Letter reveals minister’s ire with NGOs

Prime Minister Hun Sen received a proposal from Finance Minister Keat Chhon in June seeking to bar “foreign NGOs” from advocacy work in Cambodia, as well as preventing foreigners from working with local advocacy groups because of activism around the rehabilitation of the nation’s railway, according to a news report on Monday from Deutsche Presse-Agentur. According to a June 17 letter to Mr Hun Sen, Mr Chhon claimed that the government was advised to act against advocacy NGOs by a consultant working for the Asian Development Bank, which is funding the bulk of a $141.6 million railway rehabilitation project that is expected to resettle thousands of poor families living along the tracks…