Social development
Human rights
Hin Nam Nor submission to UNESCO next year
The final master plan of Hin Nam Nor National Protected Area in Khammuan province for submission to the World Heritage list will be sent to UNESCO early next year for assessment. An official for the Hin Nam Nor National Protected Area, who asked not to ...
Pak Beng Hydropower project looks set to move forward
The construction of the Pak Beng Hydropower Project is expected to begin at the end of this year after reaching agreement among Lower Mekong countries. A group of technical officials from the Ministry of Energy and Mines, Lao National Mekong Committee Secretariat and media organisations ...
Families, authorities reach relocation deal
Locals and authorities came to a relocation agreement on January 23 after some 100 villagers, representing about 200 families living on a riverbank in Kampong Chhnang province protested on Sunday to demand proper compensation after they were told they must move to pave the way for ...
Wa State suffers as fewer Chinese come to party
In a remote casino in northeastern Burma, China’s pervasive campaign against graft has taken its toll. Hundreds of local traders and farmers place petty bets as low as 10 cents, outnumbering a few Chinese who were once the VIPs of a gambling hall decorated with ...
Myanmar, Malaysia agree over aid flotilla
The flotilla spat appears to have come to an agreeable end. Myanmar has permitted a group of Malaysian organisations to send aid earmarked for Rakhine State after an official permission request was forwarded to the president, and a delegation smoothed over the arrangements on January ...
Tax cut planned for low-cost housing purchases
The government is planning to drastically reduce the taxes it levies when people purchase state-commissioned low-cost housing, which developers say puts many units out of reach for ordinary buyers. Union Planning and Finance Minister U Kyaw Win, in a speech to developers and business leaders ...
Yangon’s extreme poverty needs action: report
In a one-room hut in north Yangon, a middle-aged woman has a trick for those evenings when the children complain of hunger and she has run out of money and rice. “I ask them to drink extra water and go to bed,” said mother-of-seven Daw ...
Residents push gov’t on OCIC project
Prek Liep community members involved in a land dispute with the Overseas Cambodia Investment Company held a religious protest and press conference outside the Cambodian People’s Party offices in the commune on January 14. During the ceremony, members prayed for the protection of their land ...
Palm oil projects destroy local livelihoods: report
More than 1.8 million acres of palm oil plantations in Myanmar’s southern Tenasserim Division do more harm than good for local Karen villagers, causing land conflict, damaging livelihoods, destroying biodiversity, and polluting the environment, according to a new report. Companies and businesspeople have taken over ...
Cambodia's water people pushed out of Phnom Penh sewer for billion-dollar ING City
For decades, the vast lakes and wetlands fringing Cambodia’s capital have been home to thousands of people making a living from the water — fishing and harvesting vegetables for market. Now they face eviction, as politically well-connected land speculators push them out. “If they fill ...
