Viet Nam-Cambodia boost forestry co-operation [-More deforestation coming up?]

28/06/2012

VietNamNet Bridge – The Vietnamese and Cambodian forestry administrations signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to boost co-operation in the capital yesterday, June 27.

Accordingly, the two countries will enhance exchange of information, knowledge and experience in designing and implementing forestry-related strategies and programmes; strengthen co-operation in forest fire management, timber and wildlife transport and trade controlling, forest management and protection over a period of five years.

Moreover, the two countries will carry out activities to adapt to the changes of international timber markets to raise public awareness on forest resource protection and to better implement regional and international commitments towards forestry.

Top Ratanakiri forestry official replaced

Illegal logging in Prek Proloung commune, Prek Prasap district, Kratie province on 12 August 2009 (Photo: Or Phearith, RFA)

21 April 2010
By Ratha Visal
Radio Free Asia
Translated from Khmer by Heng Soy
Click here to read the article in Khmer

The ministry of Agriculture had replaced Youkan Vimean, its top forestry official for the province of Ratanakiri, after it discovered numerous illegal cases involving precious wood in the region.

The announcement of the replacement took place on Tuesday 20 April at the Ratanakiri provincial office under the presidency of Chan Savuth, the under-secretary of state of the ministry of Agriculture. Vong Sok Serey, another provincial forestry official, took over Youkan Vimean’s position.

Besides provincial TV reporters and photographers for the ministry of Agriculture, no other reporters are allowed inside the building to report this event.

Youkan Vimean said that he does not have a positive feelings about this replacement: “This is a re-organization of my department where there is a replacement of working officials.”

Vong Sok Serey declined to comment, claiming that he is busy in a meeting and that he just took over his duty.

However, an anonymous provincial official indicated that the replacement took place under order from Hun Xen in order to reform the local forestry leadership to provide efficient forestry work.

The same anonymous source indicated also that Vong Sok Serey was the former top forestry official for Stung Treng province. Youkan Vimean will be transferred to the forestry department.

Ratanakiri officials indicated that about 600 to 700 cubic meters of all sorts of precious wood logs were confiscated from various hiding houses, located both in farms and in the woods in all the province’s districts, starting form March 2010.

Pen Bonna, a facilitator and investigator for the Adhoc human rights group for Ratanakiri province, said that it is time for a replacement in order to reform the protection of forests which are destroyed by the thousands of hectares for private interest.

Pen Bonna said: “He is not the only one, it also involves authorities and local officials as well. In some areas, we received reports that logs are still being hidden there, and illegal logging is still taking place.”

Pao Horm Phan, the Ratanakiri provincial governor, asked the population to cooperate and report all instances of illegal logging to the authority so that they may be taken care of.

Pao Horm Phan said: “If they [public] see it, let them report to us. We are searching every day and the work is still in progress.”

For the entire country, report of illegal precious wood log confiscation indicated that about 3,000 cubic meters of logs were confiscated during police raids since the beginning of March. However, Pen Bonna said that several thousands of cubic meters of precious wood were illegally logged and transported to Vietnam along the international border gate in O’Yadaw district, and to other destinations inside Cambodia between January and March 2010. Currently, there are still several hundreds of cubic meters of precious wood logs hidden on farms and in businesses and private houses belonging to some of the local officials.

The plaintiff is accused: It only happens in Cambodia

Journalist summoned to court over photos

Thursday, 08 April 2010
May Titthara
The Phnom Penh Post

A JOURNALIST in Siem Reap province says he has been summoned to appear in court after he tried to photograph two Forestry Administration officials who were allegedly accepting bribes.

Keng Phon, a journalist with the Sthabna Cheat Khmer newspaper, said he had been ordered to appear before a court prosecutor today, after one of the officials he tried to photograph filed a complaint against him. The summons was unexpected, he said, because he had previously asked police to investigate the officials, and they had stopped him from doing his job.

“I am so surprised because I have filed a complaint to district police about the forest officials,” Keng Phon said.

The journalist said he tried to take pictures of the forest officials during a crackdown on illegal logging in early March. The officials, he said, had stopped three carts carrying timber out of a forest in Kampong Kleng commune.

Keng Phon says he saw the two officials accept a bribe of 40,000 riels (about US$10) each.

When the journalist asked the officials about the incident, he said, they grabbed his neck and deleted the pictures from his camera in a scuffle that lasted two minutes.

“After the argument, I filed a complaint with district police about the forest officials, who destroyed my documents and threatened me,” Keng Phon said. “But when I got the [court] summons, it wasn’t my complaint. It was from a forest official.”

Y Kosal, the editor in chief of the twice-monthly newspaper Sthabna Cheat Khmer, said he also has not received a response to a complaint he filed with the court.

“We are the plaintiffs,” he said. “We have become the accused.”

Suon Mengly, a provincial Forestry Administration official who Keng Phon identified as the complainant, declined to comment Wednesday.

Ty Soveinthal, the provincial court prosecutor who was named in the summons, also declined to comment.

Heng Sam Nang, the deputy police chief in Soutr Nikom district, said he received the journalist’s complaint and forwarded it to provincial police, who, he said, have already forwarded it on to the court.

The court complaints come as officials continue a country-wide crackdown on suspected illegal logging activity. The crackdown was sparked by warnings from Prime Minister Hun Sen.

More Than Half Original Forest Remains ... in Ty Sokhun corrupt forestry department's dreamland

Chea Sam Ang, deputy director of Forestry Administration.

More Than Half Original Forest Remains: Official

By Sok Khemara, VOA Khmer
Washington
27 February 2009

Cambodia has lost about 13 percent of its forest cover since the onset of the Khmer Rouge regime, with only about 60 percent of original forest remaining, a forestry official said Thursday.

“Based on a 2006 evaluation, there is 59 percent of the forest remaining, compared to 1970, when there was 73 percent,” said Chea Sam Ang, deputy director of the Ministry of Agriculture’s forestry administration, as a guest on “Hello VOA.”

The decline of the forest was from the growth of the population, he said, denying allegations of destruction of the forest and wildlife. Some wildlife thought extinct had even been found, he said.

Meanwhile, heavy fines and imprisonment of five to 10 years await illegal hunters and wildlife traffickers, he said. Preservation of wildlife needed the participation of the people, he said.

Chea Sam Ang applauded the government’s policy on forestry, despite worries from critics about deforestation.

“Hello VOA” callers said they had seen enough government preservation efforts in their areas, especially the provinces of Banteay Meanchey, Kratie and Ratanakkiri, where wildlife killed daily.