“NGOs and associations, including local communities that have already registered with the ministry, have complete freedom to legally carry out activities without having to inform local authorities three days beforehand as they did before,” Sar Kheng said in a directive dated November 27.

The instruction came nearly one month after the interior minister issued a similar guideline on cooperation between authorities at all levels with civil society groups. San Chey, the executive director of the Affiliated Network for Social Accountability, said the directive is apparently aimed at revising the existing law to provide more space for NGOs.

“It remains to be seen whether the directive will become effective. We’ll wait and see how the new directive and task forces created by the Ministry of Interior will help civil society organisations. We will continue to observe how much the authorities at sub-national level can implement this,” he said.

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