Land
Bunong vow to act against Mondolkiri loggers
Ethnic Bunong in Mondolkiri province’s Sen Monorom City said Tuesday that they would no longer cooperate with local officials in fighting illegal logging and that they would begin to confiscate loggers’ equipment and burn illicit timber themselves. At a press conference in Phnom Penh, representatives of ...
Sek Odom
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/bunong-vow-to-act-against-mondolkiri-loggers-62960/
Chroy Changva locals threaten ocic pipeline
District security guards were deployed to Chroy Changva peninsula Tuesday to intercept villagers who were ready to smash a pipe that has been pumping sand onto their land for the past year. The roughly 40 families occupy the northeastern corner of a 387-hectare swathe of wetlands ...
Sek Odom and Matt Blomberg
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/chroy-changva-locals-threaten-ocic-pipeline-62950/
Delay Sesan dam: villagers
Villagers who will be displaced if the controversial Lower Sesan II dam is built called on the developers yesterday to postpone construction for five years, allowing time for a comprehensive resettlement scheme to be devised. But a government official dismissed their request as “beyond the pale”, ...
Phak Seangly and Daniel Pye
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/delay-sesan-dam-villagers
RCAF members arrested for trafficking wood
Two Royal Cambodian Armed Forces soldiers were arrested on Monday while smuggling luxury wood in Kompong Thom province, military police said Tuesday. ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/rcaf-members-arrested-for-trafficking-wood-62956/
Security guards accused of beating
Security guards working for a firm building a resort in Koh Kong province beat a woman who was trying to farm the land from which she had been evicted, she has told police. Khun Phall, 40, said that on Monday evening, she and family members returned ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/security-guards-accused-beating
Hun Sen urges fishermen to stop fishing illegally
Prime Minister Hun Sen marked National Fish Day on Tuesday in Kompong Chhnang province by urging fishermen to refrain from illegal fishing and report lawbreakers. The government bans fishing in the Mekong and Tonle Sap rivers during the breeding season to allow fish stocks to ...
Khy Sovuthy
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/hun-sen-urges-fishermen-to-stop-fishing-illegally-62944/
Villagers accuse Mondolkiri company of major deforestation
Mondolkiri provincial villagers on Tuesday accused authorities there of colluding with a development company involved in serious deforestation. The Phnong minority villagers say the wife of the deputy provincial governor owns the company, Villas Development, which is allegedly involved in illegal logging. The activists spoke Tuesday ...
Suy Heimkhemra
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/villagers-accuse-mondolkiri-company-of-major-deforestation/1948555.html
Land issues creating mistrust of local officials, observers say
Despite a number of agencies dispatched to solve land dispute, rights workers say people continue to face forced evictions and rights abuses by land developments. These problems are not being handled at the local level, fueling mistrust in local government, rights workers say. Rights workers from myriad ...
Suy Heimkhemra
http://www.voacambodia.com/content/land-issues-creating-mistrust-of-local-officials-observers-say/1947717.html
Former councilor arrested for alleged fraud
Interior Ministry police arrested a former Phnom Penh deputy governor and municipal councilor on Thursday for questioning over allegations of land fraud, but released him the next day, police said Sunday. Chea Sothon, who served as a councilor from 2009 until earlier this year and was ...
Eang Mengleng
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/former-councilor-arrested-for-alleged-fraud-62744/
Parties face off at VN border
About 100 plainclothes men, some wielding sticks, tried to block a group of opposition activists and youth supporters in Svay Rieng province yesterday from reaching a disputed section of the Cambodia-Vietnam border. Clashes broke out at about 10am between the group of Cambodia National Rescue Party ...
Meas Sokchea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/parties-face-vn-border
Boeng Kak factions brawl over police base
The once unified fight of the Boeng Kak lake community against their forced eviction visibly fractured over the weekend, as factions within the community accused each other of literally casting the first stone in a brawl that broke out Saturday over a new military police ...
Aun Pheap and Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/boeng-kak-factions-brawl-over-police-base-62731/
As lake disappears, a development dilemma
Looking out from his house, held up by three-meter stilts on a peninsula that juts into Boeng Tompun lake, Chan Sokhom can see the sand inching closer to him every day. Within a few years, the sand will likely reach his doorstep. By then, Mr. Sokhom ...
