The UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGP BHR) outline
how States and business can protect and promote human rights through three
central pillars:
1. the State duty to protect against human rights abuses;
2. the corporate responsibility to respect human rights; and,
3. access to remedy, which requires States and businesses to provide access
for victims of business-related human rights abuses to effective judicial
and non-judicial remedies (CCHR, 2016).
Knowledge of these three pillars of the BHR framework is crucial in
Cambodia today, as corporate actors continue to violate the rights of thousands
of Cambodians in different forms. The most vulnerable in society, including the
poor, women, and indigenous peoples and their communities, are most often
the primary victims of business-related human rights abuses, for they are often
uneducated about their legal rights and have fewer resources to contest and
seek remedy for these violations.
Even if the BHR principles are not yet on the agenda of the
Cambodian Human Rights Committee (CHRC) as well as the Government,2
the Constitution of Cambodia already provides a legal framework for the
protection of BHR-related rights of all Cambodians. The Constitution states
that citizens have the right to form and join trade unions and stipulates that
the organization and operation of trade unions shall be determined by law
(Article 36). It also protects workers’ right to strike and to engage in non-violent
demonstrations (Article 37). In addition, the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights (ICCPR) and International Covenant on Economic, Social and
Cultural Rights (ICESCR) are all enshrined in the Constitution.
The Constitution also protects individual and communal rights to property.
The law also provides that any person who possesses the land peacefully, known
by the public, with no claim or contest from any other person, for up to or
more than five (5) years enjoys rights to land ownership as such (Article 30 and
31, Land Law 2001). Since the Land Law was promulgated in 2001, the titling
process has been applied to 4,881,582 out of an estimated seven million land
plots (Ministry of Land Management, Urban Planning, and Construction Website,
2
Response from the Department Director of CHRC, he said the CHRC does not cover this topic today
38
Upholding Land Rights amidst the Land Rush
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