Indigenous Cambodians struggle against land concessions and intimidation

Cambodia's forests have become a battle ground between indigenous land rights and private interests. Photo credit: Alex Schwab

“The land concessions given by the Cambodian authorities to corporations, local and international, are mostly located in the territories lived in by the indigenous peoples. Some companies have received tacit agreements or accords from the government, some have not. As a result indigenous people have mostly lost the freedom and the liberty they have enjoyed for generations.”

By: Alina Mogilyanskaya
Source: Inside the United Nation Blog

Coinciding with the arrival of the Cambodian delegation to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues in New York on 7 May, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen issued a moratorium on granting new economic land concessions in Cambodia and called for a review of all existing ones. According to members of the delegation, who spoke at a UN event entitled “The Impact of Doctrines of Domination on Indigenous Peoples in Cambodia” yesterday, the Prime Minister’s move is a victory in the indigenous communities’ continuing struggle for recognition and legal rights.

“The land concessions given by the Cambodian authorities to corporations, local and international, are mostly located in the territories lived in by the indigenous peoples. Some companies have received tacit agreements or accords from the government, some have not,” said Vothy Samoeun of the organization Indigenous Rights Active Members (IRAM). As a result, “indigenous people have mostly lost the freedom and the liberty they have enjoyed for generations.”

Economic land concessions in Cambodia have been granted to corporations since the late 1990s, often to agribusiness and mining companies working in the eastern and northeastern regions where most of the nation’s estimated 200,000 indigenous persons reside. Indigenous community organizations and human rights groups have blamed these concessions for opening the door to illegal logging and mining, the eviction of thousands of farmers from their lands, and the economic and social dispossession of Cambodia’s indigenous peoples.

Meanwhile, since 1970, Cambodia has seen its forest cover decrease from 70 percent of all land area to a mere 3 percent. Showing aerial photographs of multi-thousand hectare tracts where trees of the Prey Lang forest used to stand, Phouk Hong of the Prey Lang Network said, “In Cambodia we call it, ‘the mountain has become bald.’”

The moratorium victory is significant but bittersweet, particularly in light of the intimidation that indigenous rights activists face. Just last month, well-known Cambodian environmental activist Chut Wutty was shot and killed by a military police officer. The incident happened in Koh Kong Province in southwestern Cambodia, while Wutty was investigating illegal logging with two journalists.

“The indigenous people are faced with a threat, physical as well as military,” said Samoeun.

Speaking to MediaGlobal, Neal Keating, a professor of anthropology at SUNY Brockport, explained, “In terms of the techniques of intimidation that are used, these vary quite a bit. There is a certain invisibility that is used as a force of intimidation for local peoples.” This invisibility manifests in a lack of transparency in the law regarding how economic concessions are granted and to whom.

“The use of security forces is also ubiquitous and there too, it’s not transparent that the security forces are members of the Royal Cambodian Armed Forces, or if they’re local police, or if they’re just simply hired security guards,” Keating continued.

According to the delegation, intimidation tactics have also included arrests, expulsion of community leaders, information blockades, as well as legal and military confrontations. Despite this, the indigenous activists have clear demands – including obtaining legal recognition of their communities, a cessation of illegal deforestation, and the right to participate in the management of the forests – and continue to organize around them.