Forests and forestry

The government’s Apsara authority will join forces with the Preah Vihear administration to establish a joint committee to prevent illegal logging and to manage state land in the protected areas around Koh Ker, officials said yesterday. ...

Patrols have resumed in the area of Preah Vihear protected forests where two forest rangers were fatally shot on November 7th, as police continue their investigation into the murders. The beefed-up patrols are taking new security precautions, and unarmed patrols have not resumed yet because ...

A steady stream of tractors loaded with timber clambered along the dirt roads heading out of the Phnom Aural Wildlife Sanctuary last week, some carrying cheap firewood, others loaded with more valuable logs. ...

Authorities in Mondolkiri province seized three vehicles packed with illegally logged luxury timber at separate locations inside the Snuol Seima Biodiversity Conservation Area in the space of two hours Saturday night but failed to apprehend any of the drivers. ...

An ethnic community in Mondulkiri province has rejected a cash offer from a company that wants to clear thousands of hectares of forest locals claim as their own, saying they value the land more than money. ...

The fate of 70 million people rests on what happens to the Mekong river. With world leaders meeting in Paris next week for crucial UN climate talks, John Vidal journeys down south-east Asia’s vast waterway – a place that encapsulates some of the dilemmas they ...

An estimated 30 to 40 cubic metres of protected luxury timber was intercepted in Ratanakkiri province on Wednesday night while being hauled to Vietnam, according to local officials. ...

Four Cambodians have been released and deported by the Thai authorities after they were detained for three months on charges of illegally entering the country to log rosewood, border officials announced yesterday. ...

Decades after poachers stripped the forests surrounding Angkor Wat of large mammals, an innovative conservation group is bringing them back. Already, Wildlife Alliance has rewilded the forest with gibbons and langurs. And more are coming. ...

A freshwater Mekong dolphin was found dead yesterday morning on a river bank Prek Prosob district, Kratie province, where only only about 80 Mekong dolphins remain, according to officials. ...

A group of 15 Cambodians was arrested in Thailand on Tuesday for illegal logging in the country’s Sa Kaeo province, a Cambodian official said on Wednesday. ...

Rubber and palm oil giant the Socfin Group has committed to a global “zero-deforestation policy” across Africa and Asia amid a legal dispute with ethnic Bunong communities in Mondulkiri province’s Bousraa commune. ...

After years of land-grabbing that has eroded a protected forest in Battambang Province, forestry administration officials took a forceful step yesterday to crack down on the problem. In the early hours of the morning, a team from the forestry administration alongside local police entered the ...

A mass eviction in Battambang province yesterday saw 100 locals kicked out of the Prey Tralach community forest, which local authorities claim was illegally inhabited and deforested by villagers. ...

Ten people, including a soldier, have been arrested over the murders of a forest ranger and a policeman who were investigating illegal logging in Cambodia, officials said on Friday. In the last few decades a surge in illegal logging has contributed to a sharp drop ...

More than 200 villagers living on the fringe of a giant hydropower project in Stung Treng province are lobbying for their commune’s police chief to be removed, alleging that he habitually confiscates illegally logged wood from villagers on behalf of powerful business interests. ...

Six men suspected of involvement in the weekend murder of a local police officer and a forest ranger in Preah Vihear province were charged Wednesday with illegal logging, while authorities continue to search for evidence linking them to the double homicide, a court official said. ...

Evidence of illegal logging perpetrated by Vietnamese lumberjacks in collusion with local authorities in Ratanakkiri’s Andong Meas district was submitted to a local rights group by an ethnic Jarai community yesterday. ...

Authorities in Preah Vihear province on Tuesday arrested a local soldier on suspicion of being involved in the fatal shooting of a police officer and a Forestry Administration ranger on an overnight patrol for illegal loggers early Saturday morning. ...

Several weeks after villagers on the outskirts of a community forest in Battambang Province began clearing trees and seizing land, forestry administration officials say there has been a lull in deforestation. ...

Settlers and rangers have cleared 200 hectares of Samlot Protected Forest in Battambang and Pailin provinces, according to local authorities and staff of the Maddox Jolie-Pitt Foundation, which is helping to protect the area. ...

Authorities in a northern Cambodian province on Monday rounded up six suspects for questioning in the killing of two officials and wounding of another who were on patrol in a preserved forest area, in the latest apparent confrontation between illegal loggers and officials, provincial police ...

A police officer and a Forestry Administration official were shot dead by illegal loggers in Preah Vihear province early Saturday morning in an attack that also left a second officer injured, according to a local official who gave two different versions of the incident. ...

Members of the Jarai ethnic community in Ratanakkiri province turned to human rights NGO Adhoc for help yesterday after briefly detaining alleged illegal loggers. ...