Cameron Rhoads and Sek Odom
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/as-lake-disappears-a-development-dilemma-62718/
Judge agrees to delay trial
Greg Thomas Fryett, a British businessman arrested by the Anti-Corruption Unit last year for alleged links to a multimillion-dollar Ponzi scheme, went on trial on Friday at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court. ...
Buth Reaksmey Kongkea
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/post-weekend/judge-agrees-delay-trial
Villagers shoot slingshots in land dispute battle
A bloody slingshot battle broke out in Kompong Speu province yesterday when villagers who have sold their land to a private company defended the firm’s machinery as it attempted to bulldoze the homes of neighbors who have refused to sell. The dispute, in Thpong district’s Ya ...
Ben Sokhean
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/villagers-shoot-slingshots-in-land-dispute-battle-62582/
City builds Military Police Base amid activist neighborhood
A military police official confirmed Thursday that his unit’s new headquarters were being built in the heart of Phnom Penh’s restive Boeng Kak neighborhood, meters away from the homes of some of the country’s most high-profile anti-eviction activists. About a half-dozen armed military police officers were ...
Mech Dara and Zsombor Peter
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/city-builds-military-police-base-amid-activist-neighborhood-62576/
ADB protest lands meeting, few results
About 60 residents from Phnom Penh and the provinces of Battambang, Banteay Meanchey and Preah Sihanouk who lost land or are in danger of losing land due to a railroad development project funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) protested outside its offices Thursday morning ...
Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/adb-protest-lands-meeting-few-results-62593/
7 of Cambodia's best islands
They’re still massively undeveloped compared to their Thai neighbors, but Cambodia’s islands are starting to get the attention they deserve. Whether you’re looking for an all-night party or an underwater adventure among pristine coral reefs, Cambodia’s got an island for all types and all budgets. Not ...
Lina Goldberg
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/27/travel/cambodia-best-islands/
Pollution woes: Gov’t meets with locals about mine
Officials from the Ministry of Mines and Energy yesterday met with villagers in Ratanakkiri province’s Taveng district about a gold mine they allege violates the law and introduces toxic chemicals into the nearby Sesan River. ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/pollution-woes-gov%E2%80%99t-meets-locals-about-mine
Despite jail, village chief retains title
A village chief in Siem Reap who was sentenced on Tuesday to a year in prison for levelling private property to construct an office building will retain his position – at least until his appeal hearing is over, a commune official said yesterday. ...
Thik Kaliyann
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/despite-jail-village-chief-retains-title
Court gives village chief jail sentence
Two men, including a local official, were sentenced to a year in prison on Tuesday for clearing privately owned land to construct an office building in Siem Reap nearly two years ago, their lawyer said yesterday. ...
Thik Kaliyann
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/court-gives-village-chief-jail-sentence
Firm buying Boeng Kak land claims no knowledge of evictions
A Singapore-based firm whose subsidiary plans to buy land in Phnom Penh from which thousands of families have been forcibly evicted said Wednesday that the firm had no knowledge of the long-running land dispute. The firm, HLH Group, also denied any official or financial ties to ...
Zsombor Peter and Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/firm-buying-boeng-kak-land-claims-no-knowledge-of-evictions-62463/
Evictees abandon new land
About half the Koh Kong province villagers relocated to make way for a Union Development Group resort project have abandoned the new homes provided for them, citing poor conditions and an inconvenient location, a village representative said yesterday. More than 1,000 families living in the province’s ...
Phak Seangly
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/evictees-abandon-new-land
Fines called for in case against Khmer Krom
An ongoing land dispute may become more than just an embittered ordeal for three Khmer Krom villagers after officials requested yesterday that a Takeo court levy them huge fines. According to representatives from Borei Choslar district’s Sangkum Meanchey village, they are only farming barren land that ...
Sen David
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/fines-called-case-against-khmer-krom
Officials seek solutions to rush on Kratie land
Local authorities in Kratie met Tuesday with 301 families who were recently given a social land concession in Snuol district to discuss how to deal with an influx of hundreds of villagers who are also hoping to live on the land. The 750-hectare concession was granted ...
Aun Pheap
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/officials-seek-solutions-to-rush-on%E2%80%88kratie-land-62359/