A/HRC/12/41
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Several international donors, the country team and NGOs have supported this initiative, which is
consistent with the recommendations of the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights
in May 2009, and the Special Rapporteur on adequate housing, which called for a moratorium on
evictions until a proper normative framework is in place.
53. OHCHR has continued to work on improving legal protections pertaining to resettlement.
In 2008, it submitted comments to the second draft of the sub-decree on the socio-economic
impact of development projects and supported civil society input to the sub-decree. In early
2009, a written response by the Ministry of Economy and Finance to comments by the
United Nations, donors and NGOs seemed to indicate that many of the comments had been taken
into account. However, the actual draft was not made public, and it is unclear when the draft will
be adopted. The sub-decree would give crucial guidance to government officials implementing
State development works.
54. In its work on land and housing, OHCHR has highlighted the importance of protecting the
rights of freedom of expression, association and movement of affected communities and the
NGOs supporting them, and the need for an effective judicial recourse for aggrieved individuals
or communities. OHCHR has continued to monitor the environment for NGOs and communities
to exercise their rights under the Constitution to seek the protection of land rights. It has
documented that in a great number of cases, when people organized themselves to seek redress
or claim their rights under national law, they were ignored, threatened, accused of a number
of offences (including incitement) or - increasingly - imprisoned. As of June 2009, 55 to
60 individuals were reportedly detained in relation to land disputes. The number of criminal
charges against individuals in this regard, and the number of arrests were considerably higher, as
many charges were not acted upon or people were released on bail after initial detention.
OHCHR provided advice to the relevant authorities in several instances to ensure due process of
law, which resulted in the release of several individuals. It also approached the
Prosecutor-General at the Appeals Court to encourage him to issue a ruling that a legal
determination of the ownership of the land in dispute should be made prior to the bringing of any
criminal charge.
E. Assistance on reporting under the human rights treaties
55. OHCHR undertook to comprehensively support the Government and civil society to
engage with reporting procedures under human rights treaties and the Human Rights Council.
56. In 2008, Cambodia had 15 reports overdue to the treaty bodies and 4 others pending. By
mid-2009, this backlog had been reduced to seven and the Government was on track to clear its
backlog by the end of the year. Cambodia’s initial report under the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, overdue since 1994, was submitted in October 2008. In
February 2009, Cambodia submitted reports to the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the
Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. In April 2008, with the support of
OHCHR, the Government agreed to a proposal from the Committee against Torture to pilot a
new reporting procedure whereby its response to a list of questions prepared by the secretariat
would constitute the State report. The response to the questions, which OHCHR translated into
Khmer, is expected by 30 June 2009 and OHCHR is providing support to ensure timely
submission. The draft of the next report under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
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