CNRP Lawmaker Visits Controversial Plantation
Opposition lawmaker Son Chhay said yesterday that he would ask the government to cancel the land concession of a Vietnamese rubber firm in Ratanakkiri province he accused of logging and exporting wood illegally. Mr. Chay, a candidate in July’s national election for the Cambodia National Rescue Party, wrapped up a three-day visit to Company 72’s rubber plantation in O’Yadaw district yesterday, during which he said he saw the firm’s employees logging inside thick, healthy forest. The country’s forest laws only allow concessionaires to fell forests inside their boundaries if degraded. … Human rights groups and local communities have long accused rubber firms operating in Ratanakkiri of illegally encroaching on ethnic minority land and clearing community forests vital to the province’s minority groups. …
