E/C.12/KHM/1
page 3
UNITEDNATIONS / E
/ Economic and Social
Council / Distr.
GENERAL
E/C.12/KHM/1
7 January 2009
Original: ENGLISH
Substantive session of 2009
IMPLEMENTATION OF THE INTERNATIONAL COVENANTON ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS
Initial reports submitted by States parties underarticles 16 and 17 of the Covenant
CAMBODIA[*]
[10 November 2008]
CONTENTS
Paragraphs Page
Introduction 1 - 5 4
I. GENERAL SITUATION 6 - 32 4
II. BRIEF POLITICAL BACKGROUND 33 - 41 9
III. STATE INFRASTRUCTURE 42 - 48 10
IV. GOVERNMENT STRUCTURE 49 - 50 11
V. LEGISLATIVE, EXECUTIVE AND JUDICIAL AUTHORITY 51 - 59 11
VI. GENERAL JURISDICTION FRAMEWORK TO
PROTECT HUMAN RIGHTS 60 - 725 12
A. Jurisdictions and other competent organization
for respect of human rights 60 - 64 12
B. Protection of human rights through judiciary 65 - 70 14
Article 1: Self-determination 71 - 95 14
Article 2: Guarantees for the exercise of economic, social
and cultural rights 96 - 147 20
Article 3: Equality between men and women 148 - 173 28
Article 4: Limitation of economic, social and cultural rights 174 - 181 33
Article 5: 182 - 186 35
Article 6: Right to work 187 - 219 37
Article 7: Right to decent working conditions 220 - 273 45
Article 8: Right to form trade unions 274 - 301 54
Article 9: Right to social security 302 - 342 58
Article 10: Protection of mothers and infants 343 - 389 68
CONTENTS (continued)
Paragraphs Page
Article 11, paragraph 1: General conditions of the
right to a decent standard of living 390 - 429 77
Article 11, paragraph 2: Right to food 430 - 501 87
Article 11: paragraph 3: Right to adequate housing 502 - 542 110
Article 12: Right to health 543 - 643 118
Articles 13 and 14: Right to education 644 - 687 143
Article 15: Right to participate in cultural life 688 - 725 151
Introduction
1. Cambodia was devastated by civil war for more than two decades. Cambodia, which used to enjoy great civilization and prosperity, had dramatically moved downhill in almost every field. The country rehabilitation and development had been through many stages with a lot of complicated challenges and obstacles.
2. The Royal Government of Cambodia, formed after a fair general election in 1993, and has been in a heavy burden for country rehabilitation and development by exercising the principles of liberal democracy and pluralism.
3. According to articles 16-17 of the International Covenant on the Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights that the Kingdom of Cambodia recognized and joined as a member on 20April1992, the Royal Government of Cambodia is pleased to show some results of the implementation on this Covenant.
4. A significant instance to show that the above mentioned rights have been observed and used to make reflections in the report is that the 1993 Constitution and other regulations in the Kingdom of Cambodia. Moreover, the data from government institutions, international organizations, and other NGOs are also the references for analysis in this report.
5. Despite the existing laws and regulations, the Government acknowledges the lack of crucial standard documents and certain prioritized practical activities which ensure the respect of economy, social, and cultural rights, which the Royal Government has to resolve continuously and promptly in order to strengthen the democracy.
I. GENERAL SITUATION
General features
6. Cambodia is officially named as “The Kingdom of Cambodia”, exercising the principles of liberal democracy and pluralism.
7. The Kingdom of Cambodia is made up of 20 provinces and 4 municipalities. These provinces and municipalities are made up of 185 districts/Khans comprising 1621communes/sangkats and 13, 890 villages. Phnom Penh is the capital of the Kingdom of Cambodia.[1]
· Population: 11,437,656 (census 1998)
· Population: 12,824, 000 (investigation between the census March 2004)
· Population: 13,091,000 (estimated at the end of 2004)
· Population: 14,080,000 (estimated at the end of 2006)
Geography
8. Cambodia covers an area of 181,035 sq km,[2] and is situated in the Indochina peninsula in South East Asia between 10°-15° N latitude and 102°-105° E longitude.
