Forests and forestry

More than a dozen opposition party officials have accused Thailand of encouraging extrajudicial killings of Cambodians along the border. In a strongly worded letter sent to Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha on Monday, the Cambodia National Rescue Party MPs asked for an independent investigation into an ...

Thai soldiers shot and killed three Cambodian loggers and seriously injured a fourth last week after the group illegally crossed into Thailand from Preah Vihear province in search of valuable timber, officials said Wednesday. ...

The government’s apparent unwillingness to take seriously evidence of continued large-scale illegal logging orchestrated by the Try Pheap Group is “disappointing”, Global Witness said yesterday. A report released last week by the UK-based group titled The Cost of Luxury detailed evidence, collected during an eight-month covert ...

Four Vietnamese nationals were charged on Tuesday with illegally collecting first-grade logs from the forest after they were arrested while transporting the wood from Mondolkiri province’s border-hugging Koh Nhek district to Vietnam. ...

Minister of Agriculture Ouk Rabun yesterday dismissed allegations of large-scale illegal timber smuggling by the Try Pheap Group published in a report by UK-based corruption monitor Global Witness last week. Global Witness’s report, The Cost of Luxury, identified Pheap, a prominent tycoon and former adviser to ...

A recently elected village chief in Pursat province’s Veal Veng district, who was forced into another election by his rival, was arrested on Wednesday during the second poll. ...

In a new report, U.K. environmental rights group Global Witness places Cambodian timber magnate Try Pheap at the heart of a vast illegal logging operation driving the country’s rarest tree species to the brink of extinction with the collusion of government and military officials. “The Cost ...

Korea Forest Service (KFS) has been working to promote overseas partnership with Southeast Asia countries by aiming to expand afforestation by 1 million hectares by 2050 from 314,000 hectares in 2013. It established relations with Indonesia to collaborate in planting trees on 700,000 hectares, and ...

Representatives of communities across the country who have had their lives upturned by development projects yesterday called on the government to rescind the economic land concessions at the centre of their disputes. ...

Representatives of communities across the country who have had their lives upturned by development projects yesterday called on the government to rescind the economic land concessions at the centre of their disputes. ...

As Vietnam and Laos negotiate to enter a European Union trade agreement aimed at improving forestry governance, the EU – one of the world’s top timber importers – is urging Cambodia to join the scheme. ...

More than 100 cubic metres of luxury timber were found inside the Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary near a Vietnamese-owned economic land concession on Saturday in Ratanakkiri province, according to Adhoc and a local resident, who suspect the timber was taken out of the protected area. Nearly ...

Environment Ministry officials on Thursday found a cache of more than 400 pieces of illegally logged first-grade wood in Ratanakkiri province’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary, which the ministry oversees, and suspect officers from a nearby military police base of being involved. Thin Ngoal, the sanctuary’s deputy director, ...

Wildlife experts fear for the health of a migratory vulture from Central Asia after it was captured by villagers in Kampot province’s Teuk Chhou district and taken to a notorious private zoo. The Himalayan vulture, also known as the Himalayan griffon, which rarely visits Cambodia, was ...

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries saw at least 2,400 cases of forest- and wildlife-related crimes in 2014, of which almost 1,800 were forwarded to the courts, though fewer than 10 people were sentenced in relation to the crimes, ministry figures say. ...

The government seized more than 7,000 cubic meters of illegally logged wood last year, according to a report released by the Ministry of Agriculture on Thursday. ...

Newly released maps using U.S. satellite data show that Cambodia continued to suffer major deforestation in 2013, much of it in nominally protected forests and wildlife sanctuaries. In November 2013, the University of Maryland released what it said was the first study to combine a consistent ...

Members of a community in Preah Vihear province chased down a group of illegal loggers and briefly detained one of them yesterday, less than a week after the community accused the local wildlife sanctuary director of destroying their patrol station. ...

Authorities in Oddar Meanchey province found a haul of valuable luxury wood inside the luggage compartment of a passenger bus on Friday, but let the driver go although he later admitted to smuggling the wood. Chongkal district military police chief Un Kimseng said the Rith Mony ...

Illegal logging and destructive farming practices have archaeologists racing to rescue an ecologically crucial mountain and its hidden temples. Some 80 per cent of the forest on Phnom Kulen – one of Cambodia’s National Parks – has disappeared due to a combination of illegal logging, ...

Police in Kandal province on Tuesday confiscated a haul of wood, including a few pieces of precious rosewood, that was being unlawfully transported to Phnom Penh by the military for the construction of a Brigade 90 commander’s office. The commander has appealed to Royal Cambodian Armed ...

Police in Stung Treng province confiscated a truckload of illegally logged wood on Sunday and are investigating a Forestry Administration official who tried to take the haul off their hands following the seizure. ...

The Korea Forest Service on Wednesday signed a memorandum of understanding with Cambodia to prevent deforestation and degradation in the Southeast Asian country, government officials said Thursday. Under the MOU, the two countries will cooperate on United Nations-led REDD+ programs ― standing for Reducing Emissions from ...

A python escaped from the house of a government official and is on the loose in the Cambodian capital, a local newspaper reported Monday. It is the second such serpent to escape from the Phnom Penh home of Nhim Vanda, the first vice chairman of Cambodia’s ...