LIBRARY

12 February 2015

January 2014 started bloody and violent as thousands of mixed security forces mobilized to ruthlessly suppress a global strike by garment workers for a rise in minimum wage as well as putting an end to the three-week long post-election protest by the opposition. LICADHO monitors witnessed security forces firing live ammunition and grenades directly at crowds of civilians near the Canadia Industrial Area on Veng Sreng road, Phnom Penh, leading to four shot dead, one disappearance of a 15 year old boy, Khem Sophath, and 38 others hospitalized in the worst state violence to hit Cambodia in over a decade.Following the events that occurred on Veng Sreng road, the ruling party continued a policy of systematically repressing civil society as security forces continued to operate with impunity against peaceful protests, access to public spaces such as Freedom Park were shutdown, numerous human rights activists were arrested and tried on spurious charges, and laws designed to curtail freedom of assembly and expression continued to be drafted.

20 January 2015

Ahead of the appeal hearing this week for 10 land activists and one monk, all wrongfully convicted and imprisoned following unfair trials, LICADHO is publishing a new report about the current state of Cambodian prisons and the human rights implications for those held in them.

The report “Rights at a Price: Life inside Cambodia’s Prisons” details the ongoing, systematic abuse, discrimination, exploitation and corruption within Cambodia’s prison system and notes that despite steps towards reform, many challenges remain, including prison overcrowding, poor infrastructure, lack of appeal transportation, weak implementation of the law and lack of knowledge amongst prison officials.

22 December 2014

The violence that erupted at Freedom Park on July 15, 2014, led to a series of politically orchestrated events at the hand of the ruling Cambodian People’s Party (CPP). The arrests of various officials from the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP), including elected Members of Parliament (MPs), alongside ongoing political negotiations offers clear evidence that the judiciary is firmly within the hands of the CPP, once again raising serious concerns about the legitimacy and independence of Cambodia’s legal system.

23 November 2014

During the last decade tens of thousands of Cambodians have been forcibly removed from their homes or their farmland and many more threatened with displacement. In the majority of cases, the Cambodian authorities are involved in the disputes, through the granting of land concessions or the use of state forces to intimidate people, remove them from their land and destroy homes.

In response, many affected communities have organized themselves to resist eviction or to seek proper redress for what they have lost. Cambodian women have been at the forefront of these campaigns with many becoming effective community leaders and human rights advocates.

18 September 2014

The government has once again decided to push forward with a flawed Law on Unions of Enterprises (Trade Union Law) draft that could severely undermine freedom of association in Cambodia. The law has been years in the making and saw several improvements after consultations in the past. However, the overall quality of the current draft obtained in May 2014 has taken a dramatic turn for the worse and the government has still not been able to articulate a persuasive reason for its passage.

23 July 2014

This week, as 8 opposition party members have been provisionally released from prison but remain accused of spurious charges for leading an insurrection and inciting violence, the Human Rights Committee’s Task Force meets to adopt the issues that will be considered by the Human Rights Committee in March 2015 when it assesses Cambodia’s compliance with the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) for the first time since 1998.

In order to help inform the Task Force’s decision, LICADHO and partner FIDH submitted a joint report in April 2014 detailing serious and persistent violations of rights guaranteed under the ICCPR, including: the right to life; the freedoms of expression and assembly; the right to fair trial; and the prohibitions against torture and arbitrary detention.

26 June 2014

On June 26, International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, LICADHO releases new testimony and analysis of torture and ill-treatment in Cambodia’s police stations and prisons, including the abuse of females and juveniles and those experiencing mental health problems.

LICADHO’s findings reveal that there has been no palpable change in the type, frequency and severity of abuse reported in recent years. Inmates continue to describe being beaten, kicked, slapped or punched, often until they were bleeding and unconscious. Objects used during beatings included guns, sticks, iron rods, stun batons and electric cables. One of the primary purposes of abuse continued to be the forced extraction of confessions or money.

24 March 2014

2013 was dominated by one event: the National Assembly elections. Throughout the year, Phnom Penh saw some of its largest demonstrations in decades as Cambodian people took to the streets to demand their rights.

However, as documented by LICADHO in the report ‘Human Rights 2013: The Year in Review’, the elections witnessed an unprecedented level of fraud and left the country in a state of political turmoil; conflict over land and natural resources continued to be a major source of human rights violations throughout the year; strikes and labor issues gave rise to discord, often attracting violent action from the authorities; and human rights defenders remained a target of harassment, threats, unjustified criminal charges and violence.

31 January 2014

A timeline summarizing the series of event leading to and following the January 2-3-4, 2014, lethal clampdown on labour and political demonstrations in Cambodia's capital.

31 January 2014

Short biographies of the 23 workers and human rights defenders arrested during the lethal clampdown of labour demonstrations on January 2-3, 2014.

31 January 2014

Short biographies of the confirmed dead and missing men during the lethal clampdown of labour demonstrations on January 3, 2014.

28 January 2014

This submission by Amnesty International and the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO) is based on information collected through on-going monitoring and research, and considers the national human rights framework and the situation on the ground for Human Rights Defenders (HRDs) in Cambodia.

28 January 2014

The Community Legal Education Center (CLEC), the Cambodian League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO), the Legal Support for Children and Women (LSCW), and Human Rights Watch submit this joint submission on human trafficking for labor exploitation of Cambodian workers. Human trafficking in Cambodia has received considerable attention in recent years, with a focus primarily on sex workers. But labor trafficking is emerging as an equally important problem. In the past four and a half years, there has been a substantial increase in trafficking, exploitation and abuses of Cambodian workers.

28 January 2014

This submission focuses on a selection of major rights issues in Cambodia, based on LICADHO’s experience and knowledge in these areas. The discussion focuses on the implementation of certain recommendations accepted by the government during the first UPR cycle, namely: land rights; military abuses; prison and unlawful detention center conditions; and access to justice/lack of rule of law. This submission covers the past four-and-a-half years.

20 January 2014

We are very disturbed by statements reportedly made by you and other GMAC representatives that condoned the authorities’ use of lethal force against striking workers. On January 5, GMAC Secretary-General Ken Loo said that military police were in the right to open fire on protesters. Although Mr. Loo issued a follow-up statement on January 9 stating that GMAC does not support violence to end industrial disputes and that his previous comments were taken out of context, he continued to stand behind the use of live ammunition against protesters.

19 December 2013

Sothea, a child laborer, has spent most of his 16 years living and working in a brick factory compound in Ba Kaing Commune. He is one of a shockingly high number of children in Cambodia aged 5-17 who work as laborers and receive little to no compensation. Despite facing limited opportunities and resources, Sothea is determined to make a better life for himself and for his family. The first and most important step, he says, is getting a good education.

17 December 2013

On July 28, 2013, Cambodia held its fifth National Assembly elections since the country’s elections organized by the United Nations Transitional Authority for Cambodia (UNTAC) in 1993. Serious flaws have undermined the confidence of many Cambodians in the integrity of the elections and their results.

This joint-report aims to provide a comprehensive view of the problems that have been described in several reports and research conducted on the recent elections.

21 November 2013

This briefing paper offers brief capsule on all of the reporters killed in Cambodia since 1993.

15 October 2013

In Cambodia today there are many young children living in prison with their mothers 1 yet there is little understanding amongst authorities and society at large of the short and long term impact of prison life on children. In this, Cambodia is not alone – to date there are only a few studies of the effects on children who spend their early years behind bars.

Prisoners are among the most marginalized groups in any society, and Cambodia is no different. They are cut off from society, both physically and emotionally. This is especially devastating for children who are not prisoners but are too often treated as such. The reality of Cambodian prisons is harsh for anyone, but for a child it can be devastating.

24 August 2013

This report compiles key observations from 173 staff and partners who visited over 100 polling stations. There are 19,009 polling stations in Cambodia. As such, this report is not intended to be a comprehensive analysis of election day irregularities, but instead offers a snapshot revealing the need for further investigation.

Overall, observers witnessed serious discrepancies in an alarming percentage of the stations visited. The issues can be grouped into three main areas: voter roll irregularities, including inexplicably missing names and similar denials of the right to vote; indications of intentional fraud or vote rigging; and intimidation or harassment.