Negotiations to end a two-day-old strike by the editorial staff at the French-language daily newspaper Cambodge Soir were unsuccessful on Tuesday, the chairman of the newspaper’s board said.
The 12-year-old fixture of the Cambodian press failed to appear at newsstands Tuesday morning and was also set to miss Wednesday’s print run, according Philippe Monnin, a founding member of the paper’s five-person executive board, who said the strike was the first in the history of the Soir.
Members of management and the paper’s 14-person editorial staff both declined to reveal the cause of the walkout.
Monnin said he had received no advance notice and first learned of the labor action when it began on Monday but declined to give details of the grievances expressed by strikers.
“They don’t have the same way of perceiving the development of the country,” he said, declining to elaborate.
Editor-in-chief Stephanie Gee could not be reached for comment Tuesday while Soir reporters declined to be named or to comment.
However, one reporter, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the strike concerned perceived problems in the paper’s administration.
Monnin said discussions Monday and Tuesday had produced no resolution and participants had not scheduled another meeting after talks Tuesday evening.
The negotiations had nevertheless been worthwhile, he added.
“They perhaps moved discussions to another level,” he said.
(Additional reporting by Yun Samean)
