Wassana Nanuam
Bangkok Post
The felling of Siamese wood by Cambodian loggers could erode the already fragile relationship between Thailand and Cambodia.
Reports of Cambodians secretly crossing into Thailand to cut the trees are worrying 23rd Ranger Task Force chief Thanasak Mittraphanon, whose unit is already burdened with its mission to monitor the 4.6 square kilometre overlapping border around the World Heritage-listed Preah Vihear temple.
The illegal loggers are cutting the trees because the price of this wood has risen 100,000 baht a cubic metre, Col Thanasak said.
He believes they cut the trees almost daily.
Known by Thai locals as mai phayung, the wood is highly sought after by furniture makers for its hardness, resistance to insects and beautiful patterns.
The largest market for Siamese wood logs is China. The tree species is abundant around Preah Vihear and nearby areas in the Phanom Dongrak mountain range.
Thai military rangers have been ordered to take careful action when they spot Cambodian poachers in Thai forests.
"We shout at them," Col Thanasak said, explaining how the officers expel them.
This method works sometimes, he said, but if they still continue to cut the trees, the rangers have to make arrests.
In the worst case, some loggers open fire at the officers who then cannot help but react in kind to protect themselves.
But the military response has become a concern for Col Thanasak as the issue may further weaken Thai-Cambodian relations, which are sensitive following the border dispute near Preah Vihear.
5 comments:
So the Thai military are being civilised and disciplined as usual, only firing back in self-defense after having been shot at by unarmed civilians? Sound familiar?
If those Khmer civilians had weapons they would not have sustained such high incidence of deaths (11 dead reported) and several injured casualties whilst the Thais have reported no casualties. Worse, this unpleasant incident has escaped the Thai media's attention until now.
Moreover, what was the Thai rangers' motive for burning a Khmer victim in a similar incident a while back? Was it to rid of physical evidence or to set an example for others?
Why hasn't any of these deaths and atrocities committed by the Thai military been reported by the Thai press or media? Some facts are inconvenient?
It is little wonder then that the Thai public has no clue about what has been done in their names in relations to Cambodia except maybe a handful of individuals who make that extra effort to find out the truth for themselves.
I would urge the Cambodian authorities to demand full justice for their citizens regardless of the circumstances in which they had been victimised by the Thai rangers. It's possible that the Thai military unit in question took revenge on those Cambodian civilians simply because unlike the Cambodian military these unarmed people made for a lot easier targets.
Kouprey
again, what map did siem refer to? phnom dangrak and areas near preah vihear temple belongs to cambodia forever, you know!
siem stole a lot of lands from khmer, these areas belonged to cambodia since ancient time, ok!
everytime siem thugs open their mouths, it's a shame because they were the one who stole from cambodia, not the other way around, you know!
Siamese wood? isn't there other name they can instead of Thai this Thai that. can you imagine if all the khmer temples were in Thailand they would have called them Thai temples rather than what they currently call Khmer temple as Hindu temple.
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