Social development

Hard-line nationalist Buddhist monk U Wirathu has revealed that his Committee for the Protection of Race and Religion, known as Ma Ba Tha, is providing aid to displaced Christians in war-ravaged Kachin State. Ma Ba Tha said it had donated K6 million for internally displaced persons ...

The United Nations has called for an expansion of immunisation to combat the threat of polio and other preventable diseases, after two cases of a vaccine-derived form of the virus were detected in northern Rakhine State. The World Health Organization and the UN Children’s Fund said ...

The government knew two Chinese men it detained were refugees awaiting resettlement in Canada, but still deported them to China, according to a United Nations letter seen by Reuters. The letter, sent by the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ...

Countless rape victims, many of them children, have been failed by widespread flaws in Cambodia’s justice system, which have led to a “disturbingly low” number of convictions, a new study by the rights group Licadho has found. In its report, Getting Away With It: The Treatment ...

Over 100 students and climate change activists packed into a lecture hall at the Cambodia-Japan Cooperation Center at Royal University of Phnom Penh on 29 November afternoon for a “public mobilisation” to raise awareness of Cambodia’s position at the UN Climate Talks in Paris (COP 21) ...

A Cambodian youth group has urged the government to end its foot dragging over a law to impose an age limit on consuming and buying alcohol and other restrictions aimed at reducing drinking. Keep reading ...

Up to 38,000 Thais could be dying from antibiotic-resistant bacteria annually because of overprescription and the prevalence of the drugs in food and the water supply, research has found. Drug System Monitoring Mechanism Development Centre manager Niyada Kiatying-Angsulee said her research found Thailand had a worryingly high ...

The Chinese government confirmed it has repatriated and detained two dissidents who were living in Thailand and had won UN recognition as refugees, a state-run newspaper reported 26 November. Thai police handed over the two Chinese men — Jiang Yefei and Dong Guanping — to Chinese ...

Myanmar’s new government to be formed by the National League for Democracy will support the nationwide ceasefire process, senior party officials on 26 November assured five ethnic armed groups that signed the pact last month with President U Thein Sein. Leaders of the five groups met the officials ...

Vietnam has seen a sharp decrease in the number and the severity of traffic accidents in recent years. Compared to 2011, the number of traffic accidents in 2015 has gone down by 51 per cent, the number of fatalities and injured down by 24 per ...