The Phnom Penh Post

Cambodia moved a step closer to becoming an oil-producing nation yesterday after the government finalised its long-awaited production-sharing agreement with Singapore-listed KrisEnergy to develop the country’s first oil field. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen announced yesterday that the government will cut back on recruiting new employees next year to reduce its spending on civil servant salaries. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen escalated the government’s attacks on media outlets and NGOs yesterday, reiterating in a speech that the Cambodia Daily would have to “pack up their things and leave” if they failed to pay a $6.3 million tax bill, while at the same ...

A controversial universal minimum wage law will be passed this year in order to prevent a repeat of the mass protests over garment sector wages that rocked the country in 2013, Labour Minister Ith Sam Heng said yesterday, despite calls for revisions from independent unions ...

Private sector tourism operators claimed yesterday that a new government mandate that charges travelers an additional $2 fee to use ferry services to reach the islands off the coast near Sihanoukville has sparked a furious backlash from domestic tourists. ...

The Senate amended its internal rules yesterday to punish senators who miss sessions by docking their salaries, while also voting down a measure to appoint the wife of Hong Sok Hour to fill his former seat on the body’s anti-corruption committee. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen has decided not to shut down a Christian anti-trafficking charity after its founder issued a “heartfelt apology” yesterday. The apology from Agape International Missions (AIM) CEO Don Brewster is the first public comment he has made since the social media fracas sparked ...

Two hundred juvenile specimens of the critically endangered Mekong giant catfish were released by the Preah Sihanouk Provincial Fisheries Administration into freshwater reservoirs on Sunday evening in an effort to help preserve the species – which can grow up to 300 kilograms. ...

Garment and footwear manufacturers have called on the government to provide facilities to help offset the higher costs on production that they will face as the result of a benefits package that Prime Minister Hun Sen pledged to garment factory workers this week. ...

The Rural Development Bank (RDB) is seeking proposals from registered Cambodian agricultural firms to develop rice storage warehouses and rice-drying facilities in Kampong Thom, Prey Veng and Takeo provinces, each with the capacity to store 50,000 tonnes of paddy rice and dry approximately 1,500 tonnes ...

National Assembly President Heng Samrin’s native village is, as map lines go, technically inside of Vietnam, the head of Cambodia’s Royal Academy said at a recent press conference. ...

The central bank announced on Friday that it has fined an unnamed microfinance institution (MFI) $100,000 for engaging in non-transparent lending practices. ...

Refugee advocates have welcomed plans from the United Nations to relocate 36 Montagnard asylum seekers to a third country, but the Cambodian government yesterday remained silent as to why it has so far failed to cooperate. ...

The Tax Department’s Kong Vibol on Saturday said English-language newspaper the Cambodia Daily faced shuttering and the seizure of its assets if it failed to pay back taxes it allegedly owes by September 4 – a seeming escalation in the government’s recent targeting of NGOs and ...

A 227-kilogram US-made Mk 82 bomb was unearthed on Wednesday as authorities were digging a pond in Kandal’s Kien Svay district. ...

A meeting yesterday between Interior Ministry officials and the acting leader of jailed government critic Sourn Serey Ratha’s Khmer Power Party ended with the party being asked to file missing annual reports to bring it in line with the Political Parties Law. ...

A sub-decree establishing Cambodia’s first juvenile prison will be issued by the start of September, Minister of Social Affairs Vong Soth told United Nations Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith on Wednesday. ...

The National Election Committee (NEC) yesterday told United Nations Special Rapporteur Rhona Smith that election monitoring coalition the “Situation Room” will have to register with the Interior Ministry if it wants to deploy observers for next year’s elections – despite there being no such requirement ...

Local small- and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) met with government officials yesterday and accused them of not doing enough to support domestic products against a flood of imports while multiple officials claimed that they could provide little assistance unless businesses were properly registered. ...

Leaked materials from the United States-funded NGO National Democratic Institute (NDI) have been portrayed on Facebook and in local media as being part of an “ill intended” strategy to help the opposition party win next year’s national election, with government officials yesterday publicly questioning the ...

As Cambodia continues its upward trajectory towards becoming a lower-middle-income country, it will face even greater challenges in reducing high levels of poverty as the Kingdom loses its preferential trade privileges and donor funding dries up, according to a new World Bank report. ...

Cambodia and China are close to inking an agreement that would bring the Kingdom another step closer to developing its own nuclear technology, officials said yesterday, although it would not be used initially to bolster its electricity production. ...

Phnom Penh Governor Khoung Sreng said the municipality was half-way through a two-week crack-down on pawn shops in order to prevent the sale of stolen goods at the increasing number of second-hand establishments across the capital. ...

In order to promote interbank transactions and lending, the National Bank of Cambodia (NBC) has officially launched a new online platform which allows financial operators to apply for and trade the central bank’s financial instruments like negotiable certificates of deposits (NCDs), liquidity-providing collateralised operations (LPCOs) ...