Environment and natural resources

Two Mother Nature activists, who were released from prison yesterday, said they had been “robbed” of their freedom for the past five months after being arrested for documenting suspected illegal sand-bearing vessels in Koh Kong without evidence that they had committed a crime.​ ...

Businesses expect the establishment of Cambodia’s first marine national park covering seven coastal islands to boost tourism in the area, while government officials said yesterday it would not affect private development scheduled for the islands. ...

The kingdom’s first wastewater treatment plant will be built in Phnom Penh’s Dangkor district, with $27 million in assistance from the Japan International Cooperation Agency. Sam Piseth, director of the municipal department of public works and transport, told reporters on Saturday that the treatment plant would ...

The government announced last week the establishment of the country’s first marine national park, the Koh Rong National Park, which covers the Koh Rong archipelago off the coast of Sihanoukville. The new national park, set up by a sub-decree signed by Prime Minister Hun Sen, aims ...

The killing of three conservationists patrolling Cambodia’s biggest carbon credit project exposes the nearly insurmountable conflicts of interest plaguing schemes in which huge corporations such as Disney and Virgin Atlantic have invested millions of dollars, observers say. Military Police Officer Sek Wathana, Environment Ministry Ranger Teurn ...

Forest patrollers and rights groups are questioning why the Oddar Meanchey Forestry Administration has yet to take action after a soldier transporting illegal timber allegedly beat and threatened to kill a patroller last month. ...

Cambodia’s first marine national park was established yesterday, seemingly replacing and expanding upon a marine protection area established for the Koh Rong archipelago in 2016. ...

Military police, forestry administration officers and Wildlife Alliance officials on Wednesday raided a house in Pursat province used to facilitate the illegal wildlife trade, seizing nearly 80 kilos of snakes. ...

Kampong Speu provincial anti-economic crime police and Thporng district police yesterday morning seized six tractor loads of timber being smuggled out of the Phnom Oral Sanctuary. Kim Yon, deputy district police chief, said six homemade tractors were caught transporting the wood from the area. ...

The value of logs and sawn wood exported from Cambodia to Vietnam last year increased by about $31.5 million compared to 2016, customs data has shown. The Vietnamese data, obtained by Khmer Times yesterday, said about 163,071 cubic metres of Cambodian logs were imported to the ...

Human rights representatives from NGO Adhoc and the United Nations have been asked to intervene in a land dispute between villagers and an army lieutenant they say was granted a land title illegally inside a protected community forest in Oddar Meanchey province. ...

A Cambodian representative to the Mekong River Commission (MRC) said yesterday that new guidelines for hydropower development agreed to late last month don’t fully address threats to the health of the imperiled waterway. ...

Kampong Thom provincial police raided a wood workshop hidden in the forest in Sandan district on Sunday morning. District police chief Oung Maly said the workshop was built illegally and had no licence for operation. ...

A 55-year-old Vietnamese man was charged by Kampong Thom Provincial Court yesterday for illegally clearing more than six hectares of land in a protected forest. Provincial military police officer Keo Savoeun identified the suspect as Nguyen Duc Nhan, an excavator driver for a Vietnamese rubber plantation ...

Stung Treng provincial authorities on Friday shut down an illegal sand dredging operation on the Sesan River and confiscated equipment after having warned the company to cease operations since December, officials said yesterday. ...

Authorities in Ratanakkiri’s Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary seized a stockpile of first- and second-grade luxury timber on Saturday, while a truck hauling wood was intercepted by authorities in Kratie province in the early hours of yesterday morning. No arrests have been made in either case, authorities ...

Five more suspects have been arrested and are being interrogated by authorities in relation to the murder of three forest patrollers last Tuesday in Mondulkiri’s Keo Seima Wildlife Sanctuary, authorities confirmed yesterday. ...

Police in Mondulkiri province yesterday arrested a military officer who is a suspect in a shooting that killed three people during an operation to crack down on illegal logging. ...

Police in Mondulkiri province have arrested a military official who is a suspect in a shootout which killed three people during an operation to crack down on illegal logging. ...

As authorities yesterday searched for officials suspected of killing three forestry patrollers in a brazen ambush near Mondulkiri’s border with Vietnam, families, friends and colleagues struggled to make sense of the sudden deaths of their loved ones. ...

A Royal Cambodian Armed Forces member, backed up by seven of his fellow soldiers, allegedly attacked a community forest patroller and threatened to set him and his family on fire for confiscating illegal timber, according to the patroller. ...

An environment-monitoring working group from the Environment Ministry and the Council for the Development of Cambodia plans to meet with the owners of nearly 50 special economic zones across the country to promote standards on environmental protection and liquid waste management. ...

An Environment Ministry ranger, a Military Police officer and an employee of a conservation organisation have been killed in a shootout with other Cambodian authorities near Mondulkiri’s border with Vietnam. ...

Tbong Khmum province police on Sunday arrested a man carrying both journalist and military credentials for allegedly illegally transporting rosewood, police said. ...