campaign against ...

Cambodia is making plans to open passport offices along its border with Thailand in a bid to cut down on illegal migration, Interior Minister Sar Kheng announced yesterday. Speaking at the close of a migration workshop, Kheng said that officials are already preparing to open a ...

llegall migration is on the rise, but human trafficking cases appear to be declining, according to the government’s annual labor migration report, released yesterday. Speaking at the start of a three-day workshop held at the Ministry of Interior that involving embassies, NGOs and government officials, Chou ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday questioned five Chinese nationals after they were arrested during a seizure of more than 106 tons of chemicals police suspect were intended for the production of illegal drugs. The four men and one woman who were arrested on Tuesday, claimed ...

Three ethnic Jarai minority communities passed a crucial hurdle on the way to obtaining communal land titles in government-sanctioned ceremonies this week. But a human-rights activist tempered the celebration, saying mass deforestation in the province had already stripped most of the land the villagers are ...

The Cambodian National Rescue Party (CNRP) has submitted a new law to the National Assembly for consideration that would institute a minimum monthly wage of $150 for garment workers and $250 for civil servants, the newly formed opposition party announced at a press conference yesterday. The ...

Activists are welcoming Prime Minister Hun Sen’s public vow to prevent logging and rosewood trafficking, but they also say it’s too little too late to have any serious impact on protecting Cambodia’s already decimated forests. In a speech on Friday at the Ministry of Interior, Hun ...

Five men allegedly caught with 10 cubic meters of illegal rosewood worth more than $1 million on Wednesday were being questioned in Stung Treng provincial court yesterday, officials said. Chroeung Khmao, the provincial prosecutor, said the men – four Chinese citizens and one Cambodian – were ...

The Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers’ Democratic Union (C.CAWDU) filed legal complaints yesterday, following allegations on Wednesday that police had assaulted seven garment workers, including a pregnant woman. Sa’ang district police chief Chea Socheat yesterday again denied officers had been violent during a strike ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen’s land-titling scheme announced in June originally included a directive for granting collective property titles to indigenous communities, but this part of the program was scrapped weeks later as it was deemed too costly and time-consuming, documents obtained yesterday show. For “indigenous ...

China’s demand for natural resources is being felt in a big way in Cambodia. Illegal logging and economic land concessions are threatening Cambodia’s dwindling forests, which now echo the sound of chainsaws. Prey Lang forest — an eight-hour journey north and east of the capital, Phnom Penh ...

The convicted ringleader of a so-called secessionist movement in May in Kratie province, who is currently in self-imposed exile to avoid a 30-year prison sentence, has said that he will soon return to Cambodia to organize a large-scale demonstration against the government. Bun Ratha—who was sentenced ...

A lack of legal protections, insufficient commitment from the Malaysian government and an overworked, understaffed embassy are among the major obstacles to lifting the maid ban, according to an internal government report obtained yesterday. Penned by the Ministry of Interior, the 12-page brief details a ...

About 300 workers continued protesting at the Master and Frank garment factory yesterday, rejecting a Kandal Provincial Court injunction ordering them back to work within 48 hours. After the company promised to consider workers’ demands that it reinstate fired union members, workers cancelled their plans to ...

Four garment workers, three of them female, were injured yesterday morning when company and police officials clashed with protesters, union representatives said yesterday. During the demonstrations for the reinstatement of fired workers and back pay, authorities beat two workers unconscious at a protest in front of ...

More than 100 families face the loss of their rice fields over a social land concession that was granted to the families of military veterans in Stung Treng province, local authorities and villagers said yesterday. Seven families, who depend on their rice and mango harvest in ...

Widely different interpretations of the government’s land policy were voiced at a conference on Land Security and Housing Rights on Thursday in Phnom Penh, with civil servants defending mass relocations, while rural evictees spoke of being forced into poverty due to loss of their land. ...

The Government of Cambodia on Friday passed a draft law on fire prevention in order to contribute to maintaining security, social safety, public order, and life and property protection, according to a media statement released after the weekly Cabinet meeting. In the meeting, Hun Sen ...