News

Civil society groups yesterday urged the government to step up transparency in the judiciary to create an environment where activists could address social injustices without having to worry about being prosecuted. ...

A report published last week by the UN Action for Cooperation Against Trafficking in Persons (UN-ACT) says the main cause of human trafficking from Cambodia to China was a lack of jobs and low wages, forcing many young women to look at opportunities abroad. ...

Sixteen local NGOs released a joint statement Thursday calling on Prime Minister Hun Sen to publicly repudiate National Military Police Commander Sao Sokha’s January 15 speech in which he said he learned strategy from Adolf Hitler. ...

The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees has distanced itself from Australia’s still unsigned deal to transfer refugees from the Nauru refugee detention center for resettlement in Cambodia, one of Southeast Asia’s poorest nations. First raised in February, the cash-for-refugees deal is believed to be imminent. ...

Australia has considered sending up to 1000 refugees to live on a remote island off the coast of impoverished Cambodia under a controversial resettlement agreement,, according to an opposition leader in Phnom Penh. Australian officials have visited several sites to accommodate the refugees now on Nauru, ...

A controversial deal to allow Australia to send refugees to Cambodia is imminent and could be signed as early as this week, sources have told Fairfax Media. The Australian and Cambodian governments have been negotiating for months over a deal to resettle up to 1000 refugees ...

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 ...

Cambodia’s human rights groups are continuing to seek ways to prevent three draft judicial reform bills from becoming law. The drafts have already passed the National Assembly, but they have not been signed by the king. ...

Cambodian human rights organizations say they have major concerns over a deal with Australia that could send unwanted refugees to Cambodia. The Cambodian Human Rights Action Committee says Cambodia’s track record of human rights abuse and corruption make people “living on the margins” vulnerable to abuse. Australia ...

Cambodia’s opposition leader yesterday called on the Australian government to reconsider its plan to send refugees to the country, which he said was a short-term solution that does not address the root causes of displacement. Sam Rainsy, Cambodia National Rescue Party president, told the Post that Australia should ...

Two civil society organisations are calling on Prime Minister Hun Sen to publish three long-gestating draft laws on judicial reform to allow ample time for “genuine, inclusive and meaningful participation in the drafting process”. Hun Sen said in a speech last Wednesday that the three laws ...

A call for the Cambodian government to lift its controversial ban on public assembly is among 34 such recommendations it has chosen to defer in the wake of last week’s second Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of its human rights situation. The UN on Saturday released a ...

Cambodia is preparing three long-awaited laws aimed at restoring its widely criticized judicial system. However, two of the three draft laws obtained by VOA Khmer still need a lot more improvement, according to legal experts. The laws focus on codifying court jurisdiction, laying out guidelines for ...

The Interior Ministry on Wednesday threatened to revoke the license of the Cambodian Independent Teachers Association (CITA) if it goes ahead with a planned demonstration next week seeking higher wages for the country’s educators. An official at the ministry said that the move to revoke the ...

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. ...

A woman was killed and at least six others shot yesterday morning when police fired live ammunition into a crowd of hundreds of rioting garment workers in the capital’s Stung Meanchey district. UN reports said police also arrested 37 people, including seven monks, as a result ...

Three families involved in a land dispute with a private company filed a complaint Monday at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court accusing the company’s owner, businessman Khun Sear, of waging an ongoing campaign of intimidation as he tries to force the families from their homes ...

Three highly venomous cobras were thrown early Tuesday morning into the Phnom Penh home of a family locked in a dispute with a private company that wants to develop the family’s land in Tuol Kok district. Ly Sreang Kheng, 58, his wife Mok Siv Hong, 51, ...

Four NGOs asked the government yesterday to explain the decision to promote Lao Saroeun to an undersecretary of state position in the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications, even though he has not been cleared of alleged corruption. “In proper practice, people under investigation for alleged corruption ...

More than 200 people were arrested while defending their land in 2012 – a year human rights groups described yesterday as Cambodia’s “worst” for land disputes. Of the 201 people arrested – a figure that more than doubled the 2011 total – 29 were imprisoned, mostly ...