9. Cambodia is bounded on the north by Thailand and Laos, on the east by Vietnam, and on the west by Thailand and the gulf of Thailand. Cambodia has in land border of 5/6 and a coastline of 1/6 of its total 2,600 km border length. Cambodia’s distance from the north to the south is about 440 km and from the east to west is about 650 km, forming an almost-same angle polygon.
10. The geographic land is divided into three forms: middle plain area, mountain-plateau, and coastal area. The plain covers one third of the total land size of Cambodia. This area is generally for population and business activities.
11. In addition to this, the plain area is the biggest place, Tonle Sap Lake, to provide fish, and the flooded areas around Chak Tomuk plain area are the biggest rice producers such as Battambang, Kampong Thom, Kampong Cham, Takeo, Prey Veng, and Svay Rieng provinces.
12. The plateau and mountainous areas lie in the north, east, northeast, and southeast of the country. There are two major mountainous areas. The Cardamom Mountains situated at the southwest of the country lying from northwest to southeast along the coastline and are teeming with forest and wildlife. Moreover, black basalt and precious stones are found around the area of Kirirom. Near the Cardamom Mountains, Mount Oral, which is 1813 metres high, is the highest mountain in Cambodia. The Dang Rek Range lies in the north along the Cambodia-Thai border and is richly forested with valuable timber and a variety of wildlife.
13. Plateaus lie in the north, east and northeast of the country. Some parts of the north plateau have small mountains or hills in separate places, and some other parts are the land for sparse forest and crops. The east and northeast high land in Kampong Cham, Kratie, Stung Treng, Rattanakiri, and Mondulkiri provinces are covered with sparse forest and red land. Kampong Cham and Rattakiri provinces are now becoming rubber plantations.
14. The Coastal Areas, in the southwest of the country between the coast and Cardamom Mountains, are rich in industrial crops and fruits such as oil coconut, green pepper, and durian plantations. Cambodia’s 440-kilometre coastline stretches from Koh Kong Province to Kampot Province, with a seaport in Sihanouk Ville. Kampot and Sihanouk Ville are tourist attractions.
15. The Cambodian gulf has a flat seabed which is not very deep, averaging about 30 metres with a maximum depth of 75 metres. This area has islands. The biggest island is Koh Kong (80square kilometres and 410 metres above sea level). On this island, the people do fishery, cropping, and run businesses.
16. Cambodia has many waterways since the lowlands in the central area are surrounded by high ground, so water flows downhill everywhere. The biggest river is the Mekong River that flows 500 kilometres from the north to the south through five provinces (Stung Treng, Kratie, Kampong Cham, Kandal, and Prey Veng). In Phnom Penh, this river has four effluents which is called “Tonle Chaktomuk”. The four effluents are upper Mekong called Great River, lower Mekong called outer river, Tonle Bassak called inner river and Tonle Sap. The Mekong River is a major waterway for all seasons, brings in arable alluvium in the lower land areas along the river, is the fishing lot in the dry season, is the irrigation for rice fields during the dry season, provides pebbles and sand for construction, and can be used to build hydroelectricity plants at Sambo District, Kratie Province.
17. In the northwest of Cambodia, a great basin called “Tonle Sap” is surrounded by five provinces, viz. Kampong Thom, Siem Reap, Battambang, Pursat, and Kampong Chhnang. It has an area of 3,000 sq. km in the dry season and 10,000 sq. km in the rainy season. Tonle Sap is the place providing the biggest amount of fish in Cambodia, and it is the waterway during rainy season, bringing in arable alluvium for the nearby areas. Tonle Sap Lake can absorb flood from the Mekong River; therefore, the central plain is rarely affected by flood during the rainy season.
18. On the southwest lie gulf, creeks, and steams flowing from the Cardamom Mountains to the gulf. In the gulf, we can build modern seaports because it is not deep there and there is a natural wave barrier. In the gulf area, there are a diversity of fishes, and marine lives. Besides this, the gulf area is salt producer (salt fields in Kampot province). However, the steams or creeks in the gulf area are not important for the national economy; they are just freshwater resources, fishery lots, and pebbles producer. In addition to this, there are plenty of tributaries across the country.
