World Bank Says Freeze on Lending Remains
After repeatedly equivocating about whether it has lifted a 2011 freeze on new lending to Cambodia in response to the government’s forced evictions of families in Phnom Penh, the World Bank has said that the suspension is still firmly in place. “The World Bank has not yet made any new commitments for funding for Cambodia,” Bou Saroeun, the Bank’s Cambodia spokesman, said by email. Housing rights groups and anti-eviction activists, however, said the Bank had effectively broken its promise by using trust funds to start or extend projects since the freeze was officially implemented. In August 2011, the Bank confirmed that it had suspended all “new lending” to Cambodia and would resume funding only when the government reached an agreement with the families of Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak neighborhood. By then more than 3,000 families had been forced out of their homes to make way for CPP Senator Lao Meng Khin’s highly ambitious real estate project, which is yet to get off the ground. More than 600 families have received titles to their Boeng Kak homes since then. But nearly 100 families still face the threat of eviction, and the thousands already forced out say they have received paltry compensation. They have also received no direct assistance from the Bank, which admitted to compounding their plight with a flawed land-titling project suspended in 2009. … Responding to fresh rumors among Boeng Kak families that the freeze was over, the Bank on Monday said it was still in place and that two projects approved in February and October did not mean it had been lifted. “The two projects…are funded by trust funds provided by other donors and administered by the World Bank.” Mr. Saroeun said. The project approved in October commits $13.45 million for work in the health sector. The other commits $730,000 for a project involving microfinance lender Amret. …
Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/world-bank-says-freeze-on-lending-remains-46681/
