Environment and natural resources

Civil society groups yesterday hit back at the government after a Ministry of Interior statement released on Wednesday warned NGOs that they would be breaking ministry protocols on political neutrality by “directly or indirectly” supporting an unnamed political party or its protests. The Cambodia National Rescue ...

Early on Monday morning, at about 1am, two trucks carrying roughly 10 cubic metres of illegally felled timber were bouncing down the road between Oddar Meanchey and Siem Reap. Police stopped the trucks – one of which bore military plates – and seized the haul, but ...

Jarai ethnic minority villagers in Ratanakkiri’s O’Yadav district are demanding compensation from a villager they claim illegally cleared a sizeable portion of their community forest this year. The villagers seized two carts transporting rosewood – and the four buffaloes pulling them – out of the forest ...

City Hall has ordered all tourist boats and ferries operating on the Mekong and Tonle Bassac rivers to stock up on life jackets and prevent overloading as water levels continue to rise. “All drivers must turn lights on at night and all ferries must prepare ...

Diminishing populations of hoofed animals in Southeast Asia have hit Cambodia hard, with numbers of one of the Kingdom’s indigenous species dropping by 90 per cent. The current banteng census shows an 80 per cent drop in the world’s banteng population and a 90 per ...

A group of 12 ethnic minority villagers in Ratanakkiri province have filed a complaint with the provincial court over what they claim is collusion between other villagers and local authorities to illegally log luxury timber from 193 hectares of land inside a community forest. The Prov ...

Police and forestry officials in Siem Reap province discovered more than 10 cubic metres of illegally logged second-grade timber yesterday in two trucks, one of them bearing a Royal Cambodian Armed Forces licence plate. No arrests were made. Police were now looking into the origins ...

Rights group Adhoc will take a complaint filed against a commune police officer accused of colluding with illegal loggers in Ratanakkiri’s Lumphat district to the provincial court today. The complaint, which villagers in Lbaing II commune filed with Adhoc on Friday, alleges that commune police officer ...

One year ago today, Hang Serei Odom, a journalist in Ratanakkiri province, received a fateful phone call. After telling his wife he was going to meet a military police officer, he bid her goodnight. He left his house in Banlung City at about 7 p.m. ...

Provincial authorities in Siem Reap discovered a stockpile of rosewood weighing approximately 21 tonnes in Banteay Srei district on Wednesday afternoon. Tea Kimsoth, provincial Forestry Administration director, yesterday credited joint efforts made by the Forestry Administration and anti-economic crime police officials in discovering the wood stashed ...

Siem Reap’s provincial government apparatus, which in 2010 was relocated to a remote site 16 km outside of the city as part of an extensive and hugely controversial swap of government land and buildings, is moving back to its old home in the tourist city’s ...

Roughly 100 rubber farmers in Ratanakkiri province’s O’Chum district blocked National Road 78A on Wednesday, demanding that authorities take action against a pair of laborers they accuse of stealing resin from their land. The laborers—Math Las, 40, and his wife, Nos Yas, 38—who are reportedly employed ...

Logging has officially begun in Stung Treng province in preparation for the construction of a massive hydropower dam, but local authorities and villagers said Wednesday that the clearing of forest is going unchecked outside the official dam concession area. The Lower Sesan 2 dam was approved ...

The Cambodian government’s plan to build 20 dams along the Mekong River, with a view to boosting energy security, could harm food security and biodiversity in the region, as well as ignite a regional conflict over sharing of the river’s water, a conference has heard. ...

A storm on Saturday night killed one, badly injured two others and destroyed or damaged hundreds of homes in Svay Rieng province’s Rumduol district, officials said Sunday. Ros Pharith, provincial administration director, said a rainstorm with strong winds hit the prov­ince about 8:30 p.m. [Svay Rieng ...

The Pursat Provincial Court has issued a summons to a soldier based on the Thai border for allegedly clearing protected land in Veal Veng district, a move the man believes was orchestrated by a company owned by tycoon Try Pheap, which is embroiled in an ...

The third phase of a project designed to revamp Phnom Penh’s drainage system, currently inundated by seasonal rains, began yesterday. Four areas of the city spanning a total of 369,445 metres will be witness to the next stage of the project’s implementation, part of an ongoing ...

A raid on an orange plantation netted more than five cubic metres of illegally logged rosewood and other luxury-grade timber in Pursat’s Kravanh district on Friday, local officials said. More than 25 police officers, forestry administration officials and environment ministry officers conducted the operation, which found ...

The verdict issued Wednesday by the Ratanakkiri Provincial Court dropping the charges against a military police officer and his wife who were allegedly involved in the murder of an investigative journalist is a travesty of justice and a sign of impunity in the country, rights ...

A local Pursat province journalist filed a lawsuit yesterday against a group of wood traders who he alleges beat him up on Tuesday. According to [Krouch] Non [Santre commune police chief], Nhok Yern, a reporter for Prum Bayon newspaper, and another journalist confronted men trafficking wood by cart. ...

For the second time in as many weeks, an NGO has accused tycoon Try Pheap of facilitating illegal logging in a protected forest during the election campaign and post-election period, and with the protection of authorities. In a report set to be released today by the ...

Flash floods have killed at least 13 people and affected about 3,000 families in Cambodia since early this month, a disaster control spokesman said Wednesday. Four provinces being hit by floods are Banteay Meanchey, Preah Vihear, Kampong Thom, and Kratie, Keo Vy, chief of the Cabinet ...

A Cambodian provincial court today dropped charges against a military police officer and his wife accused of murdering a reporter investigating the country’s illegal timber trade, drawing protests from the journalist’s wife and from human rights and environmental advocacy groups. Hang Serei Oudom, a ...

A verdict in the brutal slaying last year of an investigative journalist in Ratanakkiri province is due to be handed down by the provincial court today following a reinvestigation into the case. Hang Serei Odom, 42, a reporter for the Virakchun Khmer Daily, was found hacked ...