It is time Cambodia's donors changed their approach to dealing with Hun Sen's goverment (Global Witness, Cambodia's Family Trees)Mean Veasna, VOA Khmer
Original report from Phnom Penh
01/06/2007
Global Witness said Thursday top officials, including relatives of Prime Minister Hun Sen, were responsible for the destruction of Cambodia's forests, and donors had so far failed to stop them.
Cambodia's forests are being stripped clean by an intricate network of Cambodian elite, the forest monitoring group Global Witness reported Thursday, indicting in a detailed report a roll call of illegal loggers and smugglers and the men and women who abet them.
"Cambodia is run by a kleptocratic elite that generates much of its wealth via the seizure of public assets, particularly natural resources," Global Witness said in a statement published alongside its 96-page report, "Cambodia's Family Ties," on Thursday. "The forest sector provides a particularly vivid illustration of this asset-stripping process at work."
Global Witness, which was officially ejected from the country in 2006, spent more than three years investigating the networks of illegal logging. The resulting report, available in English- and Khmer-language versions on the group's Web site, extensively maps the individuals and companies involved.
The lucrative trade has steadily stripped Cambodia of its forest cover, but donor countries, who provide $600 million per year in aid to Cambodia, do not exercise their leverage to stop it, the group said.
The report points to Prime Minister Hun Sen, wife Bun Rany, relative Hun Chouch and others as complicit in the trade. Minister of Agriculture Chan Sarun and the director-general of the government's Forest Administration, Ty Sokhun, are also singled out, as well as Lt. Gen. Hing Bun Heang, head of Hun Sen's elite body guard unit, and Gen. Sao Sokha, commander of the military police.
Gruff officials denied involvement in the trade or deflected questions Friday.
"What business does VOA have?" Hing Bun Heang said. "I am not responsible for any news. What business does it have to want to see me? Go meet the Ministry of Defense's commander. Why does it come to meet me? I am curious, very curious. I don't understand why VOA wants to meet me. If it wants to meet for business, meet with the department commander, and it is finished."
Chan Sarun said some forest had been converted to rubber plantations, but according to a government plan for development. Small-scale illegal logging had also taken place, he said, but denied he was involved.
Ty Sokhun said the report's "sources of information are not correct."
Global Witness called on the country's judiciary to investigate crimes by top officials ranging from murder, robbery, smuggling, illegal wood harvesting and tax evasion. The group also called on donors to "proactively" ensure their aid benefits ordinary Cambodians while withholding support from government bodies engaged in criminal activities.
Illegal logging also funded Hun Sen's "private army"—an elite body guard unit of 4,000 and an entire brigade of soldiers—while providing millions of dollars per year to corrupt officials and their business counterparts, the group said.
Donors, meanwhile, "have not used the leverage that [their aid money] gives them effectively," the group said. "Specifically, they have refused to acknowledge the fact that the government is thoroughly corrupt and does not act in the best interests of the population."
Cambodia's forests are being stripped clean by an intricate network of Cambodian elite, the forest monitoring group Global Witness reported Thursday, indicting in a detailed report a roll call of illegal loggers and smugglers and the men and women who abet them.
"Cambodia is run by a kleptocratic elite that generates much of its wealth via the seizure of public assets, particularly natural resources," Global Witness said in a statement published alongside its 96-page report, "Cambodia's Family Ties," on Thursday. "The forest sector provides a particularly vivid illustration of this asset-stripping process at work."
Global Witness, which was officially ejected from the country in 2006, spent more than three years investigating the networks of illegal logging. The resulting report, available in English- and Khmer-language versions on the group's Web site, extensively maps the individuals and companies involved.
The lucrative trade has steadily stripped Cambodia of its forest cover, but donor countries, who provide $600 million per year in aid to Cambodia, do not exercise their leverage to stop it, the group said.
The report points to Prime Minister Hun Sen, wife Bun Rany, relative Hun Chouch and others as complicit in the trade. Minister of Agriculture Chan Sarun and the director-general of the government's Forest Administration, Ty Sokhun, are also singled out, as well as Lt. Gen. Hing Bun Heang, head of Hun Sen's elite body guard unit, and Gen. Sao Sokha, commander of the military police.
Gruff officials denied involvement in the trade or deflected questions Friday.
"What business does VOA have?" Hing Bun Heang said. "I am not responsible for any news. What business does it have to want to see me? Go meet the Ministry of Defense's commander. Why does it come to meet me? I am curious, very curious. I don't understand why VOA wants to meet me. If it wants to meet for business, meet with the department commander, and it is finished."
Chan Sarun said some forest had been converted to rubber plantations, but according to a government plan for development. Small-scale illegal logging had also taken place, he said, but denied he was involved.
