The Phnom Penh Post
Ministry shake-up as AEC integration looms
The Ministry of Commerce is undergoing an internal shake-up to better position itself for the opening up of trade across the region. Commerce Minister Sun Chanthol told the Post yesterday that ahead of Asean Economic Community (AEC) integration in 2015, new divisions were being established and others realigned ...
Daniel de Carteret
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/ministry-shake-aec-integration-looms
Schools take funding plan to the bank
Like mob deals and black market trades, the Cambodian school budget is dealt in suitcases of cash. Four times a year, the school operating budget is dispersed in stacks of cash transferred from the central bank to the Ministry of Education, eventually ending up with the ...
Laignee Barron and Chhay Channyda
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/schools-take-funding-plan-bank
Cops on call for KNY
As hundreds of thousands participate in the annual mass migration from Phnom Penh to their home provinces for Khmer New Year next week, military police will remain at their posts. National Military Police in the capital and provincial outlets will be working at full capacity 24 ...
Vong Sokheng and Maria Wirth
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/cops-call-kny
Rice sector credit boost
The government-backed Rural Development Bank (RDB) will lend $64 million to Cambodia’s agriculture sector in 2014, the bank’s top official said yesterday. Sun Kunthor, president of RDB, said most of the funding would be used to support growth in Cambodia’s rice sector as it strives to ...
Chan Muyhong
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/rice-sector-credit-boost
Palace says King’s name still intact
The Royal Palace yesterday said the letter sent by opposition leader Sam Rainsy to King Norodom Sihamoni last week that elicited a furious response from the government for “insulting” the King, did not, in fact, disrespect the monarch’s “honour and name”. A statement signed by the ...
Kevin Ponniah and Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/palace-says-king%E2%80%99s-name-still-intact
Factories not monitoring chemicals, says ministry
Following the mass fainting of hundreds of workers at garment factories last week, an official at the Ministry of Labour has raised concerns over the control of toxic chemicals. Leng Tong, director of the Labour Ministry’s occupational health and safety department, said factories should be providing ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/factories-not-monitoring-chemicals-says-ministry
Villagers make plea over crocs
A group of villagers from Koh Kong’s Areng Valley gathered outside the offices of Flora & Fauna International (FFI) in Phnom Penh yesterday, demanding a say in a project designed to relocate endangered Siamese crocodiles from the site of the planned Stung Cheay Areng dam. ...
Phak Seangly and Amelia Woodside
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/villagers-make-plea-over-crocs
Businesses warned not to increase holiday rate
With Khmer New Year arriving next week, Prime Minister Hun Sen has warned tourism-related businesses against increasing service prices during the three-day holiday. Speaking at a graduation ceremony for students at Vanda Institute of Accounting in Koh Pich yesterday, the prime minister appealed to hotels, guesthouses, ...
Hor Kimsay
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/businesses-warned-not-increase-holiday-rate
Pardons given to 70
Seventy prisoners are to be released during Khmer New Year next week in an amnesty that will also see hundreds of prison sentences reduced by up to a year. The Ministry of Justice approved 555 applications for sentence reductions and pardons following a request by its ...
May Titthara
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/pardons-given-70
Python peddler arrested
Police in Kandal province’s Koh Thom district seized a shipment of live pythons en route to market in Vietnam on Friday, arresting the accused smuggler and turning the snakes over to conservation group Wildlife Alliance, police said yesterday. ...
Kim Sarom
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/python-peddler-arrested
Angkor ready for surge of tourists
Siem Reap hotel operators are preparing for a deluge of tourists this Khmer New Year season the likes of which is not often seen, tourism officials say. Chheuy Chhorn, deputy director of Siem Reap’s tourism department, said after attracting 170,000 visitors to the first annual Angkor ...
Hor Kimsay
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/angkor-ready-surge-tourists
Leaflets get unionist in hot water
Police in Svay Rieng province yesterday afternoon arrested a union worker who was delivering flyers supporting a stay-at-home strike scheduled to begin after Khmer New Year. While delivering about 1,100 fliers to union members at Full Fortune Knitting, Kem Chamroeun, a 25-year-old Collective Union of Movement ...
Mom Kunthear and Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/leaflets-get-unionist-hot-water
Paddy rice farms curb losses from lost land
Cambodian paddy rice production fell only slightly during the first half of this year’s dry season, despite 12,000 hectares of usually productive land deemed unusable due to last year’s floods. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries, dry season paddy rice production between December ...
Chan Muyhong
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/paddy-rice-farms-curb-losses-lost-land
Weekend storms take heavy toll
A weekend storm surge that saw torrential downpours hit the capital had far more dire consequences outside of Phnom Penh, where hundreds of families were affected and at least one man was killed. At least 675 homes in eight provinces were damaged in sudden thunderstorms that ...
Khoun Leakhana
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/weekend-storms-take-heavy-toll
Ethnic group petitions UN to halt Areng dam
The Areng Chorng ethnic minority group yesterday submitted five petitions – addressed to the UN office in Cambodia and four government institutions – seeking a halt to the Sinohydro dam project in Koh Kong province. After blocking Sinohydro from entering the dam site in the Areng ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/ethnic-group-petitions-un-halt-areng-dam
Licadho data ‘not real’: gov’t
The government yesterday accused Licadho of producing wildly misleading figures on land grabs, following the rights group’s announcement earlier this week that land conflicts in Cambodia have affected more than half a million people since 2000. Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Sar Sovan, secretary of ...
May Titthara and Alice Cuddy
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/licadho-data-%E2%80%98not-real%E2%80%99-gov%E2%80%99t
Sochua hits road after park ouster
Opposition lawmaker-elect Mu Sochua protested for her “right to freedom” for the third day running at Freedom Park yesterday and was once again forcibly ejected from the area by security forces. But the now-familiar encounter departed from the script when she left the area and went ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya and Alice Cuddy
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/sochua-hits-road-after-park-ouster
Krom families protest eviction
Sixty-eight Khmer Krom families in Takeo province allege they are being forcibly evicted, charged by fishery authorities with illegally occupying a nature preserve. Yesterday, three representatives from the Borei Choslar district, Sangkum Meanchey village, were summonsed to court. ...
Chhay Channyda and Laignee Barron
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/krom-families-protest-eviction
Assembly OKs law to patch up roadways
A draft law meant to improve the maintenance and construction of Cambodia’s dilapidating roads was passed yesterday in a one-sided session of the National Assembly that saw ruling party lawmakers lambast Public Works and Transport Minister Tram Iv Tek for his allegedly poor stewardship. ...
Buth Reaksmey Kongkea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/rcaf-captain-guilty-outlawed-birds%E2%80%99-battle
Fish exports fail to impress
Cambodian fishery exports rose slightly during the first three months of the year, according to a report by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries. The report, which was released yesterday, says that fish exports reached 4,800 tonnes in the first quarter, a year-on-year increase of ...
Chan Muyhong
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/business/fish-exports-fail-impress
Insecticides blamed for faintings
Nearly 100 garment workers employed by the New Wide garment factory in Phnom Penh’s Dangkor district have fainted since Tuesday evening after company representatives’ allegedly sprayed insecticide throughout the factory, a local official and a worker said. ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/insecticides-blamed-faintings
Eco groups slam Areng dam
Two major conservation groups yesterday said that the proposed Stung Cheay Areng dam in Koh Kong province should be scrapped, while protesters who have blocked developer Sinohydro Group from entering the site for several days headed to Phnom Penh to voice their concerns and discontent. Conservation ...
Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/eco-groups-slam-areng-dam
Intervention urged for dam
In anticipation of a regional summit this weekend, government officials and civil society have their sights locked on a controversial hydropower development just across the Cambodian border in Laos. NGO Forum submitted an open letter yesterday urging Prime Minister Hun Sen to confront Laos about its ...
Laignee Barron and Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/intervention-urged-dam
Smugglers’ boats sink in timber chase
Smugglers sank two boats filled with illegally logged rosewood into Koh Kong’s Sre Ambel River as they shook off pursuing rangers from Wildlife Alliance on March 22, the NGO has said. An anonymous informant tipped off rangers in Sre Ambel district to the boats, allegedly filled ...
Amelia Woodside and Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/smugglers%E2%80%99-boats-sink-timber-chase