Four nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) said Thursday they stood by their reporting after associations representing Cambodia’s financial sector demanded that they “correct” papers calling for debt relief for jobless workers, who are struggling to repay debts amidst the coronavirus pandemic.
Licadho, the Center for Alliance of Labor and Human Rights (CENTRAL), and the Cambodian Alliance of Trade Unions (CATU) issued a joint briefing paper last month titled “Worked to Debt,” which said that tens of thousands of garment workers will struggle to repay microfinance debts during work stoppages and factory suspensions caused by the outbreak.
The groups said the situation is “creating a mounting human rights crisis” and warned that without relief from debts owed to microfinance institutions (MFIs), many of the workers will resort to selling their land or homes, eating less food, or taking out even more loans to repay what they borrowed.
In full: https://www.rfa.org/english/news/cambodia/loans-07162020130948.html
