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In the lead up to a meeting with international donors later this month, the Cambodian government has banned a report by the environmental group Global Witness. The report purports to show how family members and business associates of Prime Minister Hun Sen and other senior government officials are destroying Cambodia's forests.
Presenter - Bill Bainbridge Speaker - Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen; Eleanor Nichol, Global Witness campaigner
BAINBRIDGE: The sounds of chainsaws biting into freshly cut timber is the sound of money in Cambodia. The impoverished country has few natural resources to exploit but it does have large tracts of untouched forest that bring in huge revenue to what the Global Witness report alleges is "a kleptocratic elite that generates much of its wealth via the seizure of public assets".
But allegations that the friends and relatives of Cambodian Prime Minister have been plundering those forests have provoked fury among the government and which has put a ban on the circulation of the report in Cambodia.
Information Minister Khieu Kanharith released a statement saying the report's content was banned because it was politically motivated and therefore unacceptable to the government. Global Witness has been at odds with the government for years over its activities highlighted illegal logging in the country.
But despite the ban the UK based NGO is unrepentant.
Eleanor Nichol is a campaigner with Global Witness.
She says the most powerful logging syndicate in Cambodia, the Seng Keang Company, is led by three people with direct links to the government. One is first cousin to Prime Minister Hun Sen, another a close friend of the prime minister's wife and the third a man is the brother-in-law to the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and father-in-law of Director General of the Forest Administration.
NICHOL: Overall they have very good links right to the top of Cambodia's political ladder. There's also substantial evidence that.
Previously Hun Sen has staked his political future on his ability to prevent the destruction of Cambodian forests, as this excerpt from a Global Witness documentary shows.
HUN SEN (translator): If the logging companies don't listen then take away their licences. This morning I read the Cambodia Daily. It said that many companies won't obey the orders of the Ministry of Agriculture, just you try, if you aren't going to obey, just you try and if I don't take away your concession and shut down your factory I will cut off my own head.
But Global Witness says he directly benefits from illegal logging.
Elenor Nichol says international donors need to use the annual donor meeting set for mid-June to pressure the government into taking action on the reports findings.
Presenter - Bill Bainbridge Speaker - Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen; Eleanor Nichol, Global Witness campaigner
BAINBRIDGE: The sounds of chainsaws biting into freshly cut timber is the sound of money in Cambodia. The impoverished country has few natural resources to exploit but it does have large tracts of untouched forest that bring in huge revenue to what the Global Witness report alleges is "a kleptocratic elite that generates much of its wealth via the seizure of public assets".
But allegations that the friends and relatives of Cambodian Prime Minister have been plundering those forests have provoked fury among the government and which has put a ban on the circulation of the report in Cambodia.
Information Minister Khieu Kanharith released a statement saying the report's content was banned because it was politically motivated and therefore unacceptable to the government. Global Witness has been at odds with the government for years over its activities highlighted illegal logging in the country.
But despite the ban the UK based NGO is unrepentant.
Eleanor Nichol is a campaigner with Global Witness.
She says the most powerful logging syndicate in Cambodia, the Seng Keang Company, is led by three people with direct links to the government. One is first cousin to Prime Minister Hun Sen, another a close friend of the prime minister's wife and the third a man is the brother-in-law to the Minister for Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries and father-in-law of Director General of the Forest Administration.
NICHOL: Overall they have very good links right to the top of Cambodia's political ladder. There's also substantial evidence that.
Previously Hun Sen has staked his political future on his ability to prevent the destruction of Cambodian forests, as this excerpt from a Global Witness documentary shows.
HUN SEN (translator): If the logging companies don't listen then take away their licences. This morning I read the Cambodia Daily. It said that many companies won't obey the orders of the Ministry of Agriculture, just you try, if you aren't going to obey, just you try and if I don't take away your concession and shut down your factory I will cut off my own head.
But Global Witness says he directly benefits from illegal logging.
Elenor Nichol says international donors need to use the annual donor meeting set for mid-June to pressure the government into taking action on the reports findings.
11 comments:
My comments to Eleanour Nichol or whovever is running the GW organisation is that the GW report is very good in having exposed the corrupted clan of Cambodia.
Howerever, it did not go far enough to expose who are the end buyers of the timber .
The illegal loggers of Cambodia are the raw material suppliers, China and Vietnam are the manufacturers of consumer goods. And who are the buyers of these consumers goods? Were they IKEA (Europe), NEXT (UK) or WALL MART (USA) etc...?. If the report can reveal the identity of these big buyers, I am sure that the (western)public will stop buying their goods which in turn would give them pressure to stop buying the illegal logged timber. Then it could stop the demand of this kind of illegal logging and all these loggers will be no longer required.
Please be fair as there are always two sides of a coin...
They need to ban shit from entering their mouths. Their mouths are so sting and full of shit; everytime they open their mouths nothing good come out of it. It just a bunch of crap.
Dear 2:26,
100% correct! We need to ban the importation of any and all tropical hardwoods, since the source nations are simply too corrupt to manage their own resources.
2:26 and 3:41
If there are two sides to this coin, they both have Hun Sen's face on them. There is no comparison between a thieving government stealing the national wealth and western consumers buying lawn furniture. The problem is corrupt governments running the majority of the world's nations. But you may be right. The only solution seems to be to ban the importation of the fruits of natural resource extraction industries in much of the developing (read "corrupt") world.
I hear Hun Sen is complaining that foreign advisors get paid too much and do too little. He should consider the fact that these long-term tourists (as Hun Sen has rightly described them) are the ones who keep donor nations antying up by spewing their bullshit lies about how progress is being made to end corruption in Cambodia. True Mr. Prime Minister, they are a pack of weasels, but remember - they're YOUR weasels.
I hear ah Hun Sen is complaining that
foreign advisors get paid too much and
do too little. Ah Hun Sen should consider
the fact that he sometimes is psychopath.
True ah ill-bred Hun Sen is ah criminal
chief against humanity in Cambodia, but
remember - he's also the corruption chief
in Cambodia. The report of Global witness
show clearly about that.
Dear 2;26 PM,
You are wrong. There are no luxury wood are being sold at Walt-Mart in USA. The only hardwood from S/E Asia in Walt-mart store is rubber wood from Thailand in form of cooking material like microwave stand, food chopping blocks.. etc These rubber wood have been imported to USA for years, Thailand has been made million of $$ from scrapped rubber wood. Instead of export them so cheap to neihboring country, Cambodian corrupted officials should put their money into rubber wood factories. May be they don't want to do it, cutting Beng/Nearng Nourn is getting rich quicker?
pol pot kill people...but hun sen kill all trees....
All rubbishes must be banned.
1010pm , I am not wrong my friend and you are right to say that Wal Mart does not sell luxury timber. I was using Wal Mart as an example and asking who are the real end buyers behind this illegal logging?
If we can identify these big corporations, I am sure that they will be put to shame as they have been collaborating with the smugglers to destroy the environment. Hopefully, the heads of these collaborators would roll and we may see the end of the unecessary deforestation in Cambodia...
Well. I agreed with 5:46AM that "all rubbishes must be banned". My line of thought exactly. Ah rubbishes Hun Sen Family members/cronies should ban from Cambodia.
The HCM is waiting for them.
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