News

Prime Minister Hun Sen has told garment workers not to demand an excessive increase in the minimum wage, otherwise factories could move to more affordable countries. ... ...

The Ministry of Labour’s spokesman yesterday said that free medical treatment for garment workers, announced by Prime Minister Hun Sen last week, will start on January 1. ... ...

In yet another potentially major new benefit to Cambodian workers ahead of next year’s national election, Prime Minister Hun Sen on Sunday announced that employees in some of the country’s key industries would soon be able to receive free checkups and treatment at state hospitals. ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen again met with garment sector workers yesterday, adding a boost to maternity leave salaries to a range of promises he had made to them on Tuesday. ... ...

The Education Ministry has unveiled plans to expand a literacy programme for garment factory workers. ... ...

Thousands of workers will once again defy government orders and march through central Phnom Penh this morning to mark International Labor Day, the president of one of Cambodia’s largest independent labor unions said on Monday. ... ...

The Labor Ministry spent more than four billion riel on help for garment workers involved in accidents in the first three months of the year, but unions say staff are still struggling to access healthcare. ... ...

Plans to pay garment workers twice a month will be difficult for employers to implement, industry representatives have warned. The Labor Ministry is amending laws so companies will be required to pay staff twice a month, in a bid to protect workers from being abandoned by ...

Approximately 40 workers fainted at the TMI garment factory in Svay Rieng yesterday, police and workers said. Workers at the factory began feeling sick and fainting when a heavy air of glue fumes wafted into the factory as workers returned from lunch, So Navy, 23, a ...

When the garment factory that employs her opened its doors yesterday for the first time since Sunday’s election, Chan Neoun was about 130 kilometres away, at home in Svay Rieng province. ... Intense rioting and a military crackdown were just some of the rumours flying around ...

A month-long battle to secure back pay waged by 750 garment workers has ended only days before the national election – with the government footing the bill. The $450,000 payout to the Pine Great (Cambodia) factory workers – whose factory owner skipped town in April – ...

Former Bavet town governor Chhouk Bandith has appealed — from hiding — his conviction for shooting three women at a protest earlier last year, his lawyer said. ... His attorney, Sun Bunnarith, said that he had filed the appeal about two weeks ago, and that Bandith’s ...

Social Affairs Ministry officials yesterday promised that about 750 workers from the shuttered Pine Great garment factory will receive their overdue salaries before the election. ... Yesterday Touch Somuth, a member of the Social Affairs Ministry committee formed to resolve the issue, said the committee was ...

Wages for Cambodian garment workers decreased by more than 20 percent in real terms between 2001 and 2011 despite the industry’s exponential increase in exports, which in 2012 were valued at more than $4 billion, according to a recent report by a U.S.-based workers advocacy ...

Despite criticisms over safety, outbreaks of sometimes violent industrial action and a raise in the minimum wage that it was warned would scare off manufacturers, Cambodia’s garment sector is booming, according to government figures. A report on state newswire Agence Kampuchea Presse (AKP) on Friday said ...

Some 400 garment workers yesterday gathered outside the Ministry of Social Affairs to plead for government intervention against a factory owner who fled without paying them overdue wages three months ago. Khem Chamnan, a Free Trade Union representative from the Pine Great (Cambodia) factory in Phnom ...

In light of ongoing disputes over working conditions in the garment sector, the Cambodian Centre for Human Rights (CCHR) released yesterday details on hundreds of factories it believes will offer greater transparency along the garment supply chain – from producers to buyers – and shine ...

Nike expressed “deep concerns” over the May 27 incident at the Sabrina Cambodia Garment Manufacturing plant outside Phnom Penh, in a letters to Cambodia’s commerce and labour ministers released late Friday in the United States. ... Following the violence, eight workers and trade union members were ...

Continuing its efforts to quell an increasing number of strikes in the Kingdom’s lucrative garment sector, the government this week issued a directive aimed at giving provincial and municipal governors powers to resolve issues at factories without calling on ministries in Phnom Penh. “To ensure further ...

Cambodia's strongman Prime Minister Hun Sen on Wednesday warned garment workers that protests demanding higher wages could push manufacturers to quit the country. His appeal came after unions last week said hundreds of workers had been fired from a factory making sportswear for US giant Nike ...

Thousands of workers from the Macau-owned M & V International Manufacturing Ltd on Wednesday blocked National Road Two to demand better working conditions. ... The protestors have 11 lists of demands including bonuses of 4,000 riel ($1) for food, $3 for holiday pay, and $12 for ...

The number of officially recorded workplace deaths in Cambodia increased by more than 25 per cent from 2011 to 2012, while the vast majority of those injured at work were women, National Social Security Fund figures released yesterday reveal. A total of 59 people were reported ...

In a country where corruption is as rife as it is in Cambodia, global brands must work with governments to ensure garment factories are safe and working conditions legal, international NGO Transparency International (TI) said yesterday. In Cambodia, where two workers were killed when a ceiling ...

The Kampong Speu Provincial Court has denied bail for eight unionists accused of instigating violence at the Sabrina Garment factory last Monday. ... Kampong Speu Provincial Court judge, Cheum Rithy said yesterday that he had not approved the bail request because significant work remained in questioning ...