National Television of Cambodia (TVK)

National Television of Cambodia (TVK) is Cambodia’s national state television service and one of the principal media institutions of the Ministry of Information. TVK’s own current history dates regular television transmissions to 2 February 1966, while Japan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs independently records the establishment of Cambodia’s national television service in 1966. The station was subsequently damaged during the country’s civil-war period and television ceased under the Khmer Rouge. The state television service was rebuilt in 1983. Following the restoration of the Kingdom, state radio and television were placed under the Ministry of Information and organised as separate institutions in 1994.

Japan subsequently played a major role in rebuilding TVK’s infrastructure. A grant-aid project approved in 1996 financed a new broadcasting centre in Phnom Penh and improvements to the regional facility in Sihanoukville, with the new Phnom Penh building completed in 1998. A Japanese government evaluation found that the project increased TVK’s broadcasting time from 61 to 81 hours per week, raised the number of programmes produced locally from four to twenty per week and expanded estimated reception coverage from 25% to 90% when satellite reception was included.

TVK’s current website states that its principal service broadcasts nine hours on weekdays and seventeen hours at weekends. TVK is a full member of the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union.

Media assets

National television: TVK, also referred to as TVK1, and TVK2. TVK2 began trial broadcasting on 20 April 2020 as an educational television service during the COVID-19 school closures, developed with the education authorities to support distance learning.

Regional television: SMM’s existing asset inventory records regional TVK stations or relay services in Battambang, Koh Kong, Kratie, Pursat, Ratanakiri, Mondulkiri, Siem Reap, Sihanoukville, Stung Treng and Preah Vihear. These should not be treated as ten additional nationally programmed channels: no current official consolidated source was identified establishing that each operates an editorially distinct television service.

Ownership and governance

TVK is directly owned and operated by the Cambodian government. Institutionally it is the General Directorate of National Television of Cambodia within the Ministry of Information rather than a separately incorporated company or autonomous statutory public broadcaster. No separate legal personality or independently constituted governing board was identified.

The Ministry of Information’s current organisational framework is established by Sub-Decree No. 217 on the organisation and functioning of the Ministry of Information, signed and effective on 20 November 2025. Earlier State Media Monitor material referred to “Sub-Decree No. 70” as TVK’s regulatory framework, but no relevant instrument with that number was verified during the present review and that reference has been removed.

Neth Pheaktra became Minister of Information when Prime Minister Hun Manet’s government took office in August 2023, succeeding long-serving minister Khieu Kanharith. Khim Vuthy remained Director General of National Television of Cambodia in July 2026. The Director General operates within the ministry hierarchy rather than under an independent governing body or appointment process.

TVK’s personnel structure is part of the Cambodian civil service. Current TVK reporting explicitly describes personnel of the General Directorate as civil servants and shows job classification, recruitment, appointments, deployment, remuneration and performance management being administered within the organisational framework of the Ministry of Information and the wider civil service. In August 2026, immediately after the review cut-off, the ministry was still conducting position-definition work at TVK following a Ministry of Civil Service census, further confirming that institutional status.

No arm’s-length nomination system, protected executive tenure, parliamentary confirmation procedure or autonomous board capable of insulating TVK management from the ministry was identified.

Source of funding and budget

TVK is predominantly financed through the state. Assessments obtained by State Media Monitor from Cambodian journalists and media analysts in January and February 2024 and again in March 2025 describe its operating resources as provided principally through government funding administered by the Ministry of Information, with staff salaries paid through the public system. Commercial advertising and sponsorship were described as supplementary rather than as the broadcaster’s principal source of finance.

Current official evidence strengthens the institutional side of that finding. TVK personnel are government civil servants working inside a ministry General Directorate, while Cambodia’s 2026 budget data are published at ministry and programme level rather than as standalone TVK corporate accounts. TVK does not publish separate publicly accessible financial statements from which a current revenue mix could be calculated.

Editorial independence

No independently enforceable framework protects TVK’s editorial autonomy from the Ministry of Information. The broadcaster has no autonomous governing board, independent editorial charter or external body identified as having the authority to audit its political balance and protect its newsroom against ministerial intervention.

The institutional relationship is explicit. In August 2023, shortly after becoming minister, Neth Pheaktra described his aim as modernising the Ministry of Information into a public-relations institution of the Royal Government and called for the state media institutions — including TVK, RNK and AKP — to play a more proactive and effective role in presenting Cambodia to domestic and international audiences. In 2024, the ministry signed a cooperation agreement under which TVK and the other state-media services would disseminate information about another ministry’s activities, mission and achievements.

An earlier attempt to introduce pluralistic programming at TVK illustrates the limits of institutional protection. The UNDP-supported Equity initiative began during the 2003 election period, while the weekly current-affairs programme Equity Weekly was developed later and was broadcasting regularly by 2007. It was produced jointly with TVK and designed to provide balanced treatment of governance and public-interest issues.

In November 2012, Equity Weekly was suspended following a programme about economic land concessions in Virachey National Park. The report had used archive footage from another location without identifying it as archive material, prompting a complaint from the Environment Minister. UNDP subsequently said that suspension had initially been suggested by the Ministry of Information. The presenter apologised on air on 11 November. Although the suspension was initially described as temporary, the programme was subsequently scrapped and its permanent termination was reported in March 2013. The episode involved a genuine production error, but it also demonstrated that an externally funded public-interest programme operating within TVK remained vulnerable to ministerial intervention.

AI and digital policy

TVK distributes news and programming through its website and associated digital and social-media channels. No publicly accessible TVK-specific editorial policy was identified governing generative artificial intelligence, synthetic media, automated production, verification of AI-assisted material or disclosure of such use to audiences.

Artificial intelligence had nevertheless become part of the wider Cambodian media-policy discussion by 2026. The national civil-society conference marking World Press Freedom Day on 30 April included a dedicated discussion on the role of artificial intelligence in the media, alongside sessions on media law and crisis reporting. Participants called for future regulation of digital media and AI to be developed transparently and in accordance with international human-rights standards.

No binding national framework was identified that establishes TVK-specific editorial rules for the use or disclosure of AI-generated journalistic content.

Classification rationale

TVK remains classified State-Controlled (SC), meeting all three conditions of the State Media Matrix.

It is predominantly state-funded. SMM interviews place government financing above the Matrix threshold, and current official evidence confirms that TVK operates as a government General Directorate staffed by civil servants. Advertising and sponsorship exist but have not been shown to displace government funding as the broadcaster’s main financial base.

It is state-owned and state-governed directly. TVK is a General Directorate within the Ministry of Information rather than an autonomous corporation. It has no separate legal personality or independent governing board, and its senior management and staff operate within the government administrative and civil-service structure. Khim Vuthy’s position as Director General is part of that ministry hierarchy.

Its editorial agenda is subject to state control. No independently enforceable editorial firewall separates TVK from the Ministry of Information. The government explicitly treats TVK as one of its state-media instruments, RSF finds Cambodia’s principal broadcasters aligned with the government line, and the Equity Weekly case demonstrates the vulnerability even of externally funded public-interest programming to ministerial intervention.

August 2026