News

Local police in Ratanakkiri province’s Veun Sai district yesterday tried to shut down a community meeting in which villagers were being educated about land rights, because it was being held without permission, rights workers said. According to Pen Bonnar, provincial coordinator for rights group Adhoc, two ...

A coalition of about 30 soldiers, police, forestry officials and military police armed with chainsaws razed some 40 houses belonging to villagers in Pursat province’s Santre commune yesterday, claiming the villagers were illegally living in a state forest, villagers and officials said. According to resident Chin ...

The Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday charged two government officials and four farmers from Kampong Thom province’s Stoung district with encroachment onto protected land after they allegedly bulldozed a flooded forest that was designated as a protected fish hatchery, police and NGO officials said. ...

A new Russian-Cambodian digital satellite television service plans to have 400,000 subscribers in the next two years with 60 channels in Khmer, English, Russian, Chinese, Vietnamese and other languages. The venture between Russia’s General Satellite and Cambodia’s Royal Group was soft-launched last night at Sofitel, with ...

About 10 workers were beaten by police and military police during a protest over severance payments yesterday in Kandal province, workers and union representatives said. Protests at Tai Yang Enterprises—which supplies clothing to U.S. brands Levi Strauss and Old Navy—in Ang Snuol district have been ongoing ...

Following a government push for Cambodia’s largest state-owned firms to list on the Cambodia Securities Exchange, Phnom Penh Autonomous Port (PPAP) said yesterday that it plans to float on the newly launched bourse. The port would join Telecom Cambodia and Sihanoukville Autonomous Port, both of which ...

Banks here are trying to take advantage of a growth in Chinese investment by launching services that will allow payments from local banks to be made in China’s currency, the renminbi. Grant Knuckey, CEO of ANZ Royal Bank, said that because of a growing number of ...

Cambodia’s first Marine Protection Area will be established around two emerging tourist destinations, Koh Rong and Koh Rong Samloem islands, a British conservation group has announced. NGO Coral Cay Conservation said last week that it has been invited to map out a 300-square-kilometre MPA by the ...

The Lao government’s refusal to halt the construction of a controversial mainstream Mekong dam is “making a mockery” of an agreement between the four Mekong countries, international conservation group World Wildlife Fund (WWF) said yesterday. Though Laos had agreed in December to suspend construction of the ...

Cambodia’s consumer price index (CPI) increased by 0.1 percent to 3.8 percent in June from 3.7 percent in May this year, according to the latest statistics of the National Institute of Statistics (NIS) on Wednesday. From May to June 2012, price for food increased by 0.9 ...

Slowly but steadily, demand to do cross-border business in Chinese yuan is pushing its way into one of Asia’s dollar-dominated strongholds. As China continues to liberalise the yuan – or at least hint at when some capital controls could be lifted – Cambodian businesses that import ...

Police have been accused of punching and shoving garment workers from Tai Yang and Camwell factories in Kandal province as the month-long strike over bonuses continued yesterday. Rong Chhun, president of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions, said 11 people had been slightly injured after being attacked ...

Thailand is rethinking a controversial plan to deport pregnant migrant workers from countries such as Cambodia and instead support them following widespread outrage, a Thai labour ministry official said yesterday. Last month, Thai Labor Minister Padermchai Sasomsap announced plans to send home migrant workers who were ...

More than six years after a sugar company bulldozed their farms in Koh Kong province, some 200 families who have held out ever since, arguing the action was illegal, will finally get their day in court on Thursday. 100 villagers will join them at the ...

A law on the management of farmland currently being drafted by the Ministry of Agriculture is a threat to private landowners as it imposes criminal penalties for farmers who do not abide by new powers the government would have to demarcate land, a human rights ...

Some 100 workers, along with the president of the Cambodian Confederation of Unions, delivered a letter yesterday to the US Embassy in Phnom Penh asking Americans to boycott clothing made by Tai Yang Enterprises. Surrounded by protesters, CCU President Rong Chhun said that the group was ...

Loans and deposits at Cambodia’s 32 commercial banks rose by more than 30 per cent and 20 per cent, respectively, year-on-year in the first half of 2012, which the central bank governor and economists said reflected the growth in economic activities even as export growth ...

Cambodia’s largest Sihanoukville Autonomous Port (SAP) Saturday reported that it earned the total revenues of about US$14-M in the 1st 5 months of this year, + 14 rise from US$12.3-M at the same period last year. Goods exported through the port are mostly garment products and ...

Phnom Penh’s mountains of garbage might be keeping the city’s lights on as early as 2015 if all goes according to plan, developers and city officials have said. Under a new proposal presented to Phnom Penh Municipal Hall last Tuesday, the Green Asia Global Corporation is ...

About 20 families in Koh Kong province are accusing provincial authorities and military police of blocking them from farming on land that is part of a dispute with a Chinese development firm stretching back almost five years. The rice farms are in Botum Sakor district, which ...

Cambodia Airports will invest $100 million next year to expand the size of its airports in Siem Reap City and Phnom Penh and double the number of passengers that can pass through its two main hubs in the country, an official airport operator said yesterday. Emmanuel ...

At some point during the planting season this year, Pheap Srey Ngoun will leave her garment factory floor for a rice paddy in Cambodia’s Prey Veng province. Like many fellow garment workers she will leave her position, with permission from the factory, to lend a hand ...

Loan demands from Cambodia’s banking industry had surged by 31 percent in the last twelve months thanks to the growing business activities in trade, real estate, agriculture and manufacturing, a central bank’s senior official said Tuesday. As of June 2012, the kingdom’s 32 commercial banks had ...

While Mam Sonando lay in a cramped Prey Sar prison cell yesterday, sweating out a fever, some 100 members of the Association of Democrats burned incense and kneeled in prayer at the Preah Ang Dang Keu shrine, calling for the outspoken Beehive Radio director’s release. With ...