News

Hundreds of families in Koh Kong province’s Khmara Phoumint City are suffering from a shortage of water, which is provided by a reservoir that dried up during the hot season, local officials said yesterday. Smach Meanchey and Dang Tong communes typically receive water from the Cham ...

The first three-day Koh Kong Investment and Trade Fair 2013 kicked off on Saturday, promoting trade and investment in the southern provinces of Cambodia with neighbours Thailand and Vietnam. “The [fair] is aimed at promoting trade and development in Koh Kong province and other border ...

Satiating the demands of the global sugar industry is big business for Cambodia’s sugarcane plantations. Yet accusations of human rights abuses and land grabs in the Kingdom have left a bitter aftertaste for many on the ground as companies vie for a larger slice of ...

Families living in Koh Kong province have called on the provincial governor to intervene in what they claim are ongoing land disputes with Forestry Administration authorities and conservation NGO Wildlife Alliance. Thirty-eight families from Mondul Seima and Khemarak Pumin districts have 110 hectares of land between ...

British sugar firm Tate & Lyle has denied knowing of the alleged abuses at two Cambodian plantations accused of illegally driving hundreds of families off their farms and says that the families have no right to ask the company for compensation, according to the firm’s ...

About a decade ago, global manufacturing firms staged a mass exodus to Asia in search of low-cost alternatives to increasing domestic wage demands and operational costs. The consensus was the continued development of a regional supply chain that had formed in countries like Vietnam and Indonesia, ...

Hundreds of Cambodian families are suing the British sugar firm Tate & Lyle in one of the U.K’s highest courts over a pair of plantations in Koh Kong province they accuse of violently forcing them off their land and out of their homes. The British law ...

Cambodia’s exports to the European Union (E.U.) grew to $2.32 billion in 2012, a 23 percent increase compared to the previous year, according to the E.U.’s latest trade figures. The figures, released this week by the European Commission’s trade office, testify to the region’s growing role ...

Lawmakers from the European Union (E.U) are again urging the block’s trade commissioner to investigate Cambodia’s Economic Land Concessions (ELCs) over a raft of alleged rights abuses and consider revoking the duty free access their owners currently enjoy to member states. Going mostly to industrial ...

Preah Vihear province – The residents of this sleepy district, on the edge of the Boeng Per Wildlife Sanctuary, grow rice, cassava and cashew nuts. But in a few short years, Chinese investors envisage that Rovieng will be rapidly transformed into an industrial town. ...

More than 40 families from Koh Kong province gathered on Friday outside Prime Minister Hun Sen’s Phnom Penh home to ask him to intervene in their land dispute with provincial forestry administration, village representatives said yesterday. According to one villager, 37-year-old Sam Sary, 47 families delivered ...

It’s not a claim every country can make, but Cambodia builds its own cars. A country known for its low-skilled workforce, the Kingdom exceeded expectations with its January release of the Angkor Car, a mini-electric vehicle able to get up to 300 kilometres per charge. ...

Police, military police and forestry officials evicted 100 families in Koh Kong province’s Smach Meanchey district yesterday, shooting into the air during the forcible removal to disperse villagers with the threat of violence. It was the second day of evictions in an area authorities say ...

More than 400 activists fighting the destruction of the Prey Lang forest held a ceremony yesterday in which they tied Buddhist monk’s robes around the trunks of trees – a gesture of protection – to stop them from being cut down. Six monks and villagers from ...

Military police in Preah Sihanouk province said yesterday that they impounded four trucks carrying retail goods worth about $1 million that a lieutenant general in the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces had imported from Thailand without paying tax duty. The unpaid import duty amounted to about ...

With locals demanding dialogue with the Chinese firms behind a proposed multibillion dollar rail line to Preah Vihear province, an NGO report released yesterday highlights the dearth of information that has been made available on the project. Chinese company Cambodia Iron Steel Mining Industry Group (CISMIG) ...

Cambodia’s focus on hydropower will reduce its independence on oil and ensure nationwide access to electricity at a stable price, Prime Minister Hun Sen said in a speech Saturday during the inauguration of a $47.1 million hydropower dam in Koh Kong province. However environmental groups ...

Prime Minister Hun Sen yeserday lauded his government’s strong ties with China but said Cambodia does not give Chinese any preferential treatment. Mr. Hun Sen was speaking at the inauguration of the $47.1 million Kirirom III hydropower dam in Koh Kong province’s Sre Ambel District- constructed ...

Cambodia is predicted to greet 4 million foreign visitors this year, an expected 12 percent rise year-on-year, Tourism Minister Thong Khon said Monday. “Last year, we received 3.58 million foreign tourists, up 24 percent year-on-year, and generated total revenue of about 2.2 billion U.S. dollars,” he ...

The number of people arrested over land disputes jumped 144 percent from a year earlier to 232 in 2012, the Cambodian Human Rights and Development Association (Adhoc) said Thursday. Speaking at a news conference, he [Adhoc president Thun Saray] said Adhoc last year received 70 ...

Nean Narin, a humble man and father of three children, says his family is going hungry. Narin lives in the village of Boeung Kak, situated on the edge of Cambodia’s capital, Phnom Penh. For years, he and other villagers relied on the Boeung Kak Lake ...

Cambodia’s largest opposition party has expressed concern that China’s investment in the country is heavily skewed towards exploiting natural resources, wreaking havoc on the environment. China is Cambodia’s largest investor by a wide margin, having poured U.S. $9.7 billion into the country over the past 18 ...

A group of opposition lawmakers have written to Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen urging action against a sugar factory owned by a ruling party official accused of exploiting child labor and grabbing land from villagers. Six Sam Rainsy Party (SRP) parliamentarians sent a letter dated Jan. ...

Looking to compete with Chinese influence in the region, the U.S. government is making plans to help American companies win large-scale infrastructure projects in Cambodia, U.S. officials said yesterday in Phnom Penh. The plans, which come as part of a strategic and economic embracing of Asia ...