Villagers take sawmill to task

Hundreds of activists partol Prey Lang forest for illegal loggers yesterday. Photo by May Titthara

A large pile of illegally cut timber awaits processing yesterday in Kampong Thom province’s Sandan district. Photo by May Titthara

Thursday, 29 March 2012
May Titthara
The Phnom Penh Post

Ouch Sam On, deputy governor of Kampong Thom province, dismissed the villagers’ claims that the trees had been felled illegally.

He said Seng Saravuth had a licence from the government to cut down the trees and “would not dare” to log illegally.

Kampong Thom province - Villagers patrolling Prey Lang forest claimed yesterday that about 600 resin trees they found inside a sawmill in the Kampong Thom province had been cut down illegally – an allegation government officials quickly denied.

After resistance from police and soldiers monitoring their actions this week, the villagers, a group of about 500 patrolling on some 250 motorbikes, were granted access to the Seng Saravuth sawmill company in Sandan district’s Meanrit commune after requesting to see the company’s licence.

Villager representative Chum Yin said the group, which comprises villagers from four provinces, had been shocked to see hundreds of resin trees inside the sawmill they suspected had been illegally cut down.

“I was very sad when I saw all those resin trees inside the company – there was about 600 trees,” he said.

Illegal Cambodian loggers add to tensions

16/07/2011
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.

Thais free seven loggers after two years in prison

Tuesday, 27 April 2010
Cheang Sokha
The Phnom Penh Post

SEVEN Cambodian villagers from Oddar Meanchey province were released from prison in Thailand on Saturday after being held in detention for nearly two years without trial, a provincial official said Monday.

Touch Ra, chief of the Cambodia-Thailand relations office at the Chom International Border Gate in Oddar Meanchey, said the seven men were among a group of 20 who were captured by Thai soldiers in May 2008 while logging illegally in the Dangrek Mountains in Thailand’s Sisaket province.

“They have been detained in prison without any trial for two years,” Touch Ra said. “They had been jailed since they were arrested, and after they were dropped off by Thai authorities, we allowed them to go back home.”

Touch Ra added that the men, aged between 21 and 36 years, hailed from Oddar Meanchey’s Trapaing Prasat district, and had not revealed whether they entered Thailand independently or at the behest of a timber dealer. Government officials say they have staged a crackdown on the illegal-logging business in recent months in response to an order from Prime Minister Hun Sen, who sacked Forestry Administration director Ty Sokun earlier this month for failing to effectively deal with the problem.Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Koy Kuong could not be reached for comment. Thai Ministry of Foreign Affairs deputy spokesman Thani Thongphakdi declined to comment, saying he had not received information about the case.

Loggers entering Thailand from border towns in Oddar Meanchey are frequently involved in confrontations with the Thai military. According to a report released in February by the local rights group Adhoc, at least 20 Cambodian civilians have been shot and killed by Thai soldiers near the border since the beginning of 2008. Thai officials have disputed the report’s findings.

Among the Cambodian loggers who have been arrested in Thai territory, 16 who were apprehended together last year received prison sentences of between six and nine years in Thailand’s Ubon Ratchathani Provincial Court in September.

In February, Thailand’s Surin Provincial Court sentenced six Cambodians to 27-month terms in a case in which Cambodian officials said they had been prevented from providing lawyers to defend the loggers by a last-minute change of schedule.

Govt to protest Thai court

Monday, 22 February 2010
Tep Nimol
The Phnom Penh Post

CAMBODIAN officials say they will file a complaint with Thailand’s Surin provincial court after it sentenced six Cambodians to prison terms on Friday for illegal logging.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Koy Kuong said Sunday that each of the six was sentenced to two years and three months in prison.

Cambodia’s plan to dispatch a team of legal advisers to Thailand on Friday were upset at the last minute when the provincial court said the trial had been rescheduled; however, the court then proceeded with the hearing after all, Koy Koung said.

“The Thai court told Cambodia that the six people had requested that they not be defended by lawyers, but we did not believe the Thai court. The Thai court has violated the legal procedure because in such a criminal case, there must be lawyers to defend the suspects,” Koy Kuong said.

On January 25, seven residents of O’Smach commune’s Akphivat village in Oddar Meanchey province reportedly crossed the Thai-Cambodian border to collect rattan.

"I am concerned about my wife and my baby, who may have to be born in prison."

Six members of the group, two of whom were pregnant, were subsequently arrested by Thai soldiers and detained in the pending trial.

