News
China says accord reached at last with Myanmar on oil pipeline
China and Myanmar have reached an agreement on an oil pipeline between the neighboring countries after almost a decade of talks, with the project due to start “very quickly,” Chinese vice foreign minister Liu Zhenmin said on Monday. The new oil gateway fits with China’s “One ...
Myanmar designates 20 fields to promote investment
Myanmar’s efforts to promote investment will target 20 newly designated fields covering 192 types of businesses and services, using a law enacted in October that makes it easier for foreign companies to receive tax benefits. The industries covered include manufacturing, agriculture, urban development, communications and medicine, while fields ...
More than 30 villagers get food poisoning
More than 30 people, mostly children, were hospitalized with food poisoning on Sunday in Battambang town. Health Ministry spokesperson Dr. Ly Sovann, who is also the director of communicable diseases control department, said most of the patients were discharged yesterday after receiving treatment from provincial ...
Villagers, soldiers in land battle
Villagers involved in a long-running land dispute in Kratie province’s Sambor district have prevented soldiers from building a fence around disputed land that the army intends to use as a sniper training ground. The two-year-old conflict surrounding 20 hectares in O’Krieng commune’s O’Kandie village between ...
MFIs predict lower earnings
With the interest rate cap of 18 percent in full force for all new and restructured microfinance loans after the National Bank of Cambodia issued a populist measure to curb high interest rates, microfinance institutions are starting to give predictions for lower profits this year ...
Growth in Thai jobless rate spurs gov’t plan
Close to half a million people in Thailand were unemployed last month, up 99,000 or 1.3 percent in the same period last year, which is spurring the government to offer skills training for jobless workers. A total of 496,000 people were jobless last month, a jump ...
Two killed, nine injured in Xekong bus crash
Two people were killed instantly and nine others sustained injuries after two buses collided head-on in Laksao village, Thataeng district, Xekong province on Sunday. Deputy Chief of the Xekong Traffic Police Office, First Lieutenant Sonevixay Keo-ounvong, told Vientiane Times on Monday the accident happened at ...
New law offers incentives to attract investment
A newly-amended Investment Promotion Law has recently been promulgated, offering a variety of incentives to attract investment in both promoted sectors and hardship areas. Businesses investing and operating in hardship communities (known as Area I),where infrastructure has not yet been developed, will enjoy favourable profit ...
Cambodia’s microfinance shakeup: in whose interest?
On the river island of Koh Srolav in southern Cambodia, everything changed for the 300 or so families inhabiting the small fishing village about ten years ago, when the sand dredging barges arrived. Operating in the dark of night, they have plundered the Tatai river with ...
Donors embrace hospital's 'green' bag campaign
More than 100,000 cloth bags have been donated to Wat Bot district Hospital in response its request for environmentally friendly bags to replace plastic ones previously used for prescribed medication. The management of the public hospital stopped distributing medication in plastic bags this year as ...
