News

The U.N. special envoy for human rights in Cambodia on Monday met with about 100 activists in the capital Phnom Penh who sought his help to gain the release of nearly two dozen people arrested during recent violent government crackdowns on striking factory workers. Envoy Surya ...

Relatives and human rights activists on Sunday called on the government to release 23 men beaten and arrested during clashes between police and garment workers just more than a week ago, and said they would defy a ban on public gatherings if they were not. The ...

The government announced on Friday it would set up two commissions headed by Interior Minister Sar Kheng to investigate clashes between police and protesters early this month that left at least four dead, more than 20 injured and 23 arrested, a move criticised by rights ...

In keeping with authorities’ indefinite ban on assembly, security forces yesterday morning dispersed a small gathering of nine youth activists who had planned to call for new elections and justice on behalf of recently slain protesters while singing songs about nonviolence in Freedom Park. Hoping to ...

Three rights monitors filed an attempted murder lawsuit against a Mondulkiri land concessionaire employee on Wednesday, after he violently denied them access to an area under investigation for forest crimes, Adhoc said yesterday. The stand-off comes on the heels of a second potentially violent confrontation ...

A provincial coordinator for rights group Adhoc claimed Thursday that a representative of a company the group was investigating attempted to crash his car into him and two of his colleagues in Mondolkiri province. Sok Ratha said he had received a complaint in December about a ...

Dozens of soldiers from the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) in Banteay Meanchey province have filed a complaint with rights group Adhoc accusing their superiors of serious corruption, stealing veterans’ pensions, nepotism and illegal logging. For three years, a representative of the soldiers said, they had ...

Family members of striking garment factory workers killed, wounded and missing after military police violently suppressed last Friday’s Veng Sreng Street protests have begun preparing complaints to file with authorities and rights NGOs. At least five people were shot dead, and more than 40 were in­jured, ...

Notification that her son is being detained at Correctional Centre 3 in Kampong Cham came as a relief to Touch Sart yesterday, after spending nearly a week wondering whether he was even alive. Since her son, Theng Saroeun, was arrested along with 22 others at demonstrations ...

The International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), along with local rights groups Licadho and Adhoc, denounced the Friday shooting of protesting garment workers by police in a joint statement released in Paris on Monday. “The killing of demonstrators by government authorities is totally unacceptable. The government ...

Hundreds of families in Banteay Meanchey province’s Thma Puok district filed a complaint yesterday to rights group Adhoc, claiming their community farmland is being bulldozed by a company under the protection of soldiers. ...

Two ethnic Kuoy villagers in Preah Vihear province’s Tbeng Meanchey district are in hiding after rumours circulated yesterday that police were seeking to arrest them for participating in a protest against two Chinese plantation firms last week. ...

The number of people shot dead while illegally logging luxury wood in Thailand decreased significantly in 2013 compared to 2012, although a Royal Cambodian Armed Forces (RCAF) official provided numbers much lower than provincial police officials, whose number also differed from human rights groups. Brigadier General ...

In the latest series of arrests involving illegal logging on the Cambodian-Thai border, 21 Cambodians were picked up by Thai authorities on Friday while attempting to smuggle rosewood into Oddar Meanchey province, a rights group said yesterday. Srey Naren, provincial coordinator for rights groups Adhoc, ...

A group of local journalists in Preah Vihear province allege, in a complaint filed with a rights group, that authorities are involved in the sale of illegally logged timber. Seven journalists, who asked that their names and respective outlets not be identified for fear of retribution ...

Security guards from a Chinese development firm in Koh Kong province have allegedly prevented civil society groups from gathering data they planned to use for a petition asking for compensation for evictees. ...

Local human rights group Adhoc has called on the government to investigate the alleged detention and torture of a Cambodian woman at a Bangkok casino where she was employed. In a statement released Friday, Adhoc said the government must push for a “full investigation” into the ...

A coalition of NGOs yesterday implored Prime Minister Hun Sen to shelve the government’s plans for the Stung Cheay Areng hydropower dam in Koh Kong province and instead turn the wilderness area in question into an eco-tourism site. ...

At least four people were injured, one seriously, after Thai soldiers shot them as they allegedly illegally logged the Thai side of the Preah Vihear border on Wednesday. The injured men were part of a group of eight from Preah Vihear province’s Choam Ksan district, provincial ...

LUMPHAT WILDLIFE SANCTUARY, Ratanakkiri Province – From behind the corrugated metal walls of Daun Penh Agrico’s wood depot, the raspy buzz of a chainsaw rattled through the surrounding forest on Monday afternoon. As the chainsaw revved and cut, a heavy-duty truck packed full of long, sawn ...

Twenty-nine families living in Pursat province have been given less than a month’s notice to pack up their belongings and move off state forest grounds. Local authorities handed out the 30-day eviction order on Sunday, according to Chhorn Khorn, a resident living in Phnom Kravanh district’s ...

Villagers in Mondolkiri province filed a complaint with rights group Adhoc on Friday, saying that they had discovered loggers illegally felling trees in their local community forest who claimed to be working for businessman Try Pheap. Mr. Pheap, who owns plantations, mining concessions and special economic ...

Cambodia must establish an independent, national human rights institution with the power to conduct investigations and sanction those guilty of violations, representatives of the country’s two leading local rights groups said on Friday. A consortium of rights groups met Thursday in Phnom Penh to discuss the ...

A private agro-industrial company has come under fire from villagers in Ratanakkiri province who say it has illegally felled resin-producing trees that are their main source of income. More than 1,000 trees in the Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary in Ratanakkiri’s Lumphat district are under threat, the villagers ...