Ethnic minorities and indigenous people

Forest activists in Ratanakkiri province’s O’yadav district said on Thursday that a group of Cambodian and Vietnamese traders are colluding with officials and transporting timber from their community forest to Vietnam after they had illegally felled trees there early this month. ...

Some 100 ethnic Banong villagers from Sre Hoy commune’s Chhul and Chhong Pang villages in Mondulkiri province’s Koh Nhek district protested on Tuesday after Srepok Wildlife Sanctuary officials allegedly uprooted wooden posts used to demarcate their ancestral burial sites. ...

Indigenous people in northeastern provinces yesterday raised concern over wildlife sanctuaries that could be affected by the government’s plan to set up new provinces carved out from Mondulkiri province’s Koh Nhek district and Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat district. ...

In the letter seen by The Post on Thursday, villagers claim the companies representatives visited the commune to introduce the project’. But landowners claimed they needed the land to live and work on and pass down to their children. ...

The Mondulkiri provincial Environment Department launched a campaign among the Banong, Krueng and Tumpuon ethnic communities to create awareness about the importance of wildlife to the ecology and tourism sector. The communities live close to wildlife sanctuaries. ...

Villagers from the Tumpuon ethnic minority group in Keng San community forest are accusing the local authority and some community members of colluding with timber traders to illegally fell large trees and clear dozens of hectares of forest land in their community. ...

Villagers claim that rampant illegal logging is taking place at the Phnom Namlear Wildlife Sanctuary and local authorities are not doing enough to curb the activity. Every night about 20 to 30 lorries remove luxury timber from the wildlife sanctuary, which is fast depleting its ...

Over 50 families affected by the Lower Sesan II dam in Stung Treng province’s Sesan district have sent a letter to the provincial governor and prominent tycoon Kith Meng requesting a number of public service facilities for the community. ...

Over100 indigenous groups from eight of the Kingdom’s provinces asked the government on Thursday to grant them land concessions instead of forcing their relocation. Celebrating the 24th International Day of Indigenous People, the groups gathered under the banner of the Indigenous People’s Migration and Movement. ...

Two organisations aiming to restore indigenous land around the world on Wednesday expressed concern over land in Preah Vihear province after a major Chinese conglomerate began developing it with approval of the government. ...

The Hydro Power Lower Sesan II Company Ltd has agreed to build infrastructure for 70 ethnic Lao families in Srekor village who refused to relocate after the controversial Sesan II Dam project went online in Stung Treng province last September. The company said construction will ...

Thousands of families along the Sekong river were evacuated last week after the collapse of a dam in Laos led to a deluge in the district. A member of the Kavet ethnic minority, Ms Doung and her family were among 15 other families in Santepheap ...

Experts from the ministry examined the water in the river of Prek Te in Kratie and found chromium and cyanide. The substances were found at various mining sites between Kratie and neighboring Mondulkiri and the ministry believed that they were improperly handled and that rain ...

Ten representatives of Banong ethnic villagers from five districts in Mondulkiri were questioned for more than an hour by police on Tuesday for their attempt to seek intervention from Prime Minister Hun Sen’s cabinet over the loss of sacred land to 11 families. ...

Indigenous families in Kbal Romeas village who were displaced last year by flooding from the reservoir of the Lower Sesan II Dam in Stung Treng province have been given new homes and hope for a better life in a new village along National Road 78. ...

Nearly 20 people representing more than 100 families in Koh Kong province’s Thma Baing district yesterday gathered in Phnom Penh to submit petitions at various institutions requesting intervention to gain official recognition of the Chong indigenous people in Areng Valley. ...

Six ethnic Kuoy villagers, citing fear of arrest, refused to appear for questioning in Preah Vihear on Wednesday over the confiscation of four pieces of equipment being used to clear community land by a subsidiary of the Chinese sugar company Rui Feng. ...

A complaint filed at the Preah Vihear Provincial Court accuses four Kuoy ethnic villagers of goading some 70 others into confiscating tractors being used to clear community land by a subsidiary of the Chinese sugar company Rui Feng, which has been involved in a series ...

The German Ambassador to Cambodia supports the government giving land titles to indigenous groups in Mondulkiri province as a means of protecting natural resources. According to a press release from the German embassy, German Ambassador Ingo Karsten and Math Mara, secretary of state at the Ministry ...

Ratanakkiri provincial authorities yesterday denied accusations by a group of villagers that the authority of O’Yadav and Andong Meas districts hired ethnic minority villagers to cut the forest along the Cambodia-Vietnam border. ...

An ethnic Phnong community near Mondulkiri’s Sen Monorom town on Monday claimed that at least 80 hectares of forestland, which they have long depended on for their livelihoods, were covertly sold, with local authorities allegedly signing off on the sale. While the Phnong villagers from ...

Fifty-eight Phnong ethnic families in Kbal Romeas village, whose land was flooded late last year by the reservoir of the controversial Lower Sesan II Dam, are seeking at least 1,500 buffaloes from authorities and company representatives in compensation for their ancestral graves that are now ...

Families forced to relocate due to the construction of the Lower Sesan II Dam are asking Stung Treng provincial authorities to register their new village as indigenous collective lands. The 67 families from Sre Ko commune received authorisation to set up the new village on their ...

Rampant deforestation and development have increased pressure on animals throughout Cambodia. They’ve especially intensified in the country’s “spirit forests,” as the hill communities like the ethnic-minority Chong call them, which are some of the creatures’ last refuges. But the changes also threaten their culture, as ...