News
‘Burst’ of land disputes sees dozens of Cambodians charged: rights group
Cambodian authorities have charged nearly half as many villagers in land dispute cases in the first three months of this year as they did in all of 2013, a local rights group said Thursday, adding that most of the rows stemmed from government-granted land concessions. Following ...
Radio Free Asia News Staff
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/land-05082014175124.html
BK evictees lose battle on plot size
Fourteen families evicted from Boeung Kak were left disappointed again yesterday when Phnom Penh’s governor ignored their calls to increase the size of land plots authorities had offered them. During a three-hour meeting, Governor Pa Socheatvong held firm on a 2011 decision that the families would ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/bk-evictees-lose-battle-plot-size
Activists ‘shot at’ by unknown assailant
Activists from the Boeung Kak, Borei Keila and Thmor Kol communities were on board a bus on Saturday night when a bullet was fired into the windscreen, their representatives said yesterday. Bo Chorvy, 39, from Boeung Kak, said more than 40 people were on the bus ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/activists-%E2%80%98shot-%E2%80%99-unknown-assailant
Boeung Kak protester trio detained, released
In yet another case of district security guards assuming the role of police officers, three evictees of the capital’s Boeung Kak lake area were detained in the capital yesterday morning and taken to a police station. Daun Penh district security guards seized Em Srey Touch, 41, ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/boeung-kak-protester-trio-detained-released
Group of B Kak villagers get long-awaited land titles
Years of fighting for their land came to an end for 17 families at Phnom Penh’s Boeung Kak community yesterday when City Hall delivered them long-awaited land titles. The handover was part of a vow to resolve the capital’s main land disputes made by Phnom Penh ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/group-b-kak-villagers-get-long-awaited-land-titles
Spirited protest at Riverside
Land activists said it was a spiritual ceremony; authorities described it as the latest attention-grabbing from “professional protesters”. Whatever the case, once the familiar scuffling between menacing security guards and civilians had passed yesterday, a demonstration calling for the release of 21 workers and activists arrested ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/spirited-protest-riverside
UN Envoy Asks Cambodia to Lift Demonstrations Ban
A U.N. rights envoy suggested Thursday that Cambodia lift a ban on public gatherings in the capital imposed amid a violent crackdown on demonstrators a month ago. Maina Kiai, the U.N.’s global Special Rapporteur for freedom of peaceful assembly and association, made the suggestion to Foreign ...
Radio Free Asia News Staff
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/rapporteur-02062014181843.html
Slum improvements planned
Civil society groups and Phnom Penh municipal officials next month will hold a workshop to decide which designated slum areas will be the focus of a planned pilot project to improve living standards. On Tuesday night, Phnom Penh governor Pa Socheatavong and members of civil society ...
Chhay Channyda
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/slum-improvements-planned
Marchers to flout ban on protests
Hundreds of civil society representatives, garment workers and community groups are expected to take to the streets this morning to deliver petitions to foreign embassies calling on the government to release the 23 people arrested during garment worker strikes earlier this month and find justice ...
Kevin Ponniah and Cheang Sokha
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/marchers-flout-ban-protests
US House passes B Kak bill
A draft US law that would require the World Bank to regularly report to congress about the condition of families displaced or still living in the Boeung Kak lake area was approved Wednesday by the House of Representatives. The bill includes language that specifically requires the ...
Sean Teehan and Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/us-house-passes-b-kak-bill
Boeung Kak protesters regroup
A combined group of protesters from the capital’s Boeung Kak lake community yesterday ended their blockade of Monivong Boulevard with some disappointment after Cambodia National Rescue Party president Sam Rainsy broke a promise to meet them at City Hall. Protesters have been blocking the road outside ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/boeung-kak-protesters-regroup
After prison, Bopha undeterred
Shelving any thoughts that 14 months in prison had deterred her from protesting, Yorm Bopha rushed to the capital’s Borei Keila community yesterday morning to try to stop authorities from forcing evictees from an abandoned building. Bopha was one of about 10 Boeung Kak activists called ...