Weather
19. Cambodia undergoes the tropical weather (warm) and Monsoon (humid), which causes warm and humid weather. The variation of the weather is from 25o C to 30o C on average, the maximum 27o C is in April and minimum is 16o C in December and January.
20. Monsoon is the cause of rainfall regime in Cambodia which has two distinct seasons; dry season from November to April, and rainy season from May to October. Rainfall varies in different parts of the country as well as from year to year. The central basin and Mekong plains area, the agricultural areas, receive less rainfall; whereas the country's heaviest rainfall occurs on Gulf. The central areas usually suffer drought and inundations that are favourable to the agricultural sector.
Forest and wildlife
21. With favourable land and weather, Cambodia is rich in forest. According to the 1960s statistics, the forest covered 73 per cent of the country, which is equivalent to 13, 227,000 ha, but it now is estimated that the forest covers only 50 per cent or 60 per cent of the country. The decrease of the forest results from the log business without technical skills and illegal logging. To prevent these acts and to ensure the continuity of the forest resources, the Royal Government has taken up immediate measures to preserve the forest, to ban log and plank exports, and called for the neighbouring countries such as Thailand, Vietnam and Laos to block the log exports from Cambodia.
22. The provinces containing more forests are Kratie, Steng Treng, Rattanakiri, Mondulkiri, Kampong Thom, Kampot, Pursat and other provinces in the north of the country. The importance of the forest products in Cambodia is to offer woods for common consumption (woods for furniture and construction), woods for industry (woods for train tracks, matches, boards and boxes and so on and so forth), woods for burning and for making coal. Other products besides forests are bamboo shoots, rattan, vine and rubber.
23. Cambodia is also a country containing several kinds of animals. Ground animals consist of wild cows, wild buffalo, wild ox, tiger and heron. Creatures in the water (fresh water) such as lake and river are fish; and the gulf is full of sea creatures. With the lack of care, environmental pollution and a war-torn country make the natural resources suffer damages remarkably.
Mineral resources
24. According to earth and mineral research, Cambodia plentiful reserves of minerals but so far little exploration research has been undertaken to exploit these reserves. The mineral reserves include:
· Silver: found around the edge of Cardamom Mountain, north of Kampong Chhnang and some hills in Siem Reap
· Iron: found in Kampong Thom, Siem Reap, Preah Vihear, and Stung Treng Provinces
· Bauxite: found in Chhlong Loeu, Kratie Province and Sam Pov mountain, Battambang Province
· Coal: found in Koh Kong, Sihanouk Ville, the plateau of Ream and Rattanakiri Province
· Copper: found in Krouch Chhmar (Kampong Cham), Lum Phat (Rattanakiri), Anlong Chey (Stung Treng), northern plateau, and Kampong Thom Province
· Underground crude oil: found in the gulf of Cambodia. Foreign companies are currently exploring in order to exploit these reserves with Government permission
25. Mining operations have been undertaken by people and the State as follows:
· Garnet and sapphire in Pailin
· Diamond in Bokeo
· Iron, gold and tin in Kampong Thom
· Marble in Pursat
· Limestone (for making cement) in Kampot
· Phosphates (for making fertilizers) in Kampot and Battambang
· Black basalt in Koh Kong, Preah Vihear and Stung Treng
26. Besides limestone and phosphates which have been managed by the State, other mines has been commercialized by the people with the use of wrong technology and against the Law on Treasures. Nowadays, the Government is taking action to curb the problems.
Population and family status
27. 1962 was the last year that Cambodia conducted the population census. Since then until2005, the observation between census showed that: Total population was about 1,380,000men compared to 93.5 per cent of women (2004).[3] The nationwide population density was 74persquare kilometre (2004).[4] Most people live in the plain area. In the whole country there is an estimate of about 2,530,000 families.
28. The average size of the families living in towns (5.4) is higher than the rural areas (5.0).