Officials in Bangkok said Sunday that they did not have any information on the case and declined to comment. Officials at the Thai embassy in Phnom Penh could not be reached for comment.

Koy Kuong accused the court of deliberately passing false information in order to prevent Cambodian involvement in the villagers’ defence.

According to Thai law, Koy Kuong added, the villagers should not have received a jail sentence of more than 40 days.

“We are upset and we will file a complaint to Surin provincial court to reexamine the case,” he said.

Yam Pith, 32, the husband of Seung Kuok, a member of the imprisoned group who is three months pregnant, said that the sentence was excessive.

“I was shocked when my wife told me over the phone that she had been sentenced to two years and three months in prison – she was only looking for rattan,” Yam Pith said. “I am concerned about my wife and my baby, who may have to be born in prison.”

Na Rein, Banteay Meanchey provincial coordinator for local rights group Adhoc, said relatives of the imprisoned villagers plann to file complaints through his organisation this week.

Srey Naren, Adhoc’s provincial coordinator for Oddar Meanchey, said last month that the villagers had been collecting rattan in an undemarcated area along the border at the time of their arrest.

They had travelled there many times before without incident, he added.

“Thai soldiers have never arrested them there before, and we don’t know why they did this time,” he said, adding that Thai soldiers had been behaving “cruelly” towards Cambodian villagers in recent months.

There have been numerous incidents along the Thai-Cambodian border related to illegal logging and gathering firewood in recent months.

Since September, at least seven Cambodians have been shot and killed by Thai troops while logging illegally in Thai territory near the border with Oddar Meanchey province, government officials and rights workers say.

Nanh Sovan, chief of the Cambodian-Thai border communication team at O’Smach International Border Crossing, said he planned to meet with Thai officials on Wednesday to seek the release of the three prisoners convicted on Friday, including the two pregnant women, though a request for this was denied last week.

China's fifth column in Cambodia: The "crooks" are honored as "lords" by the king and named "senators" by the king adopted son's party

Cambodia Awards Ethnic Chinese With Respect, Trust

PHNOM PENH, July 13 (Bernama) -- The Cambodian government and people always respect and trust the ethnic Chinese living in the kingdom, as they have contributed a lot to the economic and social development, Kong Triv, one of Cambodia's four ethnic Chinese senators, told China's news agency, Xinhua, recently.

"The ethnic Chinese in Cambodia can stick to the tradition of working hard, remaining faithful and kind-hearted, and seeking harmony with other peoples, and this is the main reason that makes the mainstream society accept them as one part within," said Triv, president of the KT Pacific Group Limited, a top syndicate of the kingdom of timber, steel, cigarette and beverage production, real estate development and airport management.

After they make some money, they not only have it to themselves, but back-feed the society through helping the poor and donating to charities, which in effect earn them wide recognition, said the tycoon, who spends tens of thousands of U.S. dollars each year for education and social welfares.

"With business success and social contribution, the elite get promoted into the government and the parliament to help govern the country in deputy of the people, which is the top prize the kingdom gives to all the ethnic Chinese," he added.

Besides, the Cambodian government adheres to the policy of national reconciliation and attaches much importance to the role of the ethnic Chinese in the economic and social developments, said Triv.

Meanwhile, China is becoming stronger and more developed, thus providing a powerful lever for the overseas Chinese to perform their contributions to the countries where they stay, he added.

During his term at the Senate starting in January 2006, Triv said, he became one of the witnesses of the country's determination to have China as its trustworthy partner and the ethnic Chinese as one of its major constructive forces.

"We can see that a lot of strategic bridges, roads and power stations were and still are being built by Chinese contractors, which embodies the Cambodian government's trust in them," he said.

"Whatever difficulties Cambodia faces, China is always there to help us," he said, adding that his company also joined hands with China's mainland developers to process agricultural products and conduct real estate project in the kingdom.

Triv, who started out selling bicycles and trading various wares before war ravaged the country, now own or has shares in the country's pivotal industries.

"I do business like the ants and swallows, which can only harvest a little at time but will always keep moving on," he said.

Due to his exemplary role, King Norodom Sihanouk in 1994 entitled him as Lord, a supreme title for Cambodian civilians.

"As a senator and businessman, I will continue living up to my duty of participating in politics, contributing suggestions to the government, serving the ethnic Chinese full-heartedly, and promoting the development of the Cambodian-Chinese friendship and the bilateral economic and trade exchanges," vowed Triv, one of some 700,000 ethnic Chinese in Cambodia, which account for around five percent of the kingdom's total population.