Phak Seangly, Khouth Sophak Chakrya and Shane Worrell
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/after-prison-bopha-undeterred
Boeung Kak villagers closer to land titles
It’s taken years of waiting – and protesting – but families in the capital’s Boeung Kak community yesterday saw City Hall officials measure land in their villages. Representatives of the city were deployed yesterday to villages 24, 22 and 6 to demarcate land as a step ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/boeung-kak-villagers-closer-land-titles-linkfix
Activists give photos, video as evidence of attack
Land activists who were brutally cracked down on at a protest in September submitted video and pictorial evidence of masked suspects slinging marbles, beating and electric shocking them to Phnom Penh Municipal Court yesterday. The group of 70 Borei Keila and Boeung Kak activists are suing ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/activists-give-photos-video-evidence-attack
Police beat Borei Keila activists blocking road
Yet another clash between protesters and police resulted in at least three women being knocked unconscious in the capital yesterday. A Post reporter saw police punch and use batons to quell protesters after a group of about 250 people, including many from the Borei Keila community ...
Khouth Sophak Chakrya
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/police-beat-borei-keila-activists-blocking-road
Calls for Boeung Kak Activist’s Release Renewed on One-Year Anniversary
Cambodian and international rights groups have renewed their calls for the release of Phnom Penh housing rights campaigner campaigner Yorm Bopha one year after her arrest, urging the public and national leaders not to forget her during the country’s current political deadlock. Global watchdog Amnesty International ...
Radio Free Asia
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/yorm-bopha-09032013201419.html
Startup Promises a Future for Former Boeng Kak Residents
In mid-August, on day seven of production at the Coco Khmer social enterprise, the team experienced a setback. Temperatures in the fermenting room must remain between 35 and 40 degrees to produce the organization’s virgin coconut oil, but the temperature on that rainy day refused to ...
Devon Geary and Mech Dara
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/startup-promises-a-future-for-former-boeng-kak-residents-41532/
Voters split in Boeung Kak
The battle for Phnom Penh at Sunday’s national election will be fought out with the years-long Boeung Kak land dispute still unresolved, after the city’s governor announced yesterday a solution would be found only after the ballot, villagers said. Phnom Penh Governor Pa Socheatvong, who in ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/voters-split-boeung-kak
Housing Activists Clash With Police in Street Protest
At least two women were injured Monday as housing rights activists clashed with police in Phnom Penh. The activists had been demonstrating by sitting in a major street in front of City Hall to demand land titles in two ongoing land disputes in the capital, those ...
Police Detain Protesting NagaWorld Staff
Nineteen NagaWorld casino employees were detained Tuesday afternoon as police attempted to break up a protest of more than 500 workers who had picketed in front of the casino for the past six days, demanding the company increase their salaries. The workers had been striking non-violently ...
http://www.cambodiadaily.com/news/police-detain-protesting-nagaworld-staff-31336/
Police block Beoung Kak protesters
More than 100 police and security guards, including riot squad members, were deployed to the capital’s Boeung Kak lake community yesterday to block a protest that, at times, involved only three shouting women. About 50 members of the Boeung Kak community tried to march from Village ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/2013061866329/National/police-block-beoung-kak-protesters.html
Boeung Kak Resolution Speeds on
Responding to a new plan put forward by members of the Boeung Kak community and NGOs last month, Phnom Penh Municipal Hall announced on Friday that it had drawn up a list of all families who remain excluded from the 12.44 hectares Prime Minister Hun ...
http://www.phnompenhpost.com/2013061066166/National/boeung-kak-resolution-speeds-on.html
Boeung Kak villagers, city officials talking titles
Local authorities met with Boeung Kak community members yesterday to register villagers left out of the oft-criticised resettlement scheme as a first step to providing them with titles and onsite housing. More than 10 officials including police, commune and village chief, as well as representatives of ...
Water Cannon Crackdown on Cambodian Land Activists
Cambodian police used water cannons Wednesday to disperse around 200 women demanding a quick resolution to long-running land disputes, knocking at least three of the protesters, including a 72-year-old, unconscious. The move came two days after authorities used stun batons to disperse a protest over wages ...
http://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/land-05292013164116.html