Ty Sokhun said the report's "sources of information are not correct."
Global Witness called on the country's judiciary to investigate crimes by top officials ranging from murder, robbery, smuggling, illegal wood harvesting and tax evasion. The group also called on donors to "proactively" ensure their aid benefits ordinary Cambodians while withholding support from government bodies engaged in criminal activities.
Illegal logging also funded Hun Sen's "private army"—an elite body guard unit of 4,000 and an entire brigade of soldiers—while providing millions of dollars per year to corrupt officials and their business counterparts, the group said.
Donors, meanwhile, "have not used the leverage that [their aid money] gives them effectively," the group said. "Specifically, they have refused to acknowledge the fact that the government is thoroughly corrupt and does not act in the best interests of the population."
22 comments:
Since they part of the Khmer Rouge. They shall be fit into the ECCC in the future.
They are not guilty yet but they need to proove that they are actually not involve with this stuff.
Why is there so much Forest stories
in the recent days. Did I missed
something?
Pressure from the west, intervention from the east.
Do you understand 4:06AM, before I go for the weekend!
Come on 4:06AM,
Everything that we have today is tie to the Forestry. Life itself depends on the Forest. Everything on Earth is interdependent, nobody can survive alone.
The CO2--O2 Cycle and the Water cycle, and the weather systems dealt with Trees.
Do you know what happened with every degree of a Temperature rises? If a country cannot take care of its resources, it will haunt the world with the ecological disaster. You'll see more stronger storm than the Katrina or the Tsunami!
How much Flood & Drought do you hear of the neighboring country? IT'S NOT JUST ABOUT CAMBODIA THAT THE WORLD ATTEMPTED TO PRESERVE THE FORESTRY!!!! THINK ABOUT PEOPLE!
Yeah, but Cambodia is just an
insignificant dot on the planet,
4:51.
To ordinary Khmer people,
Heng Samrin, Chea Sim, Hun Sen, Hun San, Hun Neng, Sar Kheng, Tea Banh, Ke Kim Yan, Hok Lundy, Sao Sokha, Meas Sophea, Moeng Samphan, Kun Kim, Ung Samkhan, Chau Phirun, Chan Sarun, Mong Rithy, Ly Yong Phat, Ms. Phu in particular and the CPP apparatchiks in general must be brought to the ECCC for 5 counts: (1) Former Khmer Rouge lieutenants, (2) plundering Cambodia's assets and natural resources, (3) land grabbing, (4) actively involving in such organized crimes as intimidation, extortion, drug and/or human trafficking and killings and (5) serving Hanoi's interests.
All members of the CPP Central Committee, Ministers, Secretaries of State and all CPP provincial governors and deputy-governors are all thugs with no exception whatsoever. No honest and decent persons can stay and work with the CPP. There used to be some patriotic elements within this party long ago. Unfortunately, they were all purged.
How to get rid of the treasonous CPP? To this critical question, there is only one answer: PEOPLE POWER. Nothing else and I mean absolutely nothing else. No individual, no political party, no alliance, no movement and no clandestine army can do the job. Only People Power can.
Folks, please wake up to this reality and stop having hopes on such lunatics as Sam Rainsy, Norodom Ranariddh, Sisowath Thomico, Kem Sokha so on and so forth. These politicians will become thugs themselves soon after they win the top job. You don't need Albert Einstein to tell you this. Cyclomen and motorcycle taxi drivers in Phnom Penh streets know this fact, too.
5:42AM, did half awake when you write your commennt? It's nonsense -- you just had a brain fart!
The book that consists of both Khmer and Language are the witness that Mr. Chan Sarun and Ty Sokun can read and learn from that description...and others who have been mentioned their names in this book.
Global Witness has employed several professional specialists to do research the possible protection of the survival natural resources and the weak, poor people.
The details of this revealing has enough illustrated the evidence to carry out legal process to those perpetrators in Cambodia.
The book will be sent to store in every library throughout the world for researching purposes and references.
The world is really awere the accuracy of this four years research and revelation relating the deforestation of Cambodia.
Thanks Global Witness!
You got it backward, fool! We don't
need no watchdog (Global Witness)
to keep Cambodia from developes
the land to relief people from
poverty.
To 6:25AM from 5:42AM,
6:25AM, for decent and knowledgeable people, your objection to my comment did not count at all. Do you know why? Simply because you did not give your reason as to why you objected to my statement above. This is characteristic of ignorant people like you and your CPP masters.
Ignorant people don't have reason even though they have normal brains. Their way of reasoning is totally differnt from that of knowledgeable people. They have normal eyes, but normally they are blind. Why? Because they don't want to see. What don't they want to see? They don't want to see the truth. And why don't they want to see the truth? Because they are scared of the truth pretty much the same way as Dracula is scared of sunlight.
