Forest activists say lives threatened

Two anti-logging activists who went into hiding yesterday have alleged that they received death threats from police because they set fire to logs cut from a protected area in Kratie province. The activists have been leading an increasingly confrontational campaign against Vietnamese firm Binh Phuoc Kratie Rubber 2 Company and others logging in the Seima Protection Forest. … Binh Phuoc Kratie Rubber 2 Company has a 10,000-hectare economic land concession in the Seima Protection Forest, formerly known as the Seima Biodiversity Conservation Area, the majority of which they were ordered to stop logging by Prime Minister Hun Sen last year. The order, according to district officials, was revised shortly after it was given, when Deputy Prime Minister Yim Chhaly intervened. Clashes between community forest patrols and loggers have intensified since, while vast swaths of forest have disappeared. …

http://www.phnompenhpost.com/2013040964966/National/forest-activists-say-lives-threatened.html