News

After setting a date this week for next year’s commune elections, Prime Minister Hun Sen used a speech on Wednesday to urge officials to speed up work to ensure that 2 million people without new identification cards are able to obtain one by election day ...

Cambodia’s first milk manufacturing plant, which aims to dominate the domestic dairy market, officially launched production operations yesterday after a ribbon-cutting ceremony held at the factory’s home in Phnom Penh SEZ. ...

Exports of organic palm sugar from Kampong Speu province have reached 135 tons, while the palm sugar industry’s association plans to expand its production chain to help meet demand. ...

Battambang police have called upon the Interior Ministry’s anti-terrorism department for help arresting the creator of a video that suggests corrupt officials have sold off the province’s most important reservoir.   ...

Five of the 11 members of the Boeung Kak lake community who were beaten by police while peacefully protesting at Wat Phnom in 2013 and later filed a lawsuit against district officials were called to testify at the Ministry of Interior yesterday. ...

Political intimidation, the suppression of political expression and restrictions on freedom of assembly have Cambodia’s young democracy under threat, observers in the country say. ...

Singapore and Cambodia have entered into a double taxation avoidance agreement to boost cross-border trade and investment between the two countries. ...

Amnesty International has designated four human rights officers and an election official who were jailed earlier this month as “prisoners of conscience” and will call on millions of members around the world to petition the government for their release.   ...

Falling productivity and rising infrastructure costs are putting Cambodia’s garment industry at a disadvantage as it tries to compete with rivals Vietnam, Bangladesh and Myanmar, a leading union said yesterday.   ...

Facilitated by Taiwan’s First Commercial Bank, seven foreign banks provided $35 million in a syndicated loan to Sathapana Bank Plc, a newly formed Cambodian commercial bank, to expand its existing microfinance operations and broaden its commercial lending portfolio. ...

Workers are labouring day and night to build a new pumping station at the Boeung Trabek reservoir to relieve the capital’s flood risk ahead of the rainy season, city authorities said yesterday.   ...

Despite the government’s vow to be more transparent with regulations and the issuing of sand-dredging licences, the Ministry of Mines and Energy (MME) has granted nearly 70 new such licences without holding public auctions or requiring companies to disclose environmental impact assessments (EIA) results to ...

Next year’s commune council elections will be held on June 4, according to a decision signed on Tuesday by Prime Minister Hun Sen, marking the first nationwide ballot since the 2013 election that led to the reform of the National Election Committee (NEC). ...

An elderly man and his two grandchildren were killed after he accidentally detonated an artillery shell yesterday morning in Prey Veng province’s Preah Sdach district, after attempting to dismantle it to create parts for his bullock cart, according to police. ...

Less than two months after Sihanoukville authorities evicted scores of vendors along O’Chheuteal Beach deemed to be an eyesore, a private developer has begun constructing a new “pub street” just 50 meters from the same shore. ...

An investigating team from the Ministry of Mines and Energy has concluded that evidence at Chhay Ching Heang Group’s operations in Ratanakkiri province seemingly points to illegal gold mining, though lab results from minerals extracted by the company are still pending, according to a ministry ...

The Cambodian and Russian governments have signed several Memorandums of Understanding (MoU) to help build a nuclear power plant in the Kingdom, despite previous statements saying the opposite and with no timeline as to when such a plant would be built, according to the Ministry ...

The Phnom Penh health department has announced an investigation into the death of a newborn who allegedly choked while being fed by staff at the privately owned VIP Sorphea Maternity Hospital.   ...

An opposition official in Kampot was arrested yesterday evening over his involvement in collecting thumbprints for a Royal petition calling for the release of detained human rights officials and politicians in the Kingdom. ...

Regularly scheduled direct flights between Cambodia and Russia proposed by Prime Minister Hun Sen last week in Moscow might land in the coastal town of Sihanoukville, an official said yesterday. ...

Rubber producers say the price of local rubber has declined again, blaming a slowdown in the global economy and less demand for rubber. ...

Russia has agreed to import agricultural products from Cambodia, while the leaders of the two countries pledged to boost bilateral trade during meetings between the two countries’ senior officials in the past week. ...

Russia is looking to expand its crude oil exports to ASEAN countries – including Cambodia – despite the Kingdom being years away from having refinery capabilities. ...

Plans to rebuild Phsar Kandal have struck fear into the market’s community of longtime vendors, who gathered on Monday over concerns they will become the latest victims of Phnom Penh’s surging inner-city development boom.   ...