News

Cheju Halla, a Korean university, plans to build a university of tourism and hospitality in Siem Reap next year, Tourism Minister Thong Khon told reporters yesterday at a meeting with Han Soo Kim, the new South Korean ambassador to Cambodia. The Ministry of Tourism has requested ...

Patrick Devillers, the French national and associate of disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai, seemed to be putting down roots in Cambodia. The architect – whose shadowy presence has been on the fringes of one of modern China’s largest political scandals – owned land and a restaurant ...

Increasing discrimination by factories against unions and continued poor wages in Cambodia’s garment sector have resulted in a rise in the number of worker protests, according to a report released yesterday by the International Labor Organization (ILO). According to its periodic synthesis report on working ...

In April, Chut Wutty was shot to death in the Cambodian forests he was so outspoken in defending, a slaying that outraged human rights activists suspicious of the conflicting explanations given by police. His death appears to be part of a chilling trend. Growing numbers of activists ...

The filling of Boeng Kak lake and the eviction of thousands of residents was necessary to root out the “prostitutes and terrorists” that were drawn to the area’s once-popular tourist zone, the Phnom Penh Municipality said in a statement yesterday. In a statement posted to its ...

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen has given approval to grant state-owned land to three private companies despite issuing a temporary ban on land concessions, drawing criticism from local NGOs concerned about increasingly frequent land disputes in the country. Copies of three subdecrees obtained by RFA showed ...

The real growth rate of the industry sector has been revised downwardly by half a percentage point against the previous estimate to 8.8 percent year-on-year in 2012. A scaling down of the growth estimate of the textile and garment sub sector, as a result of persistently weaker demand in the European and US ...

Income from post office activity increased to 3.77 million US dollars in 2011 from 2.164 million in 2010 and that money is small in size but it showed that Cambodian people still need the post ways for sending their goods and other materials. At the same time, revenue from mobile phone companies and desk ...

Less than a week after Prime Minister Hun Sen called for land to be returned to villagers embroiled in land disputes, a Pursat province villager has been summonsed by the court in a scenario many see as all too common in these disputes. Kuch Veng, a ...

An ASEAN-first Interpol database tracking transnational crime between Cambodia and Vietnam was launched in Phnom Penh yesterday. Keo Vannthan, head of Cambodia’s Interpol Bureau at the Ministry of Interior, said the European Union had pledged almost US$800,000 to the pilot EU-ASEAN Migration Border Management Program project ...

The Overseas Cambodia Investment Corporation (OCIC) is planning to develop a 400-unit apartment complex on the former site of the Ratanakkiri provincial airport, an official with knowledge of the project said yesterday. Ly Teang, Banlung City branch manager for Canadia Bank, whore investors are the ...

  Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen told the Group of 20 summit in Mexico that international financial architecture could not be sustained without reforms, sources said. Speaking in his capacity as Asean chairman, Hun Sen said the association supported any measures to reinforce financial stability ...

Cambodia and Thailand are poised for a boost in trade and tourism following a new agreement taking effect today that simplifies procedures at a key border crossing between the two nations. “The ability to move people, goods, and vehicles across borders efficiently and responsibly is at the heart of regional economic integration,” said Craig Steffensen, ...

Cambodian Foreign Minister Hor Namhong met with Senator Jim Webb, of Virginia, this week, to discuss how Cambodia might be forgiven war-era debt to the US or find a better way to pay it off. Cambodia owes nearly $450 million on pre-Khmer Rouge borrowing. ...

Adding to a growing body of research into the flaws of Cambodia’s $142 million railway rehabilitation project, a report published yesterday said soaring debt levels are crippling families forcibly relocated by the project. In the report by land rights organization Sahmakum Teang Tnaut (STT), researchers tracked ...

About 4,000 workers at the M&V Textile factory in Kompong Chhnang province, which supplies well-known brands such as H&M and Gap, went on strike yesterday morning to demand a pay raise, a union representative said. Meas Sokhen, a representative of the Free Trade Union, said ...

A Cambodian migrant worker has alleged that he and dozens of fellow migrants were arrested, beaten, stripped naked and shaved bald by Thai police, who then extorted money from them just because they did not have the correct location on their working visas. The allegation is ...

The Ha Tien Vegas Entertainment Resort and casino in Kampot Province along the Vietnamese border announced yesterday that it has sacked 500 employees and shut down its 130-room resort less than two years after it became the first casino to open in the province. The company said ...

The owner of a site in Phnom Penh where a 19th century French colonial building was demolished last week said yesterday she does not have enough money to follow through on plans to build a replica in its place. Kang Gheck Nai said it had always ...

Police in Prey Veng’s Peamro district are searching for a rice trader who paid a traditional healer with counterfeit money, and suspect that more of the fake bills could enter circulation. Neak Loeung commune police chief Chhin Sophal said the unnamed woman had paid 45,000 ...

The State Department on Tuesday cited abuses in Thailand’s huge fishing industry as part of an annual worldwide report on Trafficking in Persons. The report noted that men from Cambodia and Myanmar, also known as Burma, are trafficked aboard Thai ships and forced to work ...

Cambodian authorities yesterday arrested French architect Patrick Devillers – friend and business associate of disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai – and may be moving to extradite him to China to face unspecified charges there, police said. Phnom Penh Police Commissioner Touch Naroth confirmed the arrest to ...

“Vespa was in Cambodia before the war [and] Piaggio wanted to come back to the market in Cambodia, because the market is growing,” explained Frederic Bachelet, head of business development at Narita Vespa Co. Ltd. The company plans to break ground next week on ...

A technology called “Super Wi-Fi” that uses the frequency spectrum between television channels called “white spaces” could be a game-changing force in how people connect to the internet, especially in places like Cambodia. The technology, which requires specialised equipment costing about US$2,000 for a base station ...