News
Many jobs ‘vulnerable’: UN human development report
The persistence of dangerous and demeaning forms of work remains a major challenge for the Cambodia’s development, according to the UN’s annual Human Development Report (HDR) launched on 14 December by the United Nations Development Programme. Dubbed “Work for Human Development”, the 2015 report finds the Asia-Pacific region home ...
Organiser arrested over march
The organiser of a protest by community members who face eviction from their homes to make way for a railway project in Banteay Meanchey province was detained on 14 December after demonstrators burned an effigy and dragged its decapitated body through the streets. About 50 protesters marched ...
Mixed feelings over COP21 agreement
Cambodia’s delegates are returning with mixed feelings about the agreement to try and save the planet from catastrophic climate change that was adopted on 12 December at the UN Climate Talks in Paris, known as COP21. In an email sent just before the treaty was adopted, government ...
Cambodia ranks low on gender equality
In spite of gains, gender inequality in Cambodia remains significant, particularly in education and political empowerment, according to the World Economic Forum’s recently released 2015 Global Gender Gap Report. While the Kingdom is ranked 109 out of 145 countries in the world, slipping one place compared with ...
Minister encourages food, drink safety following deaths
Minister of Health Mam Bunheng on 13 December asked the public to stop drinking rice wine and eating sick animals after 19 people died and 170 fell ill in Kratie province over the past month. Improperly fermented booze can contain methyl alcohol or methanol, which is harmful ...
Cambodia's labour market unfazed by AEC
As ASEAN member states race to get ready for the ASEAN Economic Community (AEC) integration later this month, one of the pillars of the new economic bloc is the free flow of skilled labour across borders, with Cambodian industry experts unperturbed by the possibility of ...
NGOs condemn dam power at COP21
Major hydropower projects like the large-scale dams under way in Cambodia’s waterways are a “false solution” to climate change, according to a global coalition of 300 NGOs who are calling on parties at UN climate talks in Paris (COP21) to bar such schemes from climate ...
Thai border shooting injures two loggers
Thai soldiers opened fire on a group of 17 illegal loggers on 10 December evening, wounding two, police said. The group had illegally crossed the border into Thailand in Oddar Meanchey province under cover of darkness when they encountered a Thai patrol, according to Brigadier General Men ...
Human Rights Day protest stays peaceful
Close to 2,000 people, including monks, NGO workers and citizens, marched peacefully to the Ministry of Justice on 10 December morning, defying City Hall’s ban on the Human Rights Day protest. Demonstrators from 16 different provinces marched from three separate locations – the Senate, Chenla Cinema and ...
Malaysia maid pipeline resumes
Cambodia has signed a long-anticipated agreement to resume the legal flow of domestic workers to Malaysia, putting an end to a ban introduced more than four years ago amid reports of serious migrant abuses, which had led to multiple deaths. A statement released on 10 December evening ...