The truth will eventually put ignorant people back on the right track. Nevertheless, you don't imagine for one minute to be walking on the right track. Why? Because you know full well that you won't get even a toilet cleaning job in an open society where competition is so fierce due to the policy of free market economy, liberal democracy, transparency, good governance, check and balance, impartial and credible judiciary, bicameral legislature and the rule of law.
Therefore, your only job is to reject everything sensible and everything that leads to equality, human dignity, social justice, freedom and progress. You want Khmer people live in abject poverty so that you can practice the policy of men exploiting men, total submission to slavery and finally total domination and subsequently complete annexation by Vietnam. THIS IS THE ONLY THING YOU WON'T OBJECT TO. AM I RIGHT 6:25AM?
OK, 8:01AM, where did you get idea from that i am against the Bill of Rights from the context of your last paragraph? It's so easy to be name calling and finger pointing like we do it here in America.
You are calling "ignorant people", but let me elucidate a tat more what the word mean -- it means that the Ignorant People can be taught to learn. However, if I used the word "stupid" on someone -- it means equivalent to teaching a Jackass to climbing the palm tree.
We should stopped and asked ourselves what is wrong with the current Political Factions right now? What fails? The Cambodia Constitution is so weak & faulty. What makes one man above the laws & who should follow the law of the land?
IT WOULD BE A MIRACLE FOR KHMERS IF THE CITIZENS UNDERSTAND THE PHRASE "DON'T ASK WHAT YOUR COUNTRY CAN DO FOR YOU, BUT WHAT YOU CAN DO FOR YOUR COUNTRY!"
Least but not last, we (Khmers) will be always remained in the Dark Age so long as there are multilateral governments.
PEACE.
The only way that cambodia can change is by the people. the few corrupt cannot control the mass millions.
The Khmer rouge aka CPP also know as along as there's no mass killings, they will continue to plunder Cambodia. Pol Pot vision will come true. If you know what his visions was then you know what i'm talking about.
Messrs.3:51AM and 5:42AM,
ECCC is not the right venue to address this particular issue of deforestation raised by Global Witness.
I would suggest you explore the venue of the permanent people's tribunal which has been used to address verious issues so far.
Below is some idea on this particular tribunal.
LAO Mong Hay, Hong Kong
The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal is an international opinion tribunal, independent from any State authority. It examines and judges complaints regarding violations of human rights and rights of peoples that are submitted by the victims themselves or groups representing them. The Tribunal was founded in June 1979 in Italy by law experts, writers and other intellectuals. It succeeded the ‘Russell Tribunals’ –the International War Crimes Tribunal – which held two sessions in 1967 to expose the war crimes committed against the Vietnamese people. In 1980, the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal convened a Session on the Philippines to hear the case against the dictator Ferdinand E. Marcos, at the suit of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines (NDFP) and the Moro National Liberation Front (MNLF). It was the first international juridical body to condemn the US sponsored Marcos dictatorship. In recognition of the urgency of the appeal of the Initiating Group of Philippine organizations, the Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal decided to convene the Second Session on the Philippines.
Hmm ... sounds so corrupted!!
5:42am, people power alone still not working . The key is the military.If the ARMED FORCE joint with the mass, then the govt will collapse .In the 80th in Phillipine,the defense minister and the join chief of staff GEN.Ramos sided with the people,then what is next ,the MARCOS'S era doomed...
Can khmers copy the phillipine's revolution? don't know. The current regime in Cambodia will not removed by ballot period.
If Cambodia can preserve its remaining original forests, it will have something truly precious in 15 or 20 years.
Fuck You all whoever supported Ah One eye Hun Shit. Your brain are worst than animals.
Noope, we don't want no more two-
eyed leaders, we want "change".
Wow, what's a surprise? Timout
guys. We got enough of this forest
shits. Anyway, I have not checkup
on Iraq for months and months, and
I just bumps into one of the
lastest report on the Net. I can't
tell you how sad I am for the
Iraquis. Their country are totally
ruined. It is still gravely a
dangerous place to live. Thousands
and thousands died over the past 6
months or so, and there is no
sign of the dark cloud to move
out anytime soon. Is it wrong
to say that the Iraqis has been
cursed by their oils?
Here's the story:
http://www.examiner.com/a-759994~Mortar_Attacks_Kill_8_in_Baghdad.html
Dear KI Readers,
If anyone happens to know where we can download the PDF file from this Global Witness 's report, please advise.
Thank you.
Never mind, I found the PDF file dowloadable file.
Thanks anyway.
I just don't see how AH HUN SEN Vietcong slave can be charged with corruption because there are no laws to charge him with!
Is there anyway to pass anti-corruption law?
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