Government

The assistant of a lumber tycoon accused of major deforestation and forced evictions rejected Thursday the findings of a recent report by local rights groups. The Cambodian Human Rights Task Force said in its report that some 1,400 families had been pushed from their land by ...

A month after a company owned by tycoon Kith Meng was ordered to suspend logging the reservoir area of the controversial Lower Sesan II dam, the government yesterday threatened legal action against it if its orders aren’t followed. In a letter obtained by the Post yesterday, the Council ...

Civil servants including police officers in a supervisory role who cut into their subordinates’ salaries will face consequences including criminal charges, Interior Minister Sar Kheng announced last week. In an order obtained by the Post yesterday, Kheng urged civil servants who handle payroll to immediately report to the ...

If Information Minister Khieu Kanharith is any indication, even the government is tiring of state television. Mr. Kanharith announced on Facebook on Wednesday that he had personally ordered the state-run TVK channel to stop broadcasting the comings and goings of state officials on foreign excursions. Mr. ...

When one of Australia’s top intelligence agencies in 2009 presented staff with a slideshow detailing their attempts to intercept mobile telephone calls by Indonesia’s president, first lady and top officials, it also revealed other possible spying targets—including one of Cambodia’s largest mobile operators, MobiTel, according ...

Phnom Penh’s chief prosecutor yesterday attributed an alleged rise in Cambodia’s crime rate to an increase in public demonstrations. Prosecutor general of Phnom Penh Municipal Court Ouk Savuth’s theory came out during a speech he made at a meeting of police and prosecutors held at City ...

When the Supreme Court hears land-rights activist Yorm Bopha’s final appeal this morning, familiar cries for justice will come from Boeung Kak women on the streets outside. Much has been written about the housewives of Boeung Kak who have risen up against the government and developers ...

Average Cambodians are to pay the price for stamping out corruption in the customs department. Prices for basic goods, such as food and clothing, rose recently after the department was ordered last week to clean up its act and apply the official tax rate, importers told ...

The Ministry of Environment on Thursday denied that a private agro-industry firm had been issued an “unofficial” land concession inside Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary, as stated on Monday by the provincial governor. In response to claims by local officials that Daun Penh Agrico Co. Ltd. ...

About 200 workers protested outside SL Garment Factory in Phnom Penh’s Meanchey district Wednesday demanding that managers reinstate 19 union representatives before a 15-day deadline set by the government elapses. The Council of Ministers has ordered the factory to rehire the fired unionists or face punitive ...

Eleven senators supporting the opposition Cambodia National Rescue Party say they will not take part in a Senate session on Thursday scheduled to debate the 2014 budget. Opposition senators say they will not endorse a budget that did not go through proper parliamentary procedure and ...

The government is set to start re-deploying student volunteers to measure and demarcate plots of land across the country as part of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s land-titling scheme, which was briefly suspended ahead of July’s national election. The program was announced by the prime minister in ...

A district-level Environment Ministry official in Ratanakkiri province on Wednesday claimed that he had no way to determine the legality of logging operations by firms with private land concessions inside the province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary. The claim by Chou Sopheak, director of Lumphat district’s environment department, ...

The Finance Ministry on Wednesday defended itself against recent reports that some 45 percent of the government’s $3.4 billion draft budget for 2014 remains unallocated, issuing a statement explaining that the money will pay for loans, subsidies and other vital expenses. According to the statement, ...

Historic O’Russey Market will not be the location of a planned Chinatown development, according to Cambodia’s Tourism Minister. Tourism Minister Thong Khon said the government was looking for another site for the tourism-focused development and that O’Russey Market was not under consideration, as had recently been ...

The Global Alliance for Vaccine and Immunization (GAVI) Board meeting was held here on Thursday to decide which new vaccines will be added to the organization’s portfolio. The two-day meeting brought together 160 people who are representatives of donors and developing countries, civil society organizations, vaccine ...

Opposition leader Sam Rainsy has rebuked the European Union over two low-profile election experts it sent to monitor July’s elections, claiming their presence had undermined Cambodian democracy. In a letter sent on Tuesday to Ugu Astuto, the EU’s top diplomat for South and Southeast Asia, Rainsy ...

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries has released a nine-month status report on 2013’s illegal timber seizures, saying it had confiscated, among other things, more than 2,000 kilograms of rosewood – a figure that represents only a tiny fraction of seizures reported by the Post this ...

More than 100 workers from the Alim garment factory in Phnom Penh marched on City Hall yesterday, demanding the dismissal of four managers. Yam Thaisan, a legal officer from a union representing the workers at the Por Sen Chey district factory, said strikers had called on ...

Traffic police across the country have still not resumed enforcing traffic laws after a pre-election enforcement moratorium that was meant to last just a few weeks ahead of the July 28 poll, according to government and U.N. officials. “The superiors ordered [police] to stop, for a ...

Thai forestry officials killed three Cambodians who were illegally logging on Tuesday, in what they said was a shootout in Thailand’s Sisaket province, a border official said Wednesday. The latest deaths bring the number of Cambodians who have been shot while logging across the border this ...

An “unofficial” land concession granted earlier this year to an agro-industry firm that has logged luxury hardwood in Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary is in violation of Prime Minister Hun Sen’s 2012 moratorium on new economic land concessions (ELCs), a government spokesman said Tuesday. Phay Siphan, ...

CNRP leaders Sam Rainsy and Kem Sokha said Tuesday that the opposition party will no longer negotiate over the political deadlock with the CPP until the ruling party agrees to a transparent election investigation. The CNRP’s 55 lawmakers-elect have been boycotting the National Assembly since it ...

A Cambodian rights group said Wednesday that impunity is on the rise in Cambodia, hitting out at the authorities for failing to resolve a number of high-profile killings and bring the perpetrators to justice. Ahead of International Day to End Impunity on Saturday, the Cambodian ...