Cambodia said it would suspend online gambling next month, seven years after it banned it. Digital wallet CoolCash lost its licence, while officials noted ongoing raids and corruption cases.

Tens of thousands of Rohingya refugees gathered across Cox’s Bazar to mark the day Myanmar’s military launched a brutal crackdown against them. Nine years later, survivors carry the memories of those ...

An analysis of six REDD+ projects found continued tree-cover loss in several conservation areas, with critics questioning how carbon savings are measured — especially as the state approves infrastruct...

A Phnom Penh court has ordered land fraud Piphup Deimeas to repay $33.5 million to 1,115 families. But three years on from the owner’s initial arrest, the indebted families remain wary as their strugg...

Cambodia’s criminal scam industry saw upheaval in 2026 as major compounds emptied out in a public crackdown. This page collects Mekong Independent’s ongoing reports from these scam hotspots — how they...

Cambodian workers in Sihanoukville say that the current crackdown has repercussions stretching far beyond the previous waves of the scam industry.

Facebook remains the main way for Vietnamese victims of injustices and activists at home or in exile to air their grievances and fight for justice, despite increasing risks from government censorship ...

For the first time since the Internet opened civilians to new ideas outside the government’s scope, a new independent leftist movement is taking root among Vietnamese youth.

Militant groups claiming to defend Rohingya rights are increasingly accused of kidnapping for ransom schemes. One family spoke of their 5-year-old disappearing in June. They collected hundreds of thou...

Activists and civil society groups staged a protest near Government House against the visit of Myanmar president and junta leader Senior General Min Aung Hlaing’s visit to Thailand.

Civil society groups gathered at the Ministry of Justice to call on the authorities to protect political prisoners.

Five years after Thailand banned paraquat and chlorpyrifos, farmers and consumers remain unsafe from the overuse of other dangerous agrochemicals.

Only people involved in the “gray economy” are impacted by crackdowns on Cambodia’s online scam industry, a deputy provincial governor said as officials continue raids under their heavily promoted cam...

The arrest of Chen Zhi, chairman of Prince Group, put Sihanoukville’s 800-hectare Bay of Lights landfill project on pause. Since then, security guards were let go from their jobs, and sand-carrying bo...

A year ago, the dead body of a Korean student was found on Cambodia’s Bokor mountain, sparking rare international attention. But three other corpses were also found on Bokor the same week with little ...

Girls’ school enrollment in Cox’s Bazar falls steeply when they turn 15, leaving communities to address the harassment and community pressure keeping them out.

U.S. deportations to Mekong countries have skyrocketed in the second Trump administration. Countries such as Laos are dealing with an unprecedented influx, and many former refugees arrive in the regio...

During a hearing at the South Bangkok Criminal Court on July 16, a representative from the Immigration Bureau said that the Thai authorities prevented Hong Kong activist and UN-recognised refugee Zhan...

Seven students and a teacher were killed in the Cox’s Bazar Rohingya refugee camp when a landslide collapsed a school.

After two days of relentless monsoon rain, Rohingya refugee camps in Cox's Bazar have once again been devastated by deadly landslides and flooding, leaving families mourning loved ones while hundreds ...

Kep, the country’s smallest province, a largely tourism- and fishing-oriented coastal area, was not part of the scam boom. But as scam operations scattered amid raids elsewhere, some began to arrive.

Only one Cambodian tycoon is in jail after months of the country’s scam crackdown. But 50 police and military police officers have also been arrested in Li Kuong’s case — for allegedly stealing from h...

Laos’s capital is quite open when it comes to gender fluidity and diversity. While not technically codified in law, you won’t see many people blink twice at gay or lesbian couples out on the streets, ...

Thousands of garment workers are injured every year traveling to and from work, and some dozens, sometimes hundreds, die on the roads. On May 23, Cambodia was shocked by two fatal garment truck crashe...

Africans who say they were trafficked into Cambodian scam compounds are making significant sacrifices trying to make their way home.

Kouprey combed through Royal Gazette books from 2000 to 2024 to collate all the people who acquired Cambodian citizenship. The full database is being made available on Mekong Independent.