Dene-Hern Chen

Danish beer giant Carlsberg, a partner in Cambodia’s largest brewery, Cambrew, said it is not concerned by a call to boycott its popular Angkor Beer brand over a partner company’s investment in a Laos dam.

Looted artifacts of Khmer cultural her­itage from Cambodia are extremely desirable in the art market and fuel a global multibillion-dollar illicit industry of antiquities, participants of a workshop on preventing cultural property crimes said Monday.

Environmental groups and a local community leader in Stung Treng province have called for a nationwide boycott of the popular Angkor Beer brand to protest the beverage company’s links to a controversial hydro­power dam to be built in Laos.

About 1,000 members of the Cambodian Grassroots People’s Assembly—a network of communities throughout the country that includes farmers as well as land and labor activists—will rally at Freedom Park on Monday to demand an end to the current political impasse.

Khoo Teng Keat, executive director of Mega First Corpora tion Bhd—the Malaysian company in charge of building the Don Sahong dam in Laos—confirmed Wednesday that Goh Nan Kioh is both the executive chairman of Mega First and the director for Cambodian beverage giant Cambrew Ltd., which produces the popular Angkor Beer.

A day after the Cambodia National Mekong Committee received impact assessment documents from Laos for their controversial Don Sahong dam, Cambodian and Vietnamese officials criticized Laos’ lack of transparency on the mainstream Mekong dam.

The Court of Appeal will hear the case of former Bavet City governor Chhouk Bundith, who was convicted for shooting and injuring three garment workers but remains at large, at the end of this month, a court official said Wednesday.

Cambodia’s factories are moving away from producing the most basic clothing items and diversifying to manufacture more intricate products for international buyers.

The northern gate of the Preah Khan temple inside the Angkor Archaeological Park was damaged on Friday when a 30-meter-tall tree was uprooted during a heavy rainstorm and came crashing down on the 12th century structure. The tree smashed through eight large stones that supported one of the ancient structure’s main gates, said Bun Narith, director-general of the Apsara Au­thority, a government body that manages the temples in the Angkor park complex.

International environmental group WWF has called on the Mekong River Commission to convene an emergency meeting in order to discuss the possible environmental impact of the Don Sahong dam in Laos, on which work is expected to begin as early as next month.

Interior Minister Sar Kheng has commended the country’s security forces for creating a safe environment during the July 28 election and the post-election period leading up to the convening of the National Assembly last week, according to a letter received Tuesday.

A Singaporean-owned garment factory whose workers have been on strike since early August is no longer producing clothes for American denim giant Levi Strauss, a brand representative and a factory worker said Monday.

Supporters of the opposition CNRP and relatives of the 16 men, women and children killed in a grenade attack during a protest rally in 1997, will hold a Buddhist ceremony today at the scene of the blasts in front of the old National Assembly in Phnom Penh.

Commuters were saddled with lengthy travel times and the Supreme Court and Appeal Court were closed Monday as security forces closed off major and minor roads with razor-wire barricades, creating a chokehold of traffic in the city center.

A week after one man was shot dead and several others injured during a standoff between the armed forces and protesters, an investigation into who was responsible is no closer to conclusion, an Interior Ministry spokesman said Sunday.

Resentment is still simmering toward Cambodia for its handling of the contentions South China Sea issue last year, which fractured the unity of Asean, analysts from around the region said Thursday.

Viewers of local television on Sunday would have had no idea the opposition CNRP was staging a mass protest, during which violent clashes with police occurred.

When Kong Soki was called for questioning on Monday at the Kompong Chhnang provincial police headquarters, he was the seventh journalist to fall afoul of the law for writing stories alleging that a provincial court official had benefitted from the trade in illegally logged luxury wood.

With a red carpet rolled out at the Sofitel Phnom Penh Pho­keethra Hotel, women in traditional Khmer dress Monday greeted those interested in the launch of new banking services available at the local commercial bank, Singapore Banking Corporation, Ltd. (SBC Bank).

A senior Buddhist monk who struck two junior monks on Saturday morning because of their plans to participate in the opposition CNRP demonstration at Freedom Park, defended his not-so serene actions Sunday.