News

Labour Minister Ith Samheng has reminded private recruitment agencies to operate with integrity and strictly adhere to the code of conduct for agencies in order to ensure the safety of workers. ... ...

Recruitment agencies must meet 10 requirements and have no record of wrong-doing for the past five years in order to send Cambodian workers to Japan, according to the Ministry of Labour. ... ...

The Ministry of Information has sent a letter to radio stations ordering them to immediately cease advertisements from recruitment agencies looking to send migrant workers abroad. ... ...

The Ministry of Labour has written to the Ministry of Information requesting that it take action against fraudulent recruitment agencies promoting services for migrant workers via radio advertisements. ... ...

The U.S. has downgraded Cambodia in its latest global Trafficking in Persons Report for showing no discernable improvements in its efforts to combat human trafficking over the past year, the country’s first demotion in five years. ... The 2013 report cites an increase in the number ...

Salaries which start at S$420 (RM1,020.76), and no placement fees from employers. These proposals were part of a document the Cambodian government sent to selected maid agents, as Singapore moves ahead with a pilot scheme to see how well Cambodian maids adapt to life here. The ...

The mother of a domestic maid allegedly stranded in Malaysia has become the latest Cambodian claimant to file an official complaint to the Ministry of Interior over labor abuse in the country. Em Sokhum said her 24-year-old daughter Chher Sophorn left to pursue work in Malaysia more than ...

The recruitment firm HRD Company had allegedly threatened the mother of two sisters working as maids in Malaysia, pressuring her to withdraw her NGO complaint seeking help in repatriating her daughters or risk having all communication with them cut, a rights group said yesterday. Pov Chhan, ...

When Heng Hak escaped from Phnom Penh maid recruitment center in March 2011, falling several stories in the process, she unwittingly became part of a groundswell-one in a series of mounting cases highlighting severe mismanagment of recruitment agencies, and the abuses incurred by both trainees ...

Five brokers saw their convictions upheld yesterday at Phnom Penh’s Court of Appeal for trafficking 20 Cambodian nationals into Thailand, but legal experts say such convictions for trafficking in Cambodia are still far too rare. While Judge Chan Madyna upheld the men’s 2010 convictions, he shaved ...

Heng Hak wore a blank expression yesterday, her hair recently dyed a shade of blonde. Though her appearance suggested composure, a lift of her pant leg revealed the manifestation of the trauma she tried to escape last year. In March 2011, Hak jumped from the third ...

Rights group Adhoc yesterday said it had seen a spike in complaints from families of migrant workers since last year’s government-ordered freeze on recruitment agencies sending maids to Malaysia. At a press conference in Phnom Penh, Adhoc said it had received 141 complaints from the relatives ...

A draft memorandum of understanding (MoU) drawn up by Malaysia to regulate maids working in the country does not sufficiently protect their rights and needs improvements, an official at the Labor Ministry said on Thursday. Malaysian officials drew up the MoU between the two governments following ...

After a year of mounting concern over the treatment of migrant workers both within and outside Cambodia, the Ministry of Labor, NGOs and recruitment agencies yesterday reached an agreement on standardized contracts aimed at minimizing the possibility for exploitation. The groups agreed on a contract between ...

The government has approved Qatar as a destination for the growing number of Cambodian labourers seeking employment overseas. Workers will not be recruited for housekeeping services, however, private sector officials said. The abuse of maids in Malaysia – many of whom were reportedly under-aged – has ...

The Human Rights Commission of Malaysia has for the first time agreed to open an inquiry into the death of a Cambodian maid, opposition lawmaker Mu Sochua said yesterday, calling the investigation "a positive sign." Ms Sochua said that while she had in the past sent ...

At least 20 Cambodian migrant workers in Thailand have had their passports confiscated by a Thai recruitment agency, while another 10 have gone missing after they fled the same agency fearing they would be trafficked to work on Thai fishing vessels, Human Rights Watch and ...

The Association of Cambodian Recruitment Agencies (ACRA) plans to propose a set of measures to the government that would put the association in charge of improving protection for Cambodian maids working in Malaysia. A human rights worker, however, disapproved of the plan because it only involved ...

The government was urged yesterday not to start sending domestic helpers to Malaysia again until it had a Memorandum of Understand with Kuala Lumpur guaranteeing protection of Cambodian migrant workers there. Ya Navuth, executive director of Coordination of Action Research on Aids and Mobility, also said ...

The Cambodian Embassy in Malaysia returned abused Cambodian maids, including women who were raped by their employers, to work at maid recruitment agencies in that country, a new report by Human Rights Watch claims. The New York-based rights group also said Cambodian police colluded with labor ...

More than two weeks after a ban on sending maids to Malaysia began, work on a bilateral agreement that would protect Cambodian maids working in Malaysia has not begun, officials said yesterday. Ho Vuthy, deputy director general at the Ministry of Labor's department of labor, said ...

Two new claims of abuse of Cambodian maids employed in Malaysia have emerged since Friday, including one case of a woman who returned home with severe mental trauma following alleged mistreatment by her Malaysian employer, the victims' families said. Iy Thar, a villager from Kompong Thom ...

Overseas labor recruitment agencies that send maids to Malaysia are planning to lay off about 1,000 staff members as they prepare to close down many pre-departure training centers following a growing scandal around abuses and criminal activity during the recruitment, training and sending of maids. An ...

Police said they freed one recruit from a Phnom Penh recruitment agency this weekend and were seeking to prosecute its director, adding that they were doing the same for the director of the SKMM recruitment agency, where 78 recruits were freed last week. The court ...