About 500 Cambodian migrant workers at a food production factory in Thailand’s Chon Buri province protested on Wednesday, saying that they cannot continue under the economic pressure levied by the company for the past three months.
As the government closes schools for a second time amid renewed concerns of Covid-19 transmission, Phnom Penh students preparing for their ninth and 12th grade tests are concerned they have fallen behind during their online lessons.
Taking precautionary measures, some staff at news outlets and government bodies have gone into two-week quarantine following the visit of a Hungarian foreign minister who later tested positive for Covid-19.
Workers at the Dignity Knitter garment factory, embroiled in a labor dispute for 11 months, say they will reconvene in 10 days after the Kandal provincial governor visited and asked that they give the courts more time to process their employer’s bankruptcy proceedings.
While recent floodwaters are receding, farmers who spoke with VOD say they are weighed down by heavy debt and years of failed crops, and see fear and hopelessness ahead of them.
Veteran garment workers have kept up a 24/7 rotating vigil outside the Dignity Knitter and Eco Base factories since before they shut in April. This week, ex-employees said they were still hoping for a payout, but until a court decision they were stuck with nowhere to go.
A Phnom Penh deputy governor was among authorities who harassed rights monitors and journalists, threatening to confiscate their cameras and phones, at a small opposition rally outside the Chinese Embassy on Friday, with a media advocate calling the authorities’ actions “unacceptable intimidation.”
Residents in Phnom Penh’s flooded Dangkao district say they are running out of options as food prices rise and bills arrive, but the incomes of thousands in the community have been disrupted after floodwaters halted production at the neighborhood’s main employer.
About 16,000 factory workers are currently unable to go to work due to flooding in Phnom Penh and the provinces of Kandal and Takeo, the Labor Ministry said on Wednesday, with an economist warning of a hit to the economy and rising prices due to the recent extreme weather.
Hundreds of fishing families in a Pursat floating village are escaping barren conditions on the Tonle Sap to take on new jobs elsewhere.
Opposition members on trial at the Phnom Penh Municipal Court on Friday complained of being arrested at gunpoint without explanation; a private call and messages used as evidence for inciting social insecurity; being threatened to attest to their testimony; and their supposed testimony containing words they